The Holidays Continue...with Family!

MY FAMILY CAME TO ITALY FOR CHRISTMAS!

Well, not ACTUAL Christmas, but we've established in previous years that we can have our traditional Christmas festivities on days other than the 25th. This year, we proved we could keep traditions alive even on another continent!

We stayed in the Farmhouse (my home of last semester) for a week, spanning our late Christmas (Dec 27), my birthday, and new years. It was was perfect.

We weren't able to get a christmas tree, so Emma made one out of felt and ribbons and packed it in her suitcase! It fit perfectly in the window, and once we added the lights I bought in France and the presents Airport Security didn't decide to unwrap, it was (yet another) lovely little (makeshift) tree!

I was too wrapped up in Christmas to take photos. Sorry! Same with my birthday. We can rely on Emma and Chris for those I think. (side note, i just typed "Emma and Christ." It really was nice of Christ to take photos of us while we celebrated his birthday...)

Moving on! On New Year's Eve we spent the day in Florence! (I didn't bring my camera so the rest are ipod photos) Emma and made a distinct effort to see the sunset from the Ponte Vecchio:

Before it got too dark we headed up the Piazzale Michelangelo to see the view from up there. (Are you remembering these spots from earlier blog posts???)

We thought that view looked like Africa a little.

Here's the city as the sun is setting:

And after the sun has set:

Emma, Chris, Tate, and I spent the night in the city, getting to ring in the new year at public parties that were happening in EVERY piazza in Florence! We made lots of friends from lots of different places and drank until our frozen hands didn't bother us any more!

Here is a really cool building outside of which we began our evening:

Alas, no photos from the New Years festivities.

HOWEVER, on January 2, we headed to Rome to do a bit of sight-seeing there. Em and i wandered through Trastevere and down by the bank of the river. She gets credit for pointing out this sight - where 3 bridges are visible simultaneously:

As we have learned, lots of Italian cities like to put up Christmas lights along major streets. Rome's are by FAR the best. Via Corso, the biggest central street in the city, was draped with a never-ending river of green, white, and red (conveniently both festive and nationalistic!)

Seriously, it went on forever:

And thus concludes my oxford-comma-filled post, and the saga that was my holiday season! Happy 2012!!