Ristorante Gran Sasso - San Gabriele

One thing I am going to miss this summer is my trip to Abruzzo to visit my Nonna Linda.  Being 6 months pregnant with a 3 yr old do not really lend themselves to overseas travel, at least not when my feet swell instantly to Frakenfoot size upon waking each morning.

One of the highlights of my summer visits to my Nonna have always been our trip to the Shrine of St. Gabriel (San Gabriele dell' Addolorata).  This beautiful sanctuary, nestled underneath the majestic Gran Sasso, has been a favorite place of mine since I was a small child.  San Gabriele is the patron saint of young people and quite a super star for us Abruzzesi. 

Depending on when we go we eat at one of two places.  The prorchetta truck which is always faithfully present in the parking lot is a sure bet.  But if we feel like being a bit more relaxed we have lunch at the Ristorante Gran Sasso.  This family owned restaurant is really one of the best places I have ever eaten in my life.  Paola family have gone out of their way, year after year to make us feel welcome.  And the food is just plain heavenly.  Here you will absolutely taste la cucina abruzzese in its true form.  The best part, depending on the season, you can rent a room there if you feel like exploring the surrounding area more closely.  The town of Castelli, known for it's ceramics is close by and not to be missed.

Here we are after a meal at the Ristorante Gran Sasso in 2005...I think our smiling faces say it all!

So if you happen to be near San Gabriele or Castelli stop in and say hello.  You will not be disappointed.

4 generations

This last trip to Italy was memorable in so many ways. However, I think I can say that seeing my Nonna Linda enjoy her great-grandchildren was probably the best part of my vacation. Here we are: my brother, my sister-in-law, my two beautiful nieces, my mom, me, my husband and my son all surrounding my Nonna. 4 generations of D'Angelo/DiFilippo/Palumbi blood...I can only hope that we can continue this tradition for many years to come!

8 months old

I was unable to post a 7 month picture of Simon since we left for Italy on July 1st. So here is our big boy - all grown up - 8 months old - rooting for the Phillies and doing his best crawl pose...it is only a matter of time before he is on the move!


Clearly he is the spitting image of my hubby and looks nothing like me at all. Honestly it is a bit of a disappointment that my genes were recessive in this child...you always wonder what physical traits you will pass on...sigh...well I guess at some point we will have to give it another go. Just not yet.

Simon had a wonderful time in Italia. He was very much in love with is great-grandmother Nonna Linda and smiled every time he saw her. He was wonderful on the plane - both ways - and managed to charm the air hostesses every time the passed our row. He really is such a happy and fun baby but he is also very active that I find that I have a hard time keeping up. Probably because I am the laziest person I know. Go figure I would have a hyper baby!

We are in the process of uploading and sorting our many pics from Italy most of which are of Simon. He had his first visit to the beach and dipped his feet into the Adriatic. He met and visited with lots of his cousins. He had a blast with Sofia and Olivia once they arrived. Once the pics are sorted I will post them and some of my musings and observations from my trip.

A presto!

Almost there

I apologize to the 3 of you who still read my blog. The last 6 weeks have been a whirlwind of grad school classes, interrupted sleep and Kids Literacy Klub (KLK). I am happy to say that as of tonight I have taken my last graduate class. There are only 3 more days of KLK left. On Wed night we will be on a plane to Italy. Hooray!

The only crappy thing is that I found out today - due to some major mis-communication on the part of me and my adviser - that I have one last Praxis test to take before I am legally allowed to student teach in the state of PA.

Um, WTF? The next testing date is July 25 which I cannot make since I will be in Italy. I will have to register for the Sept 12 test (from Italy btw) the results of which I will get 4 weeks later. So if I am lucky and pass on the first try ONLY THEN can I student teach. By then it will be mid October so I am not even sure it will be feasable which means I will have to push it off until January. I am seriously pissed off.

The beauty of this whole clusterf**k is that I just happened to have a conversation with one of my colleagues today which sparked this whole thing...if I had not talked to her I would not have known I had missed this major requirement. I mean seriously...there is a woman who is in charge of our student teaching assignments. She is supposed to make sure our portolios are complete before she gives us the assignments. When was she planning on letting me know that my file was incomplete?!?!?! Sigh.

Anyway after my quasi nervous breakdown this afternoon I realized that everything happens for a reason so who knows...maybe this will all be a good thing, right?

So I apologize for being such an absent blogger. Again I leave on Wed so it is possible that this will be my last post until August. Unless I find an awesome internet cafe and some free time to update you on my travels.

So until then enjoy your summers, stay safe, wear sunscreen and have a good time!!!

Aiutatemi!!!

This post is for all those Americans living in Italy that may or may not read my blog. For those of you that have children and use formula...what brands are available in Italy? We will be heading over to Abruzzo in July...me, Mom and Simon first...and I will have fully weened Simon by then. We supplement now with Enfamil Prosobee Formula (pictured above) which is soy based...what are the odds of us finding that there?

He will be 7 months so I am sure if we bring a can of Enfamil and mix it with the Italian stuff he will get used to it but we will be there a month so I want to be sure we have all our bases covered. I am afraid if we abruptly switch his formula it will upset his stomach.

I am excited for our trip and nervous about the logistics of travelling overseas with a 7 month old...thank goodness for my mom!!!

Today is Simon's 4 month b-day... I will post his 4 month pictures tomorrow.

Please post in my comments if you have any suggestions for formula...I will be forever grateful!!!

Mille grazie, amici!!!

Verdi Cries

I finally finished my memoir for my writing class which ended Friday. I was unable to share it with the class on Friday so I think I will share it with you all here. On Friday I was fortunate enough to hear some of my classmates read their memoirs out loud. They were really well written one in particular made me cry. I was so thankful that my classmate trusted us enough to share some very dark moments in her life...I feel the more richer for having been a part of the community that got to share in her pain.

Anyway, I should be back to regular blogging this week - starting tomorrow with the results of our ultrasound.

Feel free to leave any feedback about my memoir in the comments section below.

It was the spring of 1990. It was official. I was a student of archeology. When my Latin teacher, Ms. Reidel had told me about the Summer Classics Program (SCP), I was a bit hesitant. I was only a Junior. Did I want to give up one night a week to schlep down to St. Joe’s University to take a night class for college credit? My schedule this spring was already a bit tight. Lacrosse, stage crew, Lit Mag and SAT prep left me with little time after school for much else.

“This is the first year that they are opening it up to girls,” she said. “There are only four spots and I want you to have one of them.” Then she mentioned the “on site” component. At the end of the semester the group would spend one week in Rome, two days on the island of Capri and five days in Sorrento.

Two weeks in Italy? Without my parents? With twenty guys from the Prep? During the World Cup? (Italy was hosting that year.) I looked at this opportunity with the practical eye of a 16 year old girl who attends a same sex school. Aside from our professor, I would be the only one on the trip that would speak Italian fluently. These twenty boys would NEED me. I saw myself surrounded by handsome young men, all vying for my attention as I helped them order a gelato or translated for them at a bar while we watched a soccer match. Italy was such a magical place there was no way that these boys would NOT fall in love with me. By the end of the trip I would have a boyfriend for sure. At the very least I would have my pick of them for a senior prom date. I told Ms. Reidel I was definitely in.

We arrived in Rome on a hot June day. By then, I had met the boys that I prematurely decided would escort me to the prom and realized that there were only a few acceptable candidates. My roommate was to be a girl from my high school named Eva. There were two other girls from my high school on the trip as well. My odds were looking good. On the plane I planned out the strategies that would have these “chosen” boys fawning over me by dinner the next day.

Then a funny thing happened. As soon as I set foot on Italian soil these potential escorts took a back seat to the magic of the Eternal City. I had visited Rome before with my family but never as a student of archeology. Our fearless leader, Dr. Bender, was a time wizard. With every lecture at every site we were drawn back into the past and soon we felt like we were actually living in the time of the Caesars.

If I had lived 2000 years ago would I have been a slave girl worth practically nothing and looked down upon by those I served? Perhaps I would have been the daughter of an aristocrat, married at age 12, mother of many children one of whom would become a senator. Dr. Bender gave us a truly special look into this timeless city. A place that would live on long after our footsteps and daydreams had passed through.

While our days were filled with time travel our nights were filled with soccer. Hosting the World Cup had transformed Rome that summer. Some of the games were even being played at the Stadio Olimpico right there in Rome. Azzurri fever was sweeping the city and we gladly let ourselves get caught up in the tidal wave.

Three days after my 17th birthday we visited the Capitoline Museums. It was late afternoon and the museums were already closed for the day. Dr. Bender, who by that time we had dubbed Caesar himself, had managed to find a way for us to visit the museums after hours.

The origins of these museums trace back to 1471 and Pope Sixtus IV who donated a bunch of valuable bronze statues to the people of Rome for exposition. Almost 600 years later the collection contains mostly pieces from Roman antiquity, possibly the largest collection in the world.

I had never been in a museum when it was closed. Without the tourists and general crowds the place was transformed and held almost a sacred quality. Our footsteps resonated through the ancient halls with nothing but statues and pieces of antiquity to muffle them. Dr. Bender explained statue after statue and again we were teleported back to a time even more ancient then the Caesars.

We were introduced to Romulus and Remus, twin brothers who were abandoned then taken in by a she-wolf who fed them and kept them alive. Romulus would later found the city of Rome. We had studied this ancient bronze back in our classroom at St. Joe’s. Now we were standing in front of it looking it at with our own eyes, connecting with a part of history that was older than time itself. As had already happened several times since arriving in Rome, I was overcome with emotion and an incredible sense of how immensely lucky I was to be standing here in this moment creating my own memories and my own history.

As Dr. Bender led us back out to the main entrance we passed a lone security guard huddled around a black and white TV set. Italy was playing Team USA that night at the Stadio Olimpico here in Rome. No wonder Dr. Bender had been given permission to let us in the museum that night. No one would be out on the streets. Every single person in Rome would be at the stadium, which holds 80,000 people or glued to a TV set or in one of the many piazzas that was showing the game on huge screens set up for the occasion. Rome’s antiquities were in no danger of being compromised that night. Our guard was so caught up in the game he did not even realize that we had left the building.

The outside space in between the museums is called the Campidoglio and was designed by Michelangelo himself. Dr. Bender led the group to the top of the courtyard. As we looked over the railing the Roman Forum sprawled out before us. It was dusk and the soft purple light made the ancient ruins look enchanted. We were all silenced by this magic and as we looked over the timeless columns and stones, we allowed what Dr. Bender had been telling us all week to just sink in.

Suddenly a collective cry arose from across the city of Rome. It started out softly but immediately grew into a loud and joyful noise. Startled my classmates looked at each other. I smiled. What else could possibly wake the Eternal City from its slumber?

“Gooooooooaaaaaaaallllllll” screamed the security guard running out the door of the museum and in our direction. We were the only ones around for him to share his excitement with. It did not hurt that Italy had scored against Team USA a fact that I am sure was not lost on the security guard that had the bad luck of having to baby sit a bunch of American students on the night of a world cup game.

Knowing the chaos that would ensue if Italy won the game, Dr. Bender wisely corralled us back to the hotel with strict instructions not to wander outside. Luckily for me our room faced the Via della Conciliazione, a huge main street in Rome which leads to St Peter’s Basilica. I invited a bunch of the guys back to our room and from our open window my classmates and I were able to celebrate Italy’s victory from a safe distance. It had been an incredible few days and in the morning we would be leaving for Campania where the next phase of our trip would begin.

When all was said and done I was escorted to my prom by one of my SCP classmates. The trip had not produced the boyfriend I had so desperately wanted. Instead it gave me the gift of a best friend, Ed, who in the end was gracious enough to escort me to my senior prom when no other prospects were in sight. Ed and I lost touch after college but I will always fondly remember those two weeks in Italy where as Natalie Merchant in her song Verdi Cries so wisely sang “All is memory, taken home with me.”

Eva and Paola, Rome, Coloseum, June 11, 1990

Mentally still on vacation

Dan and I arrived back from Italia safe and sound on Saturday. The trip was great - aside from the horrific swelling of my feet which made me look like Clubfoot Sally. Thankfully they have returned to their normal size.

We started our trip on the Amalfi coast...it is such a beautiful place I highly recommend stopping there if you are every in Italy. We stayed at the Grand Hotel Excelsior a beautiful hotel perched on the cliffs above Amalfi.

The view from our hotel room.

I posted a review of the hotel with more pictures on Trip Advisor. You can read all about it here.

The weather was ok not great but luckily on the day we went to Capri the weather was magnificent. We took a small boat there with 4 other couples. We represented USA, England, Ireland, France and Germany and we had a blast together. The boat circled the island and then let us off in Marina Piccola so that we could wander the island for 5 hours.

I Faraglioni

The view of Marina Piccola from the town of Capri.

For those of you who have never been, Capri is home to hundreds of high end boutiques rivaling those of New York and Rodeo Drive. Dan and I walked around a bit and ogled in clothes in the windows - my favorite was the display at Roberto Cavalli - I did not take a picture as I did not want to seem too tacky...yet I digress.

The beach where we waited for our boat to pick us up.

It was a great day. I was so tired I even took a nap on the way back, lulled by the waves of the sea and the sun beating down on me. I was in heaven.

The next day we rented a car and drove to my mom's house in Abruzzo. More to follow....

Bis-nonna

4 generations of D'Angelo/Palumbi

I know I just posted but here is a pic of Sofia with her Great-Grandmother (bis-nonna in Italian). I had to post - it made me cry when I saw her with my nonna who is 86.

Sometimes I regret waiting this long to get married...but it's not my fault I only met Dan in 2005!!! Here's to another great-grandchild soon!

More Italianness

Well, I guess mother nature read my post about missing the sun because it is freakin' beautiful outside today. So in her honor I post some more pictures from Italia, mainly Teramo, where my family is from.

The view of the Gran Sasso from our house.

My Nonna Linda showing my mom how to make gnocchi the "right way."

The finished product.

The tiny 15th century church where my parents were married.

Dan in front of our house.

The fortess at Civitella del Tronto.

This 11th century fortress was the northernmost Bourborn citadel to surrender to the armies of Vittorio Emmanuele I in 1860. Civitella is only a few miles from Garrano Basso which is where our house is. Garranno is only a few kilometers outside of Teramo - which is a rather large city in Northern Abruzzo - for those of you that are keeping score.

OK, that is enough Italy for today - this weekend I will dig through my pics to see if there are any other post worth pics of Italia.

Godetevi questa bellissima giornata di sole!!! Ciao, ciao!

Where is summer?

Ok, so I broke down and went to the tanning salon today. I know, I know, it is bad for me but I have HAD IT with this cold weather. I only went for 4 minutes so as not to burn but I needed to do SOMETHING.

For those of you that live on the East Coast and have forgotten what summer looks like, I post these two pictures. They were taken in Alba Adriatica (provinca di Teramo) in August of 2005.

The view from under my umbrella.

Tan, oh where oh where did you go?

Since the blog is called Italianissima let's talk about Italy for a bit shall we.

Alba Adriatica is a small sea town on the Adriatic Coast in the region of Abruzzo. My family has a little apartment there where as a teenager I was lucky enough to spend every summer. The beach photo is taken on the "spiaggia libera" or "free beach." This just means that you bring your own umbrella as opposed to renting one from the many beach "establishments" that surround the free beaches. When I was a teenager we rented at "Il Calimero." Still to this day, if I am ever there, the owners, Teresa and Riccardo as well as their children Maurizio and Ilenia still let me stay there for free for the day if I want.

My goal is to one day be able to take my future children here as well during the summer. Hopefully when I am a teacher this will be possible. I can take the kids for 5/6 weeks and Dan can meet us for the last few like my parents did with us.

And BTW,while I am not in the habit of posting pictures of myself with such little clothing on, I am doing so because I need a serious kick in the pants to get my diet and exercise routine back on track before Sept. 22. I look good in this picture. Now, not so much.

Stay warm, peeps!