Barcelona

Jumping back several weeks... In mid-march our wonderful friends, Jordan and Jessica Rocke flew over the ocean to see us. We miss the Rockes "like the flower misses the rain" and it was so good to spend a whole week with them! It was a week filled with board games, fun outings and a 32 hour trip to Barcelona. I've been wanting to see Barcelona, Spain for many years and it was so fun to share that with the Rockes. It was fun to practice my Spanish again, and I was thankful how quickly it came back to me!

Eating traditional tortilla española

La Sagrada Familia is a famous Cathedral in Barcelona started in 1882 by an architect named Francisco de Paula del Villar and continued from 1883-1926 by the famous architect, Gaudi. Since then many different architects have continued building the Cathedral, which is still not finished to this day. It building of the Cathedral is funded solely by donations. The Sagrada Familia was one of the most amazing buildings I've ever been inside! It was like stepping into a fairyland or a scene from The Lord of the Rings.

View of Barcelona from the top of one of the towers.

Half-way down the spiral staircase that we had to climb down. Fortunately there was an elevator going up...

Ben enjoying a delicious chocolate cake.

Famous rooftop chimneys of a Gaudi apartment building.

Another famous Gaudi building

Inside a gothic cathedral. Very different form the light, airy feeling of the Sagrada Familia.

We got lost wandering to the beach on the second day and thought we had found the famous Columbus statue. (above)

The actual Columbus statue...much bigger and more impressive than the one we thought was the statue...

Barcelona beach- beautiful, but chilly in March!

Isaiah's 18 month pictures

Ben took some great candids of Isaiah just waking up... priceless!

A couple of his "official" 18 mo. photos...

Isaiah with Grandpa & Grandma McCoy

Family picture- not the greatest with the bright sun, but we tried!

Venice

Well, it's been a while since I've posted an update, but at least I have a good excuse... If you haven' t heard through the grapevine... we are expecting!! The baby is due October 26, 2011. Isaiah was due October 26th, 2009- what a fun that our first two are due exactly 2 years apart! The first trimester was pretty terrible, but we made it through and I'm feeling much better :) This week we are at 17 weeks and I've been feeling the baby move now for about 2 weeks, which is so wonderful! In all the business of staying all day next to a toilet I wasn't quite up to blogging, so we are going to be back-tracking a bit, and we'll start with Venice.

In February, Ben took me to Venice for the weekend to celebrate out Valentines day- very romantic :) The great thing about Europe is that you can, very affordable, do things like "going to Venice for the weekend." There is a great, cheap airline called Ryan AIR that flies discount, so we got out tickets in the neighborhood of 25 euros a piece...not bad! We even left Isaiah with some good friends here, so it was our first real "vacation" solos.

The famous Accademia Bridge- build as a temporary bridge in the 1930's, the locals liked it and never took it down.

There are no cars in Venice, so our main activity was walking. We literally walked almost the entire city a few times over. All the guide books said that the best thing to do was to wander around and "get lost." It's not that big, so you aren't really ever that lost. We had a great time exploring little neighborhoods, churches, small shops, etc. Venice was different from all the places we've been, which was great! Walking around at night was so peaceful because everything was very calm; no car noises, the gentle lapping of the water as we crossed our 200th bridge...really very serene. Doge's Palace was another highlight. It was simply enormous! The biggest disappointment (aside from the food...we always struggle to find good food in Italy...) was the "famous" bridge of sighs. It is a tiny bridge that prisoners used to cross and take their last look at the beauty of Venice (hence the "sighing"), but for all its hype, it was really very uninteresting and TINY! I didn't even take a picture of it... *sigh*

It was fairly chilly, but we still couldn't resist the occasional gelato...

Doge's Palace at night

The Famous Rialto Bridge

ONU Italy style

Masks for Carnival- We missed Carnival by about 2 days

Our hotel

A guy celebrating Carnival a bit early- the second day we were there, we saw several people walking around in costumes and masks for Carnival.

Eating delicious pastries

One of the many tiny bridges

Famous pink street lanterns

Laundry Day

This is what happens at our house when there are no clean clothes left in Isaiah's drawer... by the way, he added the Baseball jammies (like a cape) of his own accord...