Valentine's Day 2016

We had fun showing our love for each other this Valentine's day. We had a special breakfast of heart shaped pancakes with strawberries and pomegranates along with an apple, pear and pomegranate juice.

Gabriel worked for a long time to make Richard a 2016 calendar, and Hope added some paper hearts on a few of the pages. We had it spiral bound and gave it to him on Valentine's Day morning.

And being in Europe, Richard and I were able to order some very special Pink Champagne Truffles from London. We had these when we visited London back in 2010, and they now bring back special memories for us as well as being quite tasty!

All these special little things made the day special for everyone. Happy Valentine's Day!

January Instagram Pictures

New Year's Eve Party, baby smiles and birthdays sum up our January Instagram pics.

Instagram - July through December

From our last moments in Italy to the birth of Hannah, looking back through my Instagram pictures makes me smile and realize what a blessed life we are living!

Follow me on Instagram!

2015 Book List

Richard:
The Attributes of God
Love and Respect
The First Commandment
The Burning Room
Left Behind (Left Behind Series)
Tribulation Force (Left Behind Series)

Sarah:
Nicolae (Left Behind Series)
Soul Harvest (Left Behind Series)
Love and Respect
All The Light We Cannot See
Don't Make Me Count to Three

~Chapter Books Read to Kids~
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
Three Tales of My Father's Dragon
Pippi Longstocking
Toys Come Home
Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle
The Stories Julian Tells
The Adventures of Grandfather Frog
The Adventures of Danny Meadow Mouse
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Mr. Popper's Penguins
The Water Horse
The Chocolate Touch
The Littles
Anna Hibiscus

Gabriel:
Gabriel has read ~150 early reader books. He's now reading at around a 2nd grade reading level. The kid loves to read!

May and June Instagram Update

March and April Instagram Pictures

A nauseous pregnant tummy has prevented me from posting any new pictures of our lives the last several weeks. But here are my Instagram pictures from March and April. At the beginning of March we were finishing up a wonderful trip in Barcelona. I fell in love with the city! Then we have some daily life pictures and ended up April with a trip to beautiful Lake Maggiore in Northern Italy.

Heard From My Kids Recently...

February Instagram Pictures

January Instagram Pictures

Since not everyone who follows our blog uses Instagram, I thought it would be fun to post my Instagram pictures at the end of each month. I won't bother with the descriptions, so if you have a question let me know. You can also view my Instagram profile by clicking here, or putting the app on your phone and following me (mommysanders). Here's January!

Pasta Class

Richard sent me to a pasta class with my friend Emily and mother-in-law fora Christmas present. The class was taught by a sweet woman who brought us into her home and kitchen. We learned to make pesto lasagna, tagliatelle, gnocchi and tiramisu! My favorites were the gnocchi and tiramisu. Words can't describe how tasty it all was. And eating it after we had spent hours making it all by hand was so rewarding!

The gnocchi was actually much easier than I thought it would be. Using this little gnocchi board to add decorative lines in the gnocchi was fun too.

The tagliatelle is what took the longest. We mixed the ingredients, let it rest, kneaded it, then rolled it so thin that you could read something placed underneath it.

The tagliatelle was then folded, cut and set out to dry.

Our teacher served us our hand-made dishes at the end.

The tiramisu was amazing! And the teacher also gave us some limoncello made by her family using lemons from her family's land in southern Italy.

Here is our whole class. It was so much fun!

If you're interested in taking this class, I highly recommend it. Go to www.cookinmilano.com for class schedules.

2014 Book List

Another year of reading is over. I wasn't keeping track of the books we had read this year, and I figured the list wouldn't be long due to our international move. Surprisingly, we read more than I thought! Plus, we have a new reader this year in the Sanders house. Very exciting!

Gabriel and I have been working on learning to read and he loves it. Most of what he reads are short stories or sentences from his reading lessons, but those aren't on this list. To make the list it had to be a complete book, and he had to read the entire thing.

So far each year I post our book list we get emails from family and friends with recommended books or book lists they have read or want to read. This is the part I look forward to when posting our list. I guess I have become quite the book worm. So keep those emails coming! Happy reading, everyone!

Richard
Non-Fiction:
The Bible
The Meaning of Marriage
Bible Doctrine: Essential Teachings of the Christian Faith

Fiction:
Ender's Game
The Lions of Lucerne
The Gods of Guilt

Sarah
Non-Fiction:
The Bible
The Meaning of Marriage
Just Do Something
Give Them Grace
Teach Them Diligently
Slow and Steady Get Me Ready {Referenced}
Cure Tooth Decay
God's Big Picture

Fiction:
Gilead
Mary Poppins
Left Behind
Tribulation Force
What Alice Forgot

Gabriel
Fiction:
Meet the Sight Words Level 1 (Books 1-12)
Meet the Sight Words Level 2 (Books 1-12)
BOB Books Set 1 (Books 1-12)
BOB Books Set 2 (Books 1-12)
BOB Books Set 3 (Books 1-8)

2014 Christmas Ornament

One of my favorite holiday traditions is adding a new ornament to the tree that represents something from that year. This year, I have been searching all over for a Italian Christmas ornament. But surprisingly I haven't found any ornament that were made in Italy. I was also looking for ornaments at different touristy places we've visited, but wasn't really happy with what I found. My ornaments usually have to match my red and gold theme. So I decided to try to make an ornament from a wine cork. The wine was from Italy, and I'm making it while living in Italy. So that seems pretty Italian to me! Here's what I came up with.

I am not completely happy with it, so I also went back to and purchased an ornament representing Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper painting, which is located just one block from our apartment. I guess I'll have two ornaments for this year.

Here are the ornaments from the past few years.
2013 - The birth of Hope Lynn Sanders
2012 - M&M from Las Vegas's M&M World
2011 - The birth of Gabriel John Sanders
2010 - Royal crown from London
2009 - Aloha Hawaiian honeymoon

Gigi in Milan

After our trip to Rome, we spent the rest of Gigi's visit in Milan.

Gigi taught Gabriel to play "Dots" and "Tic-Tac-Toe".

After bath time, Hope always asks to be a Papoose. During Gigi's visit, she made sure Gigi saw her when she was dressed as a Papoose, and even after Gigi left, she has asked to send pictures when she's dressed as a Papoose.

We love our reading time.

 Here I am at the market buying some fresh Orata fish for dinner. Orata has become a favorite of ours after being introduced by our Italian friends, Melissa and Louis. It's caught locally, in the Mediterranean, and is very easy to clean and cook.

And cleaning the fish.

My kids are just the cutest!

Do we look alike?

We visited Milan's Duomo, which was absolutely beautiful! Completely different from many of the other churches we have seen in Italy. This one is very Gothic, and surprisingly dark inside. But again, absolutely beautiful.

Me and the kids with Milan's Arco della Pace in the background.

Viewing The Cherry Blossoms

It was a beautiful day!