Ciao, Americani.  Happy belated fourth of July.  We celebrated in Bologna with the girls donning red, white, and blue.  We also had a coke and french fries at McDonalds while we were waiting for Matt to arrive.  Seemed like the right thing to do!

Matt made it--although it was not easy travel.  Here is a list of what went wrong:

1.  He forgot his passport in Austin and had to have our superhero friend, Jeff put it on a plane for same day delivery to the Atlanta airport.

2.  He showed up to the Atlanta airport for his flight to Bologna, only to realize his company travel agency had booked it for the day before.

3.  When he finally got his plans situated, he was given the pleasure of sitting on the tarmac for 2 hours due to weather.  It was hot.  There were obnoxious teenage girls.  It wasn't good.

4.  He left his belt accidentally at the security checkpoint in the Rome airport while racing to catch his connection.

5.  When he got to Europe, he realized he had no internet connection and his phone wasn't working, despite being told his phone had an international plan.  So he had no way to communicate with me what was happening.

6.  He tried to use a pay phone to call me and his debit card didn't work (forgot to tell BOA he was traveling abroad??).

7.  So now he is in Bologna with no Euros, no way to access Euros, and no way to get in touch with me.

Alas,  it all worked out.  He found a payphone that took a different credit card,  somehow managed to convince the cab driver in Bologna to accept American dollars, and made it to the rental car to meet us at the designated time.  Oh, that's right.  They also lost one of his bags.  It's supposed to be en route, but we shall see.  Ahh...the joys of travel.

Needless to say we were all thrilled to see Daddy!  He said he wished all of his homecomings were like this.  You mean, they're not?  

He doesn't look any worse for the wear after all his travel woes.

Bologna was beautiful and we wished we had more time to spend there.  Took a great tip from Andy on a dinner spot, Trattoria AnaMaria.  Here are some highlights of that dinner: 

Matt's first meal in Italia was anatra di arrosto (duck).  He's now had pizza, gelato, and more than his share of coffee.  

He jumped right in the fun of pottery:

Delaney has taken to making a sport of eating pizza.  She can take down a whole pizza almost entirely alone.  Here's one of her remnants and one of Maddie enjoying her favorite treat.  We are truly eating our way through Italy.  So glad our whole little clan is here-now feels more complete.

We are wrapping up our stay here in Urbania.  Off to Milan Saturday morning.  More from there!  xoxoxoxox

Leah