I am behind on updating our blog, but I blame it on trying to spend quality time and soak up every minute of summer with the kids and not behind a computer screen! That being said we had the best summer ever...like ever! Ryan keeps saying I will say that every year and I hope that is true! We went on several vacations throughout the summer, but this was the big one! We, once again, had a detour that was not expected. We have semi bad luck when it comes to flying. We boarded and de-boarded our flight from Charlotte to Philadelphia twice only to board a 3rd time and sit on the runway for an hour. I guess due to weather in Philly they kept pushing us back. Needless to say we missed our connecting flight and ended up in Philly at 11:30pm with no where to stay and no luggage. We found a hotel and slept in the next morning and Ryan headed back to the airport while the kids and I had breakfast, in our pjs that we luckily had packed in our book bags to sleep on the red eye flight we were planning to be on. We got on a flight leaving at 6PM so we decided to make the most of it and check out the city of Philadelphia!
The favorite part of the city was the Mint. When the kids were learning about money and how to count it last year in school, they also learned about where it is made. When we asked what they wanted to do Bobo remembered that there was a Mint in Philly and asked if we could go. They absolutely loved it! It was a little boring, but interesting in my opinion haha!
We also had to eat some Philly Cheesesteaks while we were there!
The hotel let us have a late checkout and brought us all the stuff we needed to take a shower and freshen up.
This time we made it on the flight!!!
I think we finally have this travel and red eye flight thing down!
And we made it to Italy!!! First stop Venice! Ignore the fact that we all still have on the same clothes!
Our private water taxi was the best way to start the day! We arrived early morning so we had a great full first day.
"Mommy I know I have 100 purses, but please just one more."
We checked into our house and then starting hitting up the main spots! The twins loved everything about this unique and gorgeous city.
First order of pasta and seafood was a hit!
This first day was full of wide eyes, hand holding, coffee, gelato and walking.
Ryan and I have been to Venice together, but one new thing we wanted to do was to go to the top of Fondaco dei Tedeschi for the 360 view of the city. This was seriously cool! We made a reservation so we didn't have to wait in a line and every single view was incredible!
Every night we would wind down with appetizers and apreol sprits sitting along the canal people watching.
We showered and got dressed up for a gondola ride and dinner.
Ellie loved this!! She had this smile on her face the entire time. Bobo immediately fell asleep and we woke him when we got to the Rialto bridge so he wouldn't miss the entire thing. We try to be flexible first 24 hours in a new time zone. If they are tired let them take a cat nap, but try your best to power through the first day so you can get on the right time schedule!
Or just chug coffee and fill the kids up with sugar energy!!
One of my favorite things about traveling with these guys is they are the best at meals....and up for trying anything!
Bobo is not usually a pasta guy, but he loves carbonara!
While we were waiting on dessert and finishing our wine Ellie decided to take her cat nap:)
And then there is this...this view was spectacular. While we may not have the best luck with flying, we make up for it in places to stay! We had several of these windows in our rental that opened up to the canal.
At night Ryan and I would play cards and share wine while sitting on the windows. The kids loved it too!
The next day we went to Murano and Burano, both islands in the Venetian Lagoon. This was such a fun thing to do with kids!
We walked to the ferry and stopped at a bakery by our rental on the way. The kids loved the fresh orange juice each morning.
We had a private glass blowing demonstration in Murano.
I have nothing to do with this, but they literally hold hands everywhere:)
Murano is known for their glass and Burano for their lace. They both have beautiful buildings and delicious risotto!
A friend gave me the idea (thanks Traci) to let Ellie pick out a lace handkerchief, which we will keep and monogram for her wedding day.
The colors of the buildings in Burano are so fun!
Back at our rental we relaxed and freshened up for dinner. Ellie drew this memory of her and Ryan watching boats go by in her travel journal as her favorite thing about Venice.
And this may be my favorite picture of them on the trip.
Waiting on our ride....
We took a water taxi home and decided to turn it into a sunset cruise! Every time we turned a corner in the canal we would see a better place to take a selfie...in the end they all turned out good!
I wish I could transport back to this exact moment. This is usually what we do on vacations after the kids go down.
The next morning we taxied to the airport to pick up our car which Ryan would drive for the remainder of the trip.
This didn't take long:)
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