Surprise gift!

You know sometimes when you are waiting for a gift. You know it's in the mail because the person in the other end has given you the heads up. Everyday is like Christmas morning when you get home, hoping that bulky envelope will be waiting for you by the mailbox.

This has been my everyday since I got back from Sweden at Easter. I got the heads up from my friend in New York who said he'd found a perfect gift for me, about a month ago. Everyday since I have been eagerly waiting for that gift to arrive. Last week I thought I'd write him to tell him that some sneaky neighbour must have stole it since it hadn't arrived. And then, today it did.

Such a surprise, on my way home from the supermarket I bumped in to the signora who runs the downstairs coffeeshop. She asked me for my name and said the mailman had dropped it off today since the envelope was too large to fit in the small mailbox. She said they thought it could be me. I thought it was very sweet of them to think of me.

I unwrapped it as soon as I got in the door. It was the most sweet book ever. A children's book about Rome! With water colour paintings inside and the dearest little texts to make them company. It's like a guide book for small children but it's very clever. It made me very happy to know that he knows me that well, my old friend.
(Click on the photos to make them larger)

By the same author there are also the earlier books "This is Paris" and "This is London". This book was originally created in 1960 but has not been published until recently. The author's name is Miroslav Sasek.

I can highly recommend them for cute reading and extraordinary paintings!

Good night peeps!
Tomorrow I'm off to Veneto, the area surrounding Venice. We are opening a store in Portogruaro next week and I have to go and have a look!
Exciting!

Sunday lazy

Lazy Sundays. You either love them or hate them. I usually don't like them, they make me anxious of the coming week and instead of being all chill about it I stress.

So today I thought I'd do differently.

After listening to crazy smoking lady cleaning her house and smelling the fried garlic my Chinese neighbour family was having for breakfast I decided to escape the house. Put on my new fancy jacket from Zara (love Klein blue, just discovered it's my colour!), took computer under the arm and headed out in to the sunshine. Went to my fave bar on the corner of Piazza San Giovanni in Laterano, just a stone's throw from my house, and had caffé latte and a small croissant for breakfast.

I also wrote a few emails and tapped away on my MacJournal (like a diary program). Got a few looks from passerbys (is that how you write it or did I just make that word up?), I think it looked funny hawking over my computer screen in sunlight in the middle of the street. Whatever. Or, I looked extremely handsome in my new jacket!
Woop!

I eventually had to switch sides of the table as you can see, I was almost getting sunburnt on one side only. The difficulties of everyday life, haha. Soon I'm off to lunch with my friend Melina. We have found this nice little trattoria down the street from my house, basically 20 meters from the Colosseum. I always throught it was a classic tourist trap but passing by it one evening I realized it was almost only Italian people eating there! So, we tried it and we really liked it. Classic rustic Italian food and friendly service and cheap prices. How great!

Last week I was out and about for most of the days. After an extremely nice weekend by the sea I was well rested and super motivated.

BBQ at a friend's roof terrace, watching a game of soccer of course

The beach in Maccarese, the Roman coast

Lunch in Maccarese, spaghetti alle vongole and a glass of white wine with a couple of friends

Lunch in Fregene, always the spaghetti alle vongole and a crips glass of white wine

The summer campaign is in all stores now and bikinis are flying out quicker than we can get them in. It's so nice to be a part of all this! Bikinis for the people! We popped over to lovely Torino, in the north west. Such a nice little city, super lovely and very pretty. It also had a Swedish calm to it, in the evening the streets were empty and silent. It was lovely for a change but I think I'd go crazy after a week.

My colleague took me to a Sicilian restaurant (he promised me the Torinese food was more winterish and rustic and not ideal for the warm spring evening we had) and we had great seafood and even greater wine. The waitor had to explain the whole menu for us since it was written in Sicilian accent. It was a fun experience though, and a little bit of practice for when I have to go there!

The day after we were visiting shops in the area and then we spent the evening in Milano. Oh Milano, how I adore you. We found a small bar, from the outside it looked like a student bar but inside they had a small garden where we had great aperitivo with a huge buffet of nibbles and pasta and cheese to eat. How nice. Then dinner at The Kitchen, a legendary Italian restaurant run by Chinese people. It was super good and apparently very popular since the terrace was full!

The spring is finally here now and the days are long, warm and lovely. I'm getting more into Rome mode and I am actually beginning to like this town. Slowly slowly.


What have you been up to lately?Is it springtime yet, wherever you are?