Christmas is Coming!!

When we returned to Rome from our trip to Sorrento, we found the streets lined with lights, garlands over the doors, and Nativity sets or "presepes" in churches and stores. The Christmas season has begun here in Roma! Christmas markets are popping up all over the city and the most famous one is in Piazza Navona.

Little George and I have gone quite a few times already! The stalls sell lots of carnival style junk but they also sells Nativity set pieces, ornaments, Befana, and lots of yummy food including Christmas sweets. Little George loves visiting because there is a merry-go-round (which we have not gone on yet but will before we leave), ballons, the famous fountains and lots of people. All of this provides him with lots to look at and many opportunities to ask "waz dat"!

I also bought a few animals for our Nativity set back at home and he loves playing with them. He can identify almost all of them. When we ask him to bring us a certain animal, he normally brings it to us and he takes such pride in showing us the animal. He particularly likes kissing the cat!

We started the Advent season off right by attending the First Advent Vespers with Pope Benedict XVI at St. Peter's Basilica. This is the high point of our entire trip to Italy! This was the first time that we as a family went to a papal event together. We ended up getting pretty good seats kind of close to the front and right next to the aisle that Benedict comes down. We also happened to be sitting near a Gendarmerie (a Vatican police man) who ended up taking a shine to Giorgio. When Benedict came down the aisle, the Gendarmerie encouraged us to stand Giorgio up on the barrier.

The vespers itself was beautiful, particularly the music. When vespers was concluding and it was time for the Pope to begin to exit, the Gendarmerie told us to go to the back of the church near the curtain that the Pope goes through to exit the crowd. He had a fellow Gendarmerie escort us to the back, saying "Permesso speciale bambino" as he walked through the crowd (hehe our special child) and then told a Swiss Guard at the barrier that we were there to hopefully have little George blessed by the Pope!

Unfortunately I do not have any photos of the Pope blessing George

As Pope Benedict approached, George held Giorgio as far as he could into the aisle and when Benedict passed, he looked at Giorgio, gave a little smile and then blessed him by making the sign of the cross. Oh we are and were so very excited to have little George blessed by Pope Benedict XVI!!

We have a holy boy! He actually loves going into churches! When we enter a church, the first thing he wants to do is get out of his stroller, walk over to the holy water font, insists on being picked up so he can put his finger into the holy water font and then proceeds to make his version of the sign of the cross.

When we walk around the church, I will sometime stoop down to his level to point out something to him and then he will kneel down to make the sign of the cross. He is so adorable! He also can say "cross". When I was in a religious good store, he pointed to a cross and asked Judy "waz dat". She answered that it was a cross and he repeated her. He is growing up so fast!

He has three other new words that he says; "Grazie", "Rob" and "Boom". He first said "grazie" when we handed him a toy. Now he says it all the time and will hand something to us in order for us to return it to him all so he can say "grazie". Our friends, Rob and Judy live above us and when Rob comes down the stair he normally makes a little noise. Georgie will always ask "was dat" and we answer that it is Rob. At dinner the other day, he heard Rob coming down the stair, pointed toward the door and said "Rob". Little George also likes to say "boom" when he throws his ball in imitation of Dad, who also says "boom" when throwing the ball. He also is a monkey...

Recently we have seen some family and friends from home. George's Dad visited us for a few days last week. We visited a few churches with him and took him to Palazzo Barberini, which is an amazing art gallery. He wanted to visit the Ukrainian church in Rome so on Friday we all took a cab to a modern part of the city to visit the church. The entire church was covered inside and out in mosaics! Stunning!

We also visited Santa Susanna, the English church in Rome...

and Santa Maria della Vittoria, the church that has Bernini's famous St. Teresa in Ecstasy.

On Wednesday, little George and I were heading towards the Vatican to visit some churches in the Borgo area and to do a little shopping when we happen to run into an old friend of George's, James. They had grown up in the same neighborhood. He is a seminarian at the PNAC and we had gone to his diaconate ordination earlier this semester where little George and I met him. James ended up joining little George and I in visiting Santa Maria in Transpontina, Santo Spirito and went shopping with us.

Santa Maria in Transpontina

He also ended up showing us the Venerable English College, which I had not know anything about. We were able to get into the English seminary and see their chapel. They have a beautiful painting of the Trinity.

Sorry its not the best quality photo

James invited us for lunch back at the PNAC and we ended up also seeing two of my friends from college, Brandon and JP. It was a nice surprise to spend the morning with James and have lunch with friends.

George turns in his final studio project tomorrow this Saturday at midnight and after that he is basically done! He only has to present the project and go to one more class! We are excited about having some time to spend in Rome as a family without having any work hanging over George's head!!! Then in two more weeks (13 days actually), we are coming home!