Play Time

I've been playing around with a couple of pictures. I don't know anything about actual quality photo editing so I'm sure there's a much better way to have fixed these, but oh well :p What do you think?

Can you tell the difference between these two?


This one is even more subtle. We were out of focus so I tried to sharpen it up a bit.


Sorry, I know that's a lot of us to take at once, haha.

Buon Giorno! (Part 1)

For our first anniversary Hot Cup and I decided to take a trip to Italy and we loved it! I think Hot Cup plans to tell you all about it on his blog, so I’m just going to share some pictures :)

Venezia

> The Grand Canal in the morning, from Ponte Rialto.

> One of their only remaining bridges without sides or rails. The pink building behind it is the guest house we stayed in.
> Ponte Rialto
> More Venice

Firenze

> View from Piazalle Michelangelo. Ponte Vecchio is on the left. The tower in the center belongs to the Palazzo Vecchio. The Duomo is the enormous Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore on the right.
> The nearly 700 year old south doors of the baptistery. See if you can tell what the panels depict. I'll tell you at the end of the post :) As always, click the picture to enlarge.
> The Duomo from its Campanile
> Galileo’s tomb, Machiavelli and Michelangelo are also among the well known people buried inside the Basilica di Santa Croce.

> View from the top of the Duomo’s Campanile. The church with the marble façade that stands out on the left is Santa Croce. On a hill on the right you can see the Piazzale Michelangelo - you can barely tell but there's a bronze replica of the David in the center of it.
> Ponte Vecchio is an interesting landmark. The bridge is full of shops that have only housed goldsmiths and jewelers since all other merchants were kicked out in 1593.

Pisa

> The details of the pulpit that is in the basilica. There is another impressive pulpit in the baptistery that was made by the father of the man who did this one. Can you tell what's depicted here? Some of this is easier than the baptistery doors were so have a guess and I'll tell you below.
> The basilica and leaning tower, taken from inside the baptistery.

Stay tuned to find out what other cities we visited :)

The Baptistery Doors: The top 20 panels depict events from the life of John the Baptist. The bottom 8 panels depict the 8 virtues.

The Pulpit: Left Panel: The annunciation of Mary, the visitation of Mary to Elizabeth, the birth and naming of John the Baptist. Right Panel: The birth and washing of Christ, the annunciation to the shepherds.

Hint: Escape From _______

If you know what country we're in (at Busch Gardens) then you know what country we'll be in (for real) in a week!

Chef Hot Cup

I love Hot Cup's yummy cooking! Sometimes I take pictures, and I'd probably have shared them before but taking good pictures of food is hard. On Sunday he made this delicious Valentine's Day dinner:

bacon wrapped chicken with chili cheese sauce; fresh asparagus; roasted potatoes

I didn't take a picture of him making dinner on Valentine's Day, but here he is another day:


Everything he makes is perfect and super delicious! I probably 'let' him cook too much, but I don't think he minds, and I'll be making all the meals soon enough. And I try to be a helpful chef's assistant. And I cook sometimes too, I promise!

Snow & Ice

Our walk on Sunday to borrow a shovel.


The icicles keep getting longer.
>Yesterday at 2 PM
>Today at noon (look how far it goes below the rail!)

Isn't the mid-storm vs. sunny difference amazing?

Merry Christmas!

Hot Cup has been teaching himself to play the piano and brings you this Christmas song:

Toward the end you can see he's a little conscious of being recorded, he can really play it perfectly.

Snowed In

I was quite happy to spend a couple of days at home with my husband. Some highlights from our weekend:

>Decorating the tree (we still need to get a topper)
>Playing the piano
>Shoveling snow
>Making a gingerbread house (although we didn't finish that until today)



Here's a few pics of the tree. We were having fun experimenting with the camera settings :) Which is your favorite?
>Indoor
>Night
>Star lights
>Green accent


We didn't have a shovel but a neighbor had two and let us borrow one. Hot Cup helped with the car he was working on at first and then they both, and a couple other guys, helped with ours. I stood around feeling useless (there weren't more shovels!) and ended up talking a bit with a couple of other girls. It was the most I've talked to any other residents here.