March 19, part 2

I wasn't able to add any more to that post, so I'll just start another one!

Still in Pisa, walking through the town...

orange building for Hannah

Some Roman ruins

What's that just past Chris' head?!?!

 

 

There it is!!!!

I have to say, it IS pretty impressive and cool. It's just so odd. You can climb it, but kids under 8 aren't allowed, and Chris wasn't so keen on taking Liam up (even though Liam reeeeally wanted to!) They only let 30 people up at a time, so the wait was pretty long.

See! There's a picture of me!

We kept trying to get the "holding up the tower picture" (this was the wrong side...whoops!) but it was hard to get far enough away to get the right perspective. You aren't allowed to walk on their pristine green lawns, and that's where you needed to go!

Sketching the tower with Grandma

Pushing the tower over

We didn't realize how lucky we were in our timing. The tower has been closed and wrapped up for restoration for quite some time, and only opened up again late in 2010. Here's a picture of the before and after in cleaning and restoration.

The church and bell tower (the leaning tower is actually the bell tower of the church)

The Arno river in Pisa

All in all, we really enjoyed Pisa and were so glad we went. We had thought of going on to Luca after Pisa, but it was enough - we'd done enough walking and we were all tired, so we went back to the train station and went home. I was so proud of the kids - they did A LOT of walking that day!

On the walk back to the apartment, Hannah really had to go to the bathroom, so I took her into a little pizzeria to use the bathroom (the world is your oyster when you have an adorable little girl in tow! Actually, business owners have been very gracious letting us use their facilities!)


Papa waited for us while everyone else carried on home. Since we were no longer in a rush, we decided to stop at the flower stall nearby to get some flowers. The kids have been taking turns picking them out (Grace picked some calla lillies, Katie picked a bunch of Gerbera daisies) Today it was Hannah's turn and she picked out some orange roses. The lady at the flower stall didn't speak any English, so I muddled through. She suggested another arrangement that was more masculine for Babo (Grandpa) but Hannah was quite insistant on the orange roses. She was so excited! After they were wrapped up and we were on our way, she was just bursting with pride and could hardly contain her joy carrying these flowers down the street!

Hannah and Babo

It was so sweet when we walked home (only another 2 blocks or so) Everyone was commenting on "the beautiful flowers for Babo" I thought all the little old nonnas were going to burst!

 

So thrilled!