Visit to Venice

We got an extended day off this week as it was our anniversary
[and I am only here for one more week :-(]

So we headed to Venezia!

Pastor Andrea recommended that we book a night at Hotel Noemi, which was a nice hotel with a great location, just a 1 minute walk from St. Mark's Square.

We didn't make any plans, or see almost any of the sites we felt compelled to last time, just wandered the streets and canals.

Instead of going out to eat (you've seen the amazing food we've already gotten to eat), we decided to picnic while here. We had lunch with this view, and ate dinner at sunset on the mail canal [I forgot my camera!]

Accademia bridge

Eric was in his element: gelato 2+ times a day, a kebab, and we even found Coke Zero!







We headed to the west side of Venice, a place we didn't get to explore on our honeymoon and found some really quiet and sweet neighborhoods, as well as a beautiful public park!

Thanks for a lovely getaway, Venice. 

Lake Como

Tuesday we took our first 'day off' to explore Italy in the first week we were here. We kept it a little closer and headed about an hour north of Milan to Lake Como.

(my first time attempting photostitch. It's not perfect, but it gives you an idea of the view)

Before we left, I didn't know much about the Lake, what there was to see or do, or how long we'd want to spend there. We just hopped on the train to see what we could find!

A rapid service ferry took us to the town of Bellagio, at the mid point of the lake. Its one of the larger lakeside towns to visit.

Needless to say, it is charming and the views were stunning. The lake is surrounded by mountains on both sides. We were there at the prime time so the weather was just gorgeous (but it was also not too busy on a weekday).

Here's a panorama video of what we were enjoying:

We ate pasta and seafood on the lakefront overlooking the water

and then went for a stroll

The day was too short, but it was certainly lovely.

(also for those wondering...the ferry did not take us past George Clooney's Lake Como home, sadly)

Here!

Buon Giorno!

We have arrived safely, albeit tired, in Bollate – a northern suburb of Milan – where the Ferraris live.

Our apartment is wonderful! It’s a one-bedroom flat, but the bedroom serving as the study and our closet. The main room of the apartment is studio style with our bed (a fold out couch), a table, and kitchen (which came stocked with groceries, thanks to pastor’s wife, Christina) We share both rooms with lots of books (Pastor F has over 8,000!).

Some highlights, bullet-style

• my first cooking experience in Milan. It took hours to air out the apartment. (In my defense, the toaster didn't automatically pop the bread up!) As Eric and I were have a frustrated discussion about it, we started violently waving towels around to get rid of the smoke, then promptly burst out laughing.
  
• first thing googled: “How to use a bedet”
• attempted to figure out internet using a pin drive with limited access (10 gb a month). We now know how much internet memory is used for each of our everyday. Limiting email refreshes, streaming and blogging unless we find a better solution.
• thunder so loud I jumped in my chair at the table. It has been almost non-stop raining the past 36 hours.

Speaking of thunder, here’s a little video of today’s rain from our patio.

It’s nearly dinner time. Buona Sera from Bollate!

baci e abbracci,
Eric and Katie
(eh-reek and keh-ee-tee)

Summer Plans

Now that we've told some friends and family, we wanted to share some news and prayer request for Eric and I for this summer.

A couple of weeks ago a pastor around here approached Eric about an internship opportunity for the summer.

 This was great because Eric didn't have any plans yet, and while he doesn't need any more internship experience for his degree program, he did need something to do this summer. 

The details: for 8 weeks he would be working 6 days a week--preaching twice a Sunday, doing pastoral visits with the pastor, and teaching an English class which the church uses as an evangelism tool.

The internship is a little unique in that it is in Milan, Italy. (http://reformationitaly.org) (!!)

The duomo of Milan, photo from our honeymoon June 2009

My work is being generous and flexible in allowing me to go with Eric for almost half of the eight weeks. I'll be working part-time remotely as Eric will be staying really busy with the work there.

The church has an apartment we'll be staying in, although I don't have much more detail than that for now.

We're heading to New York for our summer vacation and then flying out of there the first week of June. I'll leave July 1st and Eric will stay until early August.

There is a ton to be figured out between now and when we leave in 5 weeks, but we feel very blessed to have this opportunity, and would covet your prayers that finances for the trip work out (it is an unpaid internship and we are responsible for our travel and incidentals while we're there), that we travel safely, and that Eric's work in Milan will be used well for the sake of the Kingdom.

More details to come!

Week in Chicago

Eric and I just got home from a week in Chicago to work/attend The Gospel Coalition Conference. We had a great, but exhausting time!

One of the hotels that had rooms blocked out for the conference was the historic Palmer House Hilton (built in 1871). We decided to stay there instead of the hotel on McCormick Place's campus.

Its located right in the loop, and was beautiful!

main lobby

our room

The conference brought such a broad variety of people (reformed, baptist, evangelical) and the main topic of the plenary speakers was "Preaching Christ from the Old Testament". Eric's (educated) commentary was that most speakers did really well, although there were a few that didn't do justice to the topic.

If you get the chance, we'd highly recommend you listen to:

Tim Keller, Getting Out (Exodus)

Conrad Mbewe, The Righteous Branch (Jeremiah)

Matt Chandler, Youth (Ecclesiastes)

Mike Bullmore, God's Great Heart of Love Towards His Own (Zephaniah)

Don Carson, Getting Excited About Melchizedek (Psalms)

There were dozens of break-outs sessions and special events. One that we were able to attend was a live taping of The White Horse Inn, a radio program/podcast that Eric and I have been listening to for years. One of WSC's faculty members started WHI 20 years ago and we are closely connected with them at the seminary. Last minute one of the usual panelists got sick and wasn't able to make it, so Eric's preaching professor stepped in (he also spoke at another breakout session).  We sat in the front row and cheered like groupies.

There was addendum post-conference called Christ + City that we also attended. Mostly urban pastors seeking to communicate the mission and encourage the leaders of urban or inner-city churches.  Included in that event was Tim Keller's Generous Justice message, which was great to hear.

(Eric recently read his book, and subsequently wrote a review for Westminster's blog on it:

http://wscal.edu/blog/entry/book-review-generous-justice-by-tim-keller)

The events of the week concluded with a concert by some of Eric's favorite artists. I know most people will be skeptical when they hear this music described, so I'm just going to link up to some songs and let you know decide for your self.

We had a blast at the concert and felt edified leaving it, which is a weird thing after you've been head-bobbing, singing and stepping for two hours.

After the conference was over we headed home. A birthday dinner with Rachel, and a long lazy breakfast with the family rounded out the weekend.


We left just in time...snow had started to fall as our plane left. We were so happy to come home to Cali.

Weekending in Tucson

1. In N Out is our road trip fast food joint
2. Air Force airfield in Tucson
3. walking the grounds of Voyager Resort
4. dove who made a nest in the palm tree next to G & G's front porch.
5. grammy and gramps
6, 7, 8. dinner at La Parilla Suiza. Enchiladas sauce got spilled on me, which resulted in  free margarita
9. sunset
10. blueberry pomegranate chocolate chip ice cream--surprisingly amazing!
11. lots of card games were played as usual
12. fourteen hours round trip in the car.

in case you couldn't tell from the photos, Eric and I took advantage of our one free weekend this spring  to visit Grammy and Gramps. We had a blast hanging out with them as usual.

(all photos above take on my new HTC HD7 phone and edited with the photo enhancer app)

To tempt you to visit g & g for yourself, here are some Tucson sunset photos taken on my normal camera: