New Year's Eve Fun!

Good-bye 2007.....hello 2008!

The brat pack (Jacque, Rob, Christine, and Matt) joined in the fun and rang in the New Year 2008 together. We braved the rain and ventured into the night at 10pm just in time to make it for some Ukelele playing, salsa dancing, and fireworks fun at Tina and Thomas' house in Aci Catena. After a few wrong turns compliments of our friend, TomTom, we made it through their 2 security gates and into the garage festa.

We met people from Alaska, and Hawaii, listened to some live Hawaiian tunes, and danced the evening away amid underwater art, Kalua pig, champagne, cigars, and good chats with new friends. We were lucky and had two Hawaiian gentlemen with Ukeleles, they played and sang some great ones as we counted down to the new year......2008. There's nothing better than a live version of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" to lighten the heart and warm the soul.

Matt and Rob decided to use their height to play a practical joke on the hostess, Tina......not sure how they got those down! What's worse is that they got Jen in trouble too! Boys will be boys I suppose.

Chris and Matt bought Panerea for cheap! Well, at least we got a painting of Panerea for cheap. Thomas is a great artists and his garage is filled with underwater magic. His specialty is aquatic creations. We managed to grab one of his above the water splendors. Now we just have to find a wall large enough in our house to display it properly! Panerea is one of our favorite places in Sicily so it was quite magical to find such a great find.

The fireworks over here are amazing....feel like blowing something up? Wanna catch something on fire.....just light an Italian firework! Tina's car will never be the same.....but hey, it's New Years! The "kids" got to play with all kinds of fun fire, us ladies, we liked the sparklers!

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!

MAY 2008 BE BLESSED WITH LAUGHTER, LOVE,

AND GOOD TIMES FOR YOU ALL!

Cheers- Christymatt

PJs + Martinis = FUN!

Crepes.....birthdays......PJs......and Martinis, what a combination!

So there we were munching on great Italian bread and bean soup when the idea sprang forth.....let's have a Martini party and hey, let's wear our PJs too, so we're nice a comfortable. and thus.......the First Annual (annual because I think we can only handle it once a year) Martini/PJ party was born. We brought all the fixin's and Pat made crepes for supper. Everyone had their own glass and the "bartenders" got to work. First there was a little too much gin.......yuck! Then there was a little too much Vermouth.......double yuck! Then they were just right.






I believe we each drank about 4 of those little babies on average and BOY did our heads pound the next day. Fun was had by all though, and we finished off our evening by playing Taboo and Rummy-O.... two games that actually require your brain to function properly and not the best games to play when one has had 4 Martinis......but hey, it was fun anyway!









Our evening was filled with celebrations. We got to celebrate the birthdays of two of our dear friends--birthday buddies Rob and Kendra, and helped Pat ring in another D-Day. The evening was filled with laughter and good times.

I feel so lucky to have such a great group of friends and playmates so to speak. Here's to next year's festa. Thanks for the laughs!



Cheers- Christine

It's Almost a New Decade!

39 is the NEW 29!

Our good friend Rob just turned..........well, you can read the title. We had a lovely little celebration before we headed off to the PJ/Martini Party at Pat's.....more on that later though.

We wish him all the best for a great year and are so happy that we got to ring in his final year in the 30s with him. Looking forward to

many more happy birthdays together.

A Hour and a Half Later.......

My Return to Blogger via Google Accounts........

So here it is.....the day after Christmas and I'm thinking, yea, I'll post my new images to flickr and maybe even update my blogspot site. Well, little did I know that it would take me an hour and a half to get a darn password to work on google's login page. I'm so angry that I can't even see straight and want nothing to do to blogger or google or gmail or any of that stuff!



If I never see the words "please re-enter password" again I'll die a happy woman! Talk about a great way to totally RUIN the holiday spirit. In other news.....the Arnolds now have an email account that's just for their friends and family.

ChristyMatt.Sicily@gmail.com. I figured out that the only way it'd let me do anything productive was by creating a new gmail account. Apparently I was right so now we've got two goodies for free. A new spam free email account and an updated blog. Yea.

Here's a few snap shots of our Christmas here in Sicily. There are way more on our flickr site. Make sure and have a look around.

As one of my goals for 2008, I want to update this site more often for my friends and family. I know, I know, you've heard THAT before.....but this time I really mean it. The best laid plans......here's to hoping it'll stick this time.