Archive | weekend

a hike up Mt Etna, our local volcano

August 22, 2012 at 3:35 pm

This past weekend was Elliott’s last time to adventure around Sicily with his sister before she and Sarah leave on Friday. To make the most of our time together, we went to a beautiful beach in a nature preserve on Saturday and then headed to the slopes of Mt Etna on Sunday.

Do you remember our super eventful, super long hike up Mt Etna last summer? The volcano erupted right as we reached the highest observation point! This was also after we’d been showered with huge chunks of volcanic ash right before we our hike. But today Etna had only lovely vistas for us today… no hot lava or flying ash. Sorry, Jess and Sarah!

We drove up to the southern station on Mt Etna and then parked just beyond all the restaurants and souvenir shops. An unassuming trail veered off to the right from the tiny parking lot, and we followed it for about an hour up undulating trails of soft volcanic ash. After about an hour we reached the edge of a massive lava flow, which is pictured above. Doesn’t it look like Mordor?

Jess and Lena went to explore a nearby atmospheric research station. Then Sarah helped Jess get rid of a worrisome blemish on her shoulder.

Jess and Sarah headed up the volcano a little farther to see a plaque Jess had read about in the guidebook. Along the way they came across a flock of goats grazing on the hillside. Sarah took a stunning photo of them.

We stayed behind to smell the flowers.

Although this hike was a little less eventful than our hike last August, I think we’re more likely to choose this route again. We’ll take you if you come and visit!

4 :: in hiking, Sicily, visitors, weekend

a hike up Mt Etna, our local volcano

August 22, 2012 at 2:35 pm

Jess and Lena went to explore a nearby atmospheric research station. Then Sarah helped Jess get rid of a worrisome blemish on her shoulder.

We stayed behind to smell the flowers.

Although this hike was a little less eventful than our hike last August, I think we’re more likely to choose this route again. We’ll take you if you come and visit!

4 :: in hiking, Sicily, visitors, weekend

that time we went to Greece

July 2, 2012 at 3:20 pm

There’s a whole story behind our last-minute, semi-harrowing journey to Crete last week, but I’m going to save it for tomorrow when the four loads of laundry are no longer calling my name. There are some lovely pictures to share of a magnificent island, and I’ll also tell you what’s like for your plane to lose an engine halfway across the Mediterranean!

In the meantime, I have a wonderful article I want to share with you: Constraint and Consent, Career and Motherhood. Kate Harris, Executive Director of the Washington Institute, wrote a response to the much-discussed Atlantic article Why Women Still Can’t Have It All. Kate’s perspective is insightful and encouraging, especially as she writes as a Christian woman who works part-time as she mothers three pre-school-age children full time. Read Kate’s article and be encouraged and inspired to use the constraints of motherhood to figure out your true calling and passions.

As I muddle through volunteering as a nurse, developing my skills as a homemaker, blogging somewhat regularly, knitting with a purpose, I wonder where in there lie my true passions, now gently and firmly constrained by the presence of little Lena in our lives. I think of two of my friends who are going back to school (taking classes at home) to become midwives while raising their young children. I think of other bloggers who have studiously developed their writing or design or photography skills while nursing young bodies or homeschooling young minds. I think of many published authors who have written during nap time as they crafted their life’s work. Wherein lies my deepest passion? How can I refine my vocation and pursue the sweetest calling of all, all to the glory of God?

2 :: in good reads, thoughts, travel, weekend

that time we went to Greece

July 2, 2012 at 2:20 pm

2 :: in good reads, thoughts, travel, weekend

a trip to the beach

June 1, 2012 at 3:00 pm

Very, very spontaneously, Elliott and I decided to go away to the beach this past weekend. The decision was made when Elliott was looking at hotels online, and when I asked him why, he said, “For Memorial Day weekend.”

This was Saturday night of Memorial Day weekend.

The hotel he’d found, though, seemed perfect. Glowing reviews on booking.com, lovely pictures of gardens, famously delicious meals in the hotel restaurant, and just 100 feet from the beach.

“Let’s do it!” I said. “You said you wanted a getaway to a white sand beach. We can go tomorrow afternoon and come back Monday.”

And so we did!

Hotel Villamare was fabulous; I think we’ll go back if we can. White sand surrounded a bay of turquoise water, although unfortunately the scenery was marred by a lot of seaweed. (We missed the annual seaweed clean up, which was scheduled for June 1… oops!) We worked around a winters’ worth of seaweed, though, and thoroughly enjoyed sand and sea.

That evening Elliott and I enjoyed a delicious three-course Italian meal in the hotel restaurant. We lingered over our bottle of wine, savoring the cheeses and meats, the fresh pistachio pasta, the fillets of fish. Breakfast the next morning was just as noteworthy, and we got special attention because of little Lena sitting primly in her high chair at our table. The waitress brought us a special dish of almond granita and brioche, a very traditional Sicilian breakfast. We slathered the sorbet (granita) over the sweet bread roll (brioche) and ate up like true Sicilians.

On Monday morning our good friends Josh, Becca, and their kids joined us on the beach, and another friend and her two sons came as well. They all dug a huuuuuge hole, which little Stevie said was for Lena to swim in.

Princess Lena awaited her pool while playing with everyone else’s beach toys and trying a taste of sand.

She loved her handmade pool! She also clearly loved the beach, and her friends, and the sunshine. Now whenever Lena sees a bottle of sunscreen, she asks me to pop off the lid and then carefully dabs her fingertip in it and wipes it on her face. She’s ready for summertime in Sicily, I think!