Gluttony and Other Virtues
Santuario della Verna I really don’t know what my fascination with St. Francis is. I was raised Southern Baptist and we didn’t do saints and such. But for some reason, St. Francis strikes a chord with me. Maybe it’s because he was all over this part of Italy. Maybe...
We’ve Been Busy – In a Good Way
When we decided to take this fantastic journey, one of the things we were looking forward to was sharing it with friends and family. So we took on the apartment upstairs to use for visitors. After seven weeks of preparing, organizing, and planning, we hosted our first guests. Tim...
The Simple Life is a Lot of Work
We thought we were moving here to simplify our lives. No more (real) work, no more schedules, no more responsibilities. Just carefree days of doing what we want when we want where we want. While that’s largely true, our dream of simplicity is a little complicated. We have no...
Day Trippin’
We’ve been a little housebound for the past few weeks due to various issues and situations. We had expected to take many day trips while we’re here and we’ve really been itching to get out. We finally got out recently and took two trips. One to Deruta and one...
There’s Red Sauce in My Future
I’m on a mission to use every one of the tomatoes Piero the gardener gave me. I refuse to let even one of them go to waste. I’ve done all the usual things, like caprese salads and panini, and now am ready to take on some major things. Our...
The Upsides of Pandemic Dining
Most of you know that Italy got hit pretty hard early in the pandemic. I think because of that, they are very cautious about how they proceed. Almost everyone wears a mask and you can’t go into stores, offices, or restaurants without one. They still limit the number of...
Nesting, Italian Style
We’re almost finished doing battle with the Italian bureaucracy. We thought we would be done last week, but, alas, if there can be a monkey wrench thrown into something, we will find it. We went for our final appointment in Sansepolcro to get our permesso di siggiorno. It was...
Buon Compleanno!
Saturday was our dear friend, Anna’s, birthday. To celebrate, she invited her family and us to dinner. We felt very honored to be included in this group, even though out of the 10 people there, only four spoke any English (and two of them were us!). It was a...