The last week in Tuscany

Last week we went to see the olives that we picked being turned into olive oil at the mill. The stages are: First they go through a fan to separate the olives from the leafs. Next the olives get a rinse then they go into a mulcher. Then the olive oil goes through pipes and ends up in a trough. Last but not least you pour the olive oil in to your containers. I don't like olive oil but my mum said it was great!

Last week it was SNOWING!!!!!!
It was so much fun. We went up the big mountains behind our house and we went tobogganing, had snow ball fights and made snow devils.

Well this is my last blog entry in Italy. I have enjoyed it a lot and I am looking forward to going to England.


Arrivederci

Auf Wiedersehen

Bye Bye

Ciao

Olive Picking

Yesterday we went to pick olives at our friend's dad's olive grove. They have 120 trees. Yesterday we picked 14 trees worth of olives and that's about 220 kilos. It's fun because you don't do it with your hands you do it with small rakes and you can climb up the center of the tree. I attached a stick to the end of my rake so I could reach olives that were above me. Some of the trees don't have a lot of olives but others have heaps. Before you start a tree you have to spread a net out underneath the tree for the olives to fall on and if the tree is on a slope you have to put sticks on one side so the olives don't roll off the net. We have some trees at our house. We harvested them then we gave our olives to our friends to bring to the mill. We only had 23 kilos so we got 5liters of olive oil. On Saturday we will go and see the olives we picked yesterday getting pressed at the mill.

Ferrari Cup and holiday

Last Sunday we went to the Ferrari world finals. It was so cool except for the beginning when there was, in the first 100 meters, a 5 car crash. There were tractors pulling the cars away and the safety car slowing all the others down to a stop. One of the drivers went off in an ambulance but I don't think it was bad. Apart from the crash it was cool and loud. Here are some pictures.

The day after we went to Florence and bought some chestnuts. In the evening we roasted them on the BBQ. I don't like them but everyone else does. It was fun because it was cold but we had the fire going so it kept us warm. I took some bread and stuck it on the end of a fork and toasted it. It was yummy because it tasted like it had been on a BBQ. Here are some more pictures.

Yesterday we came back from our trip to Carrara, Colonnata, Castelnuovo, La Spezia and the Cinque Terre. Colonnata is famous for lardo and we bought 2 packets of it, one big, one small. Lardo is cured back fat from a pig and it tastes very salty. It is cured in salt and left in marble boxes for a very long time. Carrara is famous for Carrara marble which the sculpture of The David is made out of. When we were there we saw the marble mountains where the marble gets mined from. We stayed in La Spezia for the night. In the morning we went to the Cinque Terre. The Cinque Terre is in translation The Five Villages which go along the coast at the Mediterranean sea. First we went to Manarola. The cool thing about Manarola is that to get the boats into the water they lower them with a crane. Then we went to Monterosso and had lunch. For lunch I had a french fries pizza it was yummy. Then we headed home and that was the end of our holiday. Here are some pictures.

The river at the bottom of our drive way has changed dramatically. From hardly any water to a raging torrent. It has even gone over my dam that I built with my friend. Here are some pictures of the torrent.

Pasta Making

This morning we made pasta dough. After kneading the dough we prepared the filling. The filling contains bacon, pecorino cheese, nutmeg, breadcrumbs and the yolk of a egg. Then we put the dough through the pasta machine. First we put a ball of dough through the biggest setting then we folded it twice and put it through the machine again. We repeated that step again. Then we put the dough through the machine 6 times changing the setting each time. Then we put the filling in between 2 sheets of pasta and cut it out in to triangel shapes and then its all done.Ready to be cooked. Here is a picture of the pasta.

Austria

Yesterday we arrived back from our trip to Austria. We took 8 1/2 hours to get there and we stopped for lunch about 40 kilometers over the border. I had schnitzel, a roll and an Almdudler which is kind of like lemonade. Then we finished lunch and went to my Omi and Opa's house in Vienna. We had to go there because we had to pick up all our winter stuff. It was funny because for dinner it was schnitzel again. We slept in my Uncle's bed in the apartment above my Omi and Opas. For breakfast I had dream cake which is a type of cake. In the morning we went to my Omi and Opa's holiday house to pick up all the winter stuff, like all our snowboarding gear and winter shoes. Then we went into the village and I had a haircut. We came home and had lunch which was pancakes. They were yummy!

In the afternoon we went to the Zoo which was cool because we saw 3 lion babies. They were running around and around. Then we went to see the panda baby and he was sleeping he is about the size of a fully grown koala. When he was born he was 10 centimeters long and had no fur. When we went to see the tiger babies they weren't there. Then we went to the playground. It was fun because there were rabbits everywhere and you can walk in tunnels and come out in a plastic semi-circle and see rabbits all around you.

That evening we went to a restaurant. It was cool because we sat above water. After the meal we went into the restaurant's wine cellar. There was about a million liters of wine in there. Then we went home to have a nice sleep and in the morning we set of on another long trip back to Italy.

Another busy week

Last week we went to a small village called Marradi to a chestnut festival. Marradi is set in the Apennine mountains and is famous for marroni a.k.a. chestnut. The types of chestnut food at the festival were roasted chestnuts, swissroll with chestnut paste inside, deep fried chestnut tortelli and chestnut cake. My favourite food was the swissroll and Ana's was the roasted chestnuts.the train trip back was awful we were stuffed full up to our necks in people. Here are some photos from the festival:



When we arrived back home our friends Mindy, Alex and Esme were there. My favourite game to play with Alex is soccer. We have been best friends since he was born. They stayed with us for a week and that's why I haven't written on my blog. One of the things we did with them was to go and see The David which is a marble sculpture of King David going out to battle the giant Goliath. His sling shot is hung over his shoulder and in his right hand is the stone. Here is a picture of the rest of his profile:

On Friday we went out for dinner. When we arrived home my Dad's friends surprised him for his 42 birthday. Their names are Georg, Doris, Tim and Lucas. Lucas and Tim don't speak any English but we got along just fine. They live in Vienna Austria. On Saturday we went to a truffle festival and we bought one big black truffle. They were also selling antique cars like Ferrari's and Alfa Romeos. My Dad also bought some salami and cheese. Then we went home and set up my Dads party. For dinner the kids had pizza and pop corn and the adults had spaghetti with truffle shavings. Then they had pork loin and roasted potatoes.

Today all our visitors left. Tomorrow my Dad and I will be going to pick up all our winter stuff from Vienna.

Rufina and Kite Flying

About 2 weeks ago my grandparents arrived back from their holiday in England. When they are with us we do things like play French cricket. In French cricket you have to defend your legs when the bowler bowls underarm to try and hit below the knees.We also play a game called leggy which is a game for 2 players where you stand about 3 meters away from each other with your legs apart and you have to try and throw the ball through your opponent's legs.

A couple of days later we went to Rufina. Rufina is where they make a lot of Chianti wine. We drove up to a view point and there was a lovely view of the town and rows and rows of vines. Then we went and had some ice cream. The flavours that I had were chocolate and crema. Then we went home. We drove for a bit but then we found out that our sat nav was taking us the wrong way. That made our drive a bit longer.

When my dad was in Brussels he bought me a kite. It is yellow, orange and red. When the wind lifts it up it looks like a flying mattress. The strings are about 30 meters long. When you pull on the right hand side string it flys to the right and the same with the left. If you do it fast enough you can do a figure of eight. I have a lot of fun flying my kite. Here are some pictures of the things I have written about.

Rufina

Kite Flying