Good bye 2011, Hello 2012!

Wow! What a way to end the year. This was the few at sunset tonight. I think we have a pretty good view of the Bay of Naples. This is perfect for the fireworks that have already started.

Lots of things happened to us in 2011.
We celebrated our oldest's 13th Birthday in NC with Family.

The hubs and I celebrated our 16th Wedding Anniversary in Gatlinburg Tennesse with the kids. It was great family time and we were able to see lots of wildlife in Cades Cove.

Shipped the hubs off to Fort Leonard Wood Mo just a few short days later.

Celebrated Anniversary with family.
Dropped our Van off in Portsmouth VA to shipped to Naples, kids in tow.
The middle ones 12th birthday was celebrated with family at a Chinese buffet! If you know him you understand this :D

A few days later we drove to VA to pick the hubs up from his school. And spend our final stateside days stuck in the Navy Lodge Fort Story/ Little Creek base.
Enjoyed one last meal at Red Lobster just to leave my purse there (see why I never carry them lol) and have all of the cash stolen. Reported the credit cards just in case they wrote all of that info down. Put fraud alerts on the SS #s.

We flew to Naples on the AMC flight in early April. Said good bye to my mom and mother in law, along with the hubs aunt at the airport.
Arrived in Naples exhausted cause I was too excited to sleep. And got checked into TLA.

Spent a week in Area Orientation, boring but things you need to know.

Did a lot of house hunting.

Bought a Naples Beater!
We found a place with a few of the Med. We have a pool for just our duplex. The house is smaller than most we looked at, which at this point is a good thing, they don't hold heat nor AC well. We picked this place for the view :D. That photo was taken from our roof top terrace.

Finally moved out of TLA after 58 days and into our house on June 3.
Movers came the same day. We had no power. Gotta love Italy lol.

Did lots of unpacking, but thankful we left a lot of stuff in the states.
The kids and I spent a day at Magic World with NOSC. Had fun but learned that the Italian safety standards are no match for the USA ones. I am an adrenaline junkie all the way but there were rides there that really bothered me. haha.
The catalytic converters on our van caught on fire less than two weeks after we moved in. Italians don't work on American cars much and most wanted nothing to do with it.

Made a few friends and a few enemies along the way.
Spent my Birthday in Northern Tuscany! Stayed in a little mountain town and visited the leaning tower of Pisa and lots of little towns.

Bought some real Italian Marble.
Ordered the youngest a Gelato cake for her 11th birthday in August. Oh and we had spaghetti tacos per her request. That was a new one for me too.

The hubs had shoulder surgery in September.

I drove us all the way to Sigonella Sicily in the Naples beater :D

Met a long time internet friend Shakyra! Ate some great food with her.
We got to see Mt Etna errupt. That was awesome!

Finally got our van back!

We went to Normandy France in October. The place is absoltely beautiful. I want to go back. It is a very humbling place too. The kids learned a lot and did the hubs and I.

Ate sea snails!

We went to France for Halloween! Been there done that, it was nice but have no reason to go back. lol

Got felt up by a very rude screener at Orly airport. Had we been in the states we would probably have both been in jail as I would have knocked her ass out. I didn't want to sit in a French Jail though. I did make a scene though :)

Celebrated Thanksgiving with the hubs working so we had a turkey dinner instead of lunch.

Kept trying to decide if we were decorating for Christmas or not.

Wound up borrowing a 4ft tree and that was it.

We spent the week of Christmas in Rome.

Christmas day was spent with a friend Annette and her 2 daughters.

And now here we are celebrating a new year.

Oh yeah tried lots of wines and foods I thought I would never in my life eat lol.
No worries though the wine won't get hot tonight. Celebrating the new year over the fire pit with rosted weenies and roasted marshmellows (maybe a few smores), lots of junk food, wine, hot chocolate and sparkling grape juice for the kids.

I don't want to say I have New Years Resolutions but I do have goals. I plan to get some relief for my fibromyalgia (includes my back pain).

Post more often here.
Make lots more photographs of Italy.
Spend as much time with my husband and kids as I can.

Hopefully have a girls week/weekend some where.

See Ireland, more of London, lots of Germany, Switzerland and of course more of Italy for sure.
Hoping to see more than that but those are definites.

Hold photography classes and more portrait sessions. But most of all I will take more landscape and nature photographs.
And of course loose this weight. I will be working out weekly. Not sure how often, it will depend on how bad the fibro is that day.
All in All I expect 2012 to be great!

Buon Anno!!! Happy New Year!