Family-friendly Sicily: Marina di Ragusa

We've now been in Sicily for approaching four years, and I'm still surprised by how much of this gorgeous island we still have to explore! Last month, we visited Sicily's southern coast and had a wonderful first post-lockdown weekend in Marina di Ragusa. Our goal was really just to find a house with a pool and near a b [...]
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So, I bought a chicken with a face.

As I type this, there is a chicken head somewhere in my house. It still has eyes. And a beak, and a tongue. Also, it now has a name. Just in case you couldn't have gathered this from the fact that I'm even writing about it, this is a family first. It's been a while since I've had a classic Kasey misadventure to p [...]
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What we’ve been up to lately: summer edition

The weather has been beautiful (and HOT!) here in Sicily, and we've been keeping busy! Our main goal on a daily basis is to leave the house, as even though it is about 10 degrees cooler up on our mountain than it is at base, it is still broiling. We have air conditioning, but currently the main AC system isn't working [...]
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The Giro d’Italia comes to Sicily

Pausing this France recap for a minute -- Wednesday the kids and I watched a (tiny bit) of the Giro d"Italia! If you are unfamiliar, the Giro is a three-week bike race that is one of Europe's premiere cycling events, along with the Tour de France and Spain's Vuelta a Espa [...]
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We’ve been here HOW long?

During the first hectic couple of weeks here, when everything was either baffling or infuriating or both (I'm looking at you, government bureaucracy), Chris and I said more than once that we kind of wished we could fast-forward six months to when everything would have calmed down. Six months was always the marker we u [...]
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Planning for visitors (woohoo!)

So, yesterday Tuseday our first-ever overnight guest arrived! Our friend Mike (who we stayed with in Naples) is on the island for work, so he is staying with us so we can all hang out. If we haven't scared him off by Friday, his wife is also going to join us and we are go [...]
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What we’ve been up to lately

Well, somehow it has been more than two weeks since I posted. Um. Whoops. I certainly didn't mean to let that much time go by, but the combination of having a lot of freelance work due at the same time and just trying to get back into a routine made the days fly by. Some updates: 1) Owen started preschool! We hav [...]
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A train strike adventure for Chris

The scene:* Chris and his buddy Mike, sitting in the backseat of a stranger's vehicle somewhere in Rome. The Beach Boys' "Surfin' in the USA" is blaring and the non-English-speaking driver is singing along. A fellow passenger and birthday twin, James from Liverpool, is joining in. James' wife's jacket, studded with [...]
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The car hunt becomes urgent

Chris' summary of buying a car here, in our experience: "We'd like to buy a car, please." "Haha, LOL, good luck." So, as you may remember we are shipping our minivan to Sicily. It is on a boat somewhere in the Atlantic right now, I assume. Ever since we've arrived, we've been been looking for an island beater [...]
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