May Holidays, Belli-style

May is filled with endless holidays in Ukraine.  What is already a glorious month is vastly improved by all of the vacation time.  We, of course, decided to take advantage and hopped on a flight to Italy even before the month began. As many of you already know, we are expecting Gio's baby sister to arrive in early August, so this is my last chance to fly before our family expands.

Hard to believe that this was our life only a month ago. 

On Gio's last day of school before a 3-week break (oops...more absences racking up on his transcript.  Bad parents. Bad parents), Gio is showing of his plumber look. 

Our 4-year-old has completely outgrown his size 5 clothing but the 6-7s are still a bit large.  He fits in now with all of the high school boys, at least. 

Before going to the US we took a chance to spend a few days in Italy first.  On the way there, through Munich, we found this fabulous airport playground.  It had slides and even a boarding gate that led to a control tower.  Have I mentioned how much we love this airline??

And, as always, Gio spent all of his time on the airplanes awake.  Only cars are for sleeping.  

We had gotten up at 3:30 AM to catch our 6AM flight out of Kyiv, so this nap in the car lasted long after we arrived at our house.  We left him out in the driveway for 2 more hours (and even did a few errands with him happily snoring away).  

The next day our wonderful friends the Mcdougals arrived from Kyiv to spend some time with us in Italy.  We visited the local cheese factory (and its resident pouch)...

....ate A LOT (look closely to see how Gio managed to destroy an entire basket full of bread)

Shared bedtime stories with Xavier (McDougal crew includes three children, ages 10, 7 and almost 6 so Gio was in heaven with so many big kids around!)...

...and did A LOT of jumping....

....in PJs, of course.  For more on the McDougal's visit, see Merilee's blog: http://mcdougalfamilyoverseas.blogspot.com/

We celebrated Paolo's birthday and then had to say goodbye to the Mcdougals as we headed back to Bologna for our trip to the USA.... 

....which did not happen as planned.  The plane that was supposed to take us to Munich never arrived in Bologna as it had to make an emergency landing in Verona.  While we waited to fly instead to Frankfurt (where we would have to spend the night), Gio befriended this adorable boy named Lorenzo.  The two of them terrorized the airport for quite a while.  Lorenzo was on his way to San Francisco as his father is the skipper for the Italian boat in the America's Cup race.  Paolo and I were a bit start struck.  Gio was just happy to have a fun companion for the boring wait at the gate.  

Our flight to DC the next day was an easy one.  How did anyone fly with children before in-flight entertainment and iPads existed??  I know card games, stickers and books are great, but who can do that for 8-9 hours??? Better parents than I, I suppose.  

For anyone who feels ho-hum about living in such a fabulous place as Washington, go live in Kyiv for a while and then get back to me.  For us, the glorious chance to play on clean playgrounds, visit farmer's markets (and not worry about how close Chernobyl is to your food supply), eat cupcakes, maneuver around on streets with polite drivers (YES, to us DC drivers are exceedingly courteous!) and be understood wherever we go are glorious treats.  When asked on the trip here what he was most looking forward to in DC, Gio replied, "Everyone speaks English there!"  

We finally came clean about my expanding Belli belly.  Hard to hide it anymore.....

Our first full day in Washington involved a LOT of swinging...

and a visit to the Dupont Farmer's Market.  

No need to slice it up....

And then back to Rose Park for a few hours in the giant sand pit.   Not a piece of trash, beer bottle or angry babushka in sight.  

Happy to be here.  Hope to see a few of you while we are around.  And for my Kyiv friends, we will also be happy to return in a few weeks.  We miss you.  Hugs to all.