Dicembre 2011
~Frohe Weihnachten~
Stuttgart Germany

Christmas Markets,
gluhwine and many many
cameras.

It was so nice to see our
big boy and for us ALL to
be together.

It was gorgeous, I still
believe Germans invented
Christmas!

A BIG Thank YOU to the
Plapps for hosting us - not
pictured as they were only
at their house for one night
and then jetted off to
Austria for their annual ski
weekend...thank goodness
snow is finally arriving in
the Alps.

And a HUGE thank you to
Susi for Baci sitting for us!
Baci was very good, we
loved having him with us,
even though it was a bit of
a pain in the ass. Thank
goodness we found a local
dog sitter for the next trip.


Joe and Zaven's last day of
school is the 21st.  We will
be on vacation until the 9th
of January.  Avalon will be
here in Milano on the 23rd
for Christmas.

It's sunny and cold - what a
nice December!

10 dicembre 2011
A HUGE THANK YOU to the fabulous Conny Wenk! Behind the scenes at
the Stuttgart Library Leonetti Christmas Photo Shoot - Conny came out of
her Winter Hiatus - just for us! The library staff were so cool with our
picture high jinx. Below the post shoot lunch at Besitos - we were starving!
Cervinia ~ Italia (the other side
of Zermatt /  The Matterhorn)

Too much snow to ski!? Really?

Yes, finally the snow has arrived
in the Alps...and it arrived with a
vengence. We had done some
thorough discussing of where
exactly to go - narrowing to
Aosta because not all the Alps
have been blessed with snow.
Lin said Cervinia was our best
bet because it was dumping and
is so high. We had never skied
there before but had always
wanted to, so plans were
confirmed.

We woke up at 5.00 AM and
arrived promptly at 8.30 to be
the first on the slopes. But there
had been an avalanche on the
road arriving into Cervinia so
they had to clear that. Then we
had to wait in the bar because
there was just TOO much snow
that they had to fly a helicopter
around to blow it up as a
preemptive strike against any
potential avalanches. It sounded
a bit like the 4th of July or a war
zone. They stopped when they
opened the lifts. But they didn't
open them all - at first just the
lower ones, but finally the higher
ones and we were up HIGH over
3000 meters. It was a crazy
amount of amazing snow, the
sun was mostly out and it wasn't
too freezing as predicted ~ worst
on the Suunto was - 12.

Sadly, the Matterhorn never
came out from behind the clouds
and our legs couldn't keep up
with our open the season ski
spirit - overall it was a
WONDERFUL opening day -
better than expected!

Only a few more days of work
and school. Yay!

Av' arrives on Friday - the vacay
house is prepped for our
Christmas festivities as we had
to go up there as the
window/door craftsman finally
finished the bedroom doors and
the sliding bathroom door - we
are very happy with the results.

Joe's work xmas party was last
Friday - it was very fun - I had to
admit to Av that we did in fact
dance - cringe. Av' didn't give
me too much shit about it.

Having a lovely Christmas Time ~
18 dicembre 2011
Buone Feste!!!!

Below ~ Christmas at Serole. It was perfect because we were thankful to be  together - we had wonderful food and amazing
weather with a view of the French Alps ~

26 dicembre 2012

Above Conny Wenk Lifestyle Photography (we are fortunate to have this amazing talent as a dear friend)