Our Summer Vacation

View from our house in Durres

We returned last month from our summer vacation to Albania and Italy.  This was Siena's first trip to our summer home on the Albanian coast in Durres.  The water in Durres is the Adriatic Sea and it was just beautiful this summer.  It was nice and warm and perfect for swimming.

The cousins at the beach

The best part of our trip was spending so much time with our family that lives so far away.  This was the first time Siena had seen her first cousin Majkell since she was only 3 months old.  He quickly became her best buddy and almost beat out Baba for being her favorite man to hang out with.

The Boardwalk 

After our long days at the beach sometimes we would walk over to the boardwalk in town.  They have lots of restaurants and rides.  Siena wasnt so crazy about the rides as you can see by her face here!

There was no shortage of ice cream on this trip.  Siena even started to recognize "a collori" (albanian for dessert) in no time.  The time that Siena was able to spend with Nana Milie, her cousins, Auxhe Sokol and Tesia Jana really improved her understanding of the language.  The whole family was thrilled and couldn't believe how much Albanian she understood.  I wish that was the same case for Mama...maybe one of these years Siena will teach me.
Even with the beautiful sea right outside, Siena's favorite activities were right at home with Nana Milie and Baba.  She was quite the little helper around the house.

She also had a blast in the hose in front of the house...

We took a break from the beach and flew to Venice for a short get away.  Nana Milie came with us and we visited with our cousins Mary, Leta and Marco.  It was very hot while we were there but we still had a great time visiting this beautiful old city.  Here is a picture of the whole family at the famous Piazza San Marco.

We all had a great time on our trip and enjoyed spending so much time with our family.  We wish we didn't have to fly over 12 hours to get there but it was well worth it once we arrived.  I hope Siena is able to spend many summers with Nana Milie and continue to learn the Albanian language and traditions (or should i say superstitions...and there are many!) :-)