Florence! & Proposal Pictures!

Hello Team!

We are in Florence and loving it. The day started out with a bit of a bump.. we failed to reserve train tickets ahead of time and ended up having to wait three hours for a train to Florence. But this didn't bother either of us much because I suppose we needed the rest and down time.. so I could heal my aching knees and Brad could shop at Chinese dollar stores. That man loves junk!! I sat in a cafe and drank two lattes that seemed to have been made with heavy cream and loved every second of it. We finally got to board our train and while I finished the second Dragon Tattoo book, Brad listened to Tupac on repeat. Okay maybe there was some Eminem thrown in there :) It was a three hour ride and both of us were starved by the end of it. Along our lovely journey, we have learned that Brad and I are like a newborn babies and need to eat every two hours or the beast comes out. We actually ended up being in first class (nothing like flying first class) and were excited to see the food trolley come by. For a
moment it felt like we were headed to Hogwarts. But we were quite disappointed to learn there were no Bertie Botts Every Flavor Beans and our stomachs roared in protest.

When we landed in Florence we went to our b&b, ate some pizza right quick, and made our way down the main. As we approached the Duomo, my heart skipped a beat. As cheesy as it sounds, this darn dome, church, and baptistery bring tears to my eyes. The facade is simply amazing and I cannot get enough. Every angle is breathtaking. Brad, being the designated photographer of the trip, took a ton of great pictures as I played tour guide and told him whatever I could remember from my previous trip and college Italian Renaissance Art History class. I'm sure I fudged a few details but who cares! The architecture speaks for itself. Tomorrow we'll take the climb to the top for a grand view of Firenze.

We wandered the streets and caught the tail end of the daily open market, making sure to snap up a few items to bring home. Then we aimlessly headed toward ponte vecchio but arrived too late and missed all the gold. We'll have to go back tomorrow. We decided it was feeding time again so we headed toward the piazza de la republicca and settled in for an over priced meal. Brad ordered a large coke and spaghetti with meat sauce, I got the ricotta spinach ravioli in a creamy truffle sauce. His coke arrived and we both laughed so hard we nearly started crying. It was so huge it could have been mistaken for a two liter in a medieval goblet. It ended up costing 9 euros but it was so worth the laugh!! After dinner we sat in the piazza and listened to a musician play an acoustic guitar and sing James Taylor and Simon and Garfunkel songs with an Italian accent. So beautiful! Then we got our "fanta" on and walked through the rain, refusing every single street peddler trying to sell us an umbrella, and laughed about all the silly things we've seen and done on this trip.

And finally, the photos from our engagement!!

before.. drinks in hand!


rialto bridge, right where he proposed in the gondola


ahhh!! Is this real??


the ring


yay!