I'm Never Moving Again...

...for at least 3 more years. Now that we have received our last shipment of boxes from home we are finally settling in and making our apartamento a home.  I'm so happy that we don't have to move for another few years.  Here is the slow transition of our kitchen:

The day we signed the lease

Movers just left the boxes scattered

Slowly but surely unpacking everything we own and probably don't really need

Sherman helped unpack too

And now we are finally settled....ahhhh.  Just looking through these pictures makes me tired from the move all over again.

 A side note about Italian kitchens:  Almost all kitchens in Italy don't come with a sink, stove, cabinets, oven, etc. Most Italians move their WHOLE kitchen unit with them when they move from place to place.  So when you move in somewhere new you get to choose which room you want to be your kitchen and which you want to be your master bedroom.  So almost all kitchens have doors...and are about the same size as the master bedroom.

La Dolce Vita

One of the best and the worst things about the Italian culture is their constant search for "la dolce vita" which is translated as "the sweet life."  Italy is truly an alternate universe where money and careers come secondary to love and leisure. As a general rule it seems they try to limit ANYTHING that interferes with this philosophy.  Is it any wonder why the Italians live longer than us? I'm starting to think they are on to something here and it is us Americans who are living all wrong.

Jon and I enjoying the sweet life at a wine tasting in the country of  Slovenia

But for this American this way of life can sometimes be extremely frustrating when I'm used to a culture where everything is available 24 hours.  Here are a few frustrating charming examples of the Italian relaxed way of life:

1. From noon to 3pm EVERYDAY  every store/pharmacy/ business closes for nap time.  Although I agree that I am jealous from an employee stand-point; it is very frustrating coming from a culture of everything being available 24/7.  When calling a hotel to book an appointment last month I was given the manager's phone number to inquire about their dog policy.  The receptionist quickly and sternly warned me not to call between noon and 3 pm because the manager will be napping. Hee hee. It just makes me giggle how frank they are with their nap time. I picture a man in a business suit snuggled up with his blankie.  Living the sweet life means being stress-free and well-rested!
2. "Domani" has to be one of the most used words in the Italian language.  The word means: tomorrow.  They say it for EVERYTHING. If you call your landlord for a repair you get: "Si, domani" which usually ends up being 2 weeks.  You ask the grocer when they will start carrying red onions? "Domani"  which then usually means never.  Living the sweet life means never being hurried.
3. The month of August is practically a national month of vacation.  Literally.  Businesses and restaurants completely shut down so everyone can go on a month long trip to the beach or mountains. When we moved into our house we had to rush everything because after the second week of August all of the moving companies, our landlord and our realtor would be on their 30 day vacation.  Jon and I marveled how the restaurants wouldn't just stay open and just rotate their employee's vacation to keep a cash flow?! I guess who cares about business financials when you are living the sweet life.
4. Nothing is rushed here.  As anyone who has traveled through Europe knows, it is nearly impossible to get a waitress to acknowledge your presence or take your order within the first 15 minutes after you sit down at a restaurant.  They think it is rude to interrupt diners and will only come over if you grab their attention.  No service industry is rushed.  A few days ago I spent 4 hours waiting on the electrician to come to our house and fix our major issues (No heat! Fridge isn't working! Smoke coming from guest bathroom lights!)  When I finally got a hold of him he said "Oh. I forgot."   No excuses.  He just kind of laughed and then said "Domani?"  I have to say I wasn't even that mad.  His honesty was refreshing.  His phone had been off when I called because he was napping.  Ahhh....the sweet life!
5. The Italians take food extremely seriously here.  (I know, I know...that is kind of a "duh" statement.) But if you dare NOT FINISH your plate you will almost always get the same response from the waiter who will look truly hurt: "Why don't you like it?"  They are honestly concerned if you didn't just have the dining experience of a lifetime at their tiny mom and pop cafe.  I am always so filled with guilt that I end up making everyone at the table help me finish if I can't complete on my own. I don't want to insult anyone.  The sweet life is taking true pleasure in your food.  

Ok.  So this was a really wordy post mostly because  the electrician who I mentioned in #4 is finally here fixing my house problems and I'm bored of watching him.  ( Domani, which literally translates to tomorrow, only equaled 2 days this time! Not bad at all! )  When I showed him the smoke that comes out of our guest bathroom lights his face lit up with a solution: he flipped on the bathroom fan.  Hmmmmm....the sweet life may also need to include fire insurance and a new electrician.

Surgery Road Trip

While Mom was visiting we spent the majority of her trip taking Jon to have his knee surgery in Landstuhl, Germany. Only a mom would consider flying across the world to spend her "vacation" taking care of her son-in-law.  The drive to Landstuhl from Vicenza is 9 hours (11 hours on the way back due to snow and windy roads in the Alps) so we tried to make stops on the way to explore Germany and break up the trip.

Our first stop was at the Neuschwanstein castle, built by the mad King Ludwig.  If the castle looks familiar it is because Cinderella's castle in Disney World was modeled after this monstrous place.  Unfortunately, dogs were not allowed in the castle (yes, I asked) so Sherman had to stay in the car when we took the tour.  

Our next stop was in Munich for some frosty steins at the famous Hofbrauhaus. By the end of the night mom and one of the locals were carrying on a great conversation and laughing together.  The lady didn't speak a word of English and mom can't speak a word of German.  Maybe our political leaders should schedule their next NATO summit at the Hofbrauhaus.  I bet a lot of the world's problems could be solved.  Just sayin'.

"Prost!"

Finally we arrived at the Ramstein Air Force Base and it was just like stepping into the ol' USA!  The Air Force is spoiled!  They have a mall! A Macaroni Grill! Starbucks Coffee! And best of all.....CHILI'S!  Jon and I almost wish we hadn't seen how other military posts live because now our post in Italy looks quite sad and neglected.

What is that glow? Heaven?  No, its Macaroni Grill.  And yes, we know we live in Italy...but the truth is, Americanized Italian is better.  Just like how, in my opinion, Tex-Mex is better than Mexican food.  The truth hurts.

So after all of our adventures to get to the hospital in Germany- Jon had his surgery and everything went great. Before Jon went into surgery they told him he wouldn't be allowed to leave after the procedure until he peed, ate, walked (with crutches)  and drank something.  Well, Jon being the impatient overachiever we all know and love, they were wheeling him out of the surgery room and he was telling the doctor in his anesthesia haze that he was already ready to eat, drink, pee and walk.  The Doctor just laughed and said "Ummm...why don't you just relax for a bit."

This purple gown was amazing! It blows hot air throughout the gown so the patient can control their  temp and never be cold in recovery.  Every hospital needs these!  Jon just wished it came in a more manly color.

So now he is healing up nicely at home (the army gave him 30 days paid leave!) Before mom left to go back to the States she gave Jon a bell to ring in case he needs me.  Jeez. Thanks. Mom. 

Prince Jon

Buon Compleanno!

In an effort to catch up for my lackadaisical blogging lately I will try to update events of the past month through the next few posts.  Starting with my birthday! My biggest birthday present was that my mom came to visit!   We picked her up from the airport and then went to dinner at a restaurant that used to be the home of Galileo ( the famous astronomer and scientist).

Galileo's wine cellar...while he temporarily lived near Vicenza.

The day after my birthday was my mom's birthday so we took a mother-daughter day trip to Venice complete with shopping, wine, venetian glass purchases and of course a classic gondola ride through the canals.

cruisin' through the canals

 Mom kept saying "This is the best birthday I have ever had.  How did you know I have always wanted to visit Venice??"  I kept reminding her that Jon getting stationed by the army in Italy was not part of my elaborate master plan to make sure my mom spent her birthday in Venice. But it was fun to pretend for the day.

Venice: a city without cars

When we arrived back to Vicenza, Jon surprised us with a bottle of wine from my favorite vineyard complete with a personalized birthday message for mom and I from the winemaker!

Personalized birthday message for us! Thanks sweet husband!

It was by far the best bottle of wine I have ever had and one of the most memorable birthdays for both mom and I.  How can we top this next year?

Gobble Gobble!

This was my first year to have major responsibility for Thanksgiving. Luckily my mom was visiting to hold my hand (and an extra spatula) through the whole process. We went over to our friend's house to celebrate the holiday since everyone over here is without their family as well. It makes for an interesting combination of traditions (Should the TV stay on or off during dinner? Who here knows how to carve a turkey? Should thanksgiving be at 1pm or 6pm? No prayer??) We all had different ideas of what we considered a traditional Thanksgiving with 2 Hawaiians, 3 Northerners, 3 Texans and a guy from Florida. In fact, I would say one of the only traditions that seemed unanimous was stuffing yourself into a food induced coma.

The day before Thanksgiving we headed to the American grocery store to gather our necessary ingredients only to discover it had already been completely picked over.  No milk, limited butter, no cream cheese, no cheddar cheese.  So we were forced to brave the Italian markets to find our American staples for Thanksgiving.  As you see below, I had to buy 4 different types of  "formaggio" in an attempt to find something similar to cream cheese.

Which one was what we would consider cream cheese in the states?? The one on the top left.  I'm still not sure what the heck the bottom right cheese is supposed to be.  I had a 1 in 4 chance. 

Thanks NB and Aunt Janet for the Bubba Corn recipe! It was a hit as you can tell!

  

My annual pumpkin roll also made it's first Italian appearance.

Overall it was a very successful Thanksgiving! We had a 32 pound Turkey for 9 people which allowed each of us 3.5 pounds of bird. Mom and I made the cranberry/orange relish, pecan crumble cake, pumpkin roll, sweet potatoes and the Post family's traditional "Bubba Corn" named after my great grandmother. I have to tell you, there is nothing quite like a bunch of Yankees and Hawaiians asking for "More BUBBA corn, please!" We brought them a little taste of the South for Thanksgiving :)

Home of the Brave

Lately we have thousands of soldiers from our post returning after spending the past year in Afghanistan.  This month has been the first time I got to meet most of my friends' husbands because they have been gone for 12 months.  Our military post is small- so you can really feel the energy and patriotism buzzing all around with the majority of our soldiers returning.  In fact, tomorrow the first living recipient of the Medal of Honor since Vietnam is being awarded to a soldier from our tiny little post!! So you might see Vicenza on national news this week! 60 minutes was here last month filming the medal recipient at one of my favorite pubs! (Yes, it is an Irish pub in Italy. Best of both worlds.)

 Some of our 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team returning...

To their anxious families.

Anyway, I was searching today online to find a video of my friend's husband's homecoming this week and I stumbled upon one of my favorite YouTube videos of all-time. I figured I would share it in (delayed) honor of Veterans Day last week.  I dare you not tear up. 


 
There is plenty to be thankful for this Thanksgiving.

They Grow Up So Quickly...

Sherman turns 1 today!  In honor of my lil' man here is a tribute to his jam-packed first year of life! In his first year he has been to 4 countries, traveled in 3 planes, 4 boats, 10 trains and countless car rides..and he's always a "good boy!"

Sherman doing his best Julie Andrews in The Sound Of Music impression in the hills of Austria

Time for a nostalgic trip down memory lane from pictures I have taken in the past year on my iPhone:

Here we are leaving the parking lot where we bought him out of the back of a lady's truck. We bought him in Sherman, Texas and named him Sherman.  No one has ever accused us of being creative. 

Sherman's first surgery.  If you look closely you can see his toy that he got stuck in his "cone of shame" and he was coming to me for help in this picture. So pathetic. 

Jon was gone for the army during Sherman's first 4 months.  I made signs to send to Jon from Sherman...and then  Sherman ate them.

This is still his favorite thing in the world. Look at the pride in his face when I discovered his mess! Toilet paper is his drug. He can't get enough. We just think he is a winter dog and likes everything to be snowy. 

First Haircut.  And consequently, my first lesson to not allow my mom to take him to the groomer alone. 

Aggie Pride. ( I promise I'm not someone who likes to put clothes on my animals.  I can't help it if my dog doesn't like to be naked. )

 So today we are heading to the Hofbrauhaus in Munich to celebrate his birthday.  Unfortunately he is still too young to drink so we will have to leave him at the hotel while we go out to celebrate.  Maybe on his 3rd Birthday- after all, he will be 21 in dog years then.  Cheers!

When It Rains, It Pours

I should have known something was about to happen when I saw all of the animals begin to pair up two by two...

On Sunday it started raining, on Monday the entire military post closed at noon due to flooding, on Tuesday we were trapped downtown.

It turns out that not only was 3 days of rain the cause of our natural disaster, but the snow melting up in the Alps also contributed to the biggest flood in decades.  We were lucky because our building only had minor flooding and we live on the 3rd floor.  Besides, this building has survived for 600 years...a little water won't hurt anything! Some people down the street weren't so lucky as seen in this youtube video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvxkAI39i10&feature=share

 On a positive note I got to wear the green rain boots that Jon insisted I would never wear. That is our house on the left.

.

And we got to see the Polizia bring out their amphibious tanks to survey the damage

What you can't see in this picture is the park bench that is underwater at the bottom of the stairs

    But even through the floods the signs of Fall are gorgeous.

From Kuwait, With Love

Our stuff finally arrived!! After a FOUR MONTH long sabbatical from Dallas to Kuwait, Kuwait to New Jersey, New Jersey to Germany and then finally Germany to Italy! All of our boxes were LOST in Kuwait for a few months... (Insert your own government efficiency joke here) but we finally got the call that our stuff had arrived!!!

                      Origin: Kuwait  Destination: USA...........Fail.

 

This is how the packages arrived BEFORE we "opened them" 

Is there no tape in Kuwait to reseal opened boxes? Jeez. 

Medical supplies? Really? Not all of the boxes delivered were ours.

Somewhere there is Doctor opening a box in a hospital and

instead of gauze and needles he will find my Ugg boots. 

 Is that a tire track mark across my dress??? What happened here?

I'm so happy I dry-cleaned Jon's dress shirts

before the move (notice the yellow dry-cleaned tag).  

All of our stuff arrived covered in sand from Kuwait. 

You can't make this stuff up.

It has been a long week because our washer and dryer takes 4.5 hours to complete a load.

Let's Dish!

I discovered a gem! Come to find out- 30 minutes from my doorstep is the ceramics capital of Northern Italy. Nove is a tiny little town at the base of the alps where you can't throw a stone without hitting 5 ceramics factories.  Ceramics originally didn't sound interesting until I found out that American companies like Williams-Sonoma and Tiffany & Co order their "Made in Italy" stock from this tiny town.  Which means..........WHOLESALE!!!!!!!!!!  4 dinner plates that would cost $172 in the United States are only $28 here!

Ummm...yes, please?  Tiffany & Co cheaper than Target!

Coming out of the kiln

Where your dishes are born~       hand-painted in an Italian warehouse

This might be what Martha Stewart's heaven looks like: floor to ceiling serving dishes!

Jon is mad that I'm blogging about this place because he was planning on giving out Tiffany & Co serving dishes for Christmas and never mentioning Nove's factories.  But in true girl fashion- I can't help but share with EVERYONE when I discover a great deal!

As a side note, since many of you have inquired privately, my own dishes etc have still not arrived yet.  No word from Kuwait on their whereabouts.

It's in my blood

They say you can take the girl out of Texas, but you can't take the Texas outta the girl.  Well...the same can be said for the car business. Yes, this Post girl moved half way around the world and STILL found a car dealership to work at.  How you ask?  Well, like how all of my ventures begin....it started over drinks.  Jon and I started talking to a guy at an Italian bar who runs the dealership on base, I mention that I grew up in the car business and next thing I know I'm selling Ford trucks in Italy.  It's in my blood I guess. My Grandfather Pop would be so proud...selling cars on an army base.

It is just part-time, filling in when the main guy is out. So I worked there full-time the past 2 weeks while he was on vacation. After practicing my lines of "What's it going to take me to get you to drive away in this car today?"  you know what?     I actually sold one!  (but he custom ordered  his car and it will arrive in Italy in 3 months---living in Italy is all about delayed gratification)

Yup that's the car dealership trailer  and the one car on the lot. Nothing but the best for our soldiers. (Most of the inventory is in Germany on bigger military posts)

I'm also starting my job at the online travel guide company.  My first freelance assignment is....get this....review all of the local restaurants, bars and beauty salons. Yes, I'm getting paid to go out to eat and have drinks.  So tonight Jon and I are headed to one of the new restaurants in town to take pictures and taste their food for a review I'm working on.   Then we are headed to a wine bar...you know...for RESEARCH  : )

I will let you know when my first assignment is published!

Happy Birthday Loren!!

My amazing cousin Loren turns a quarter of a century today! I hope you have a great day and drink a mojito for me at dinner! muah! 

Since you refused a gift from me this year I will show you what I WOULD HAVE bought you (you know...if I was in Dallas)

Brand new Christian Louboutin heels

 

  a new Balenciaga bag

                       and a brand new Michael Kors watch

Oh well...maybe next year....

Checkmate!

We went to a live chess match the other day- which many of you have already made fun of us for doing. But it wasn't just watching people play chess...it was a show! The history is that in this town a Lord had a daughter who had 2 suitors who both wanted her hand in marriage.  The suitors were going to duel till the death; but the Lord instead suggested a chess match instead.  The winner would get his oldest daughter and the loser would get his youngest daughter (poor youngest daughter! jeez!).  So now every 2 years the town of Marostica (45 minutes from us) hosts this huge chess match in their main piazza and recreates the story of their historic chess match.  It is like the Medieval Times on steroids only with real castles involved.

Lighting the chess board on fire!

Raining fireworks off the Marostica Castle (built in 1312)

It was b.y.o.w. (bring your own wine) which made for a very rowdy chess crowd (oxymoron?)