Yes.  Of COURSE we had to take the "holding the tower up" picture.

Augh!  That tower is falling on my baby!

Look at that!  You bring an extra person along, and you get pics of the whole family!

Ok - this is what I got when I asked them to pose together for the camera.  How cute are these kids?

Answer: pretty cute.  Also? Messy.  How do you get peanut butter and jelly on your NOSE?

I don't know, Mommy!  She's a mystery!

Of course, the picnic deteriorates into feeding the pigeons. Is there a bigger thrill?

How about jumping right into a circle of them and freaking them all out?  That would be pretty thrilling!

Saw this little alcove, thought it was missing something...

Ah.  Exactly.  It was missing bellies.

Covered sidewalk in Lucca.  The town is teeny tiny, but freaking gorgeous.

Omar, our fabulous third set of hands.  I don't know what he was thinking when he asked to come along with us.  We really made him work for the "free" ride.

Cute. Cute. Cute.

Joe went down this alley to get a picture of the church.

The children took the opportunity of only one adult watching them to make a run for the door.

Instead of helping me, Joe chose to keep his distance and take these fabulous pictures of me chasing them down and dragging them back out of the church.  He's so helpful.

CHEEEEESE!

Ok, at this point it's possible that we were getting a little loopy...

Here are my children, running around like crazy people, chasing birds.

Here are my children, chasing birds directly at people trying to enjoy their meal (nothing goes better with dinner than a panicked pigeon flying right at your linguine, followed by a couple of pint-sized maniacs.)

Here is Violet, chasing birds alone.  Joe took this picture, then put down the camera, looked around, and realized he'd lost Jonas.  I saw the whole thing from our table, spotted the boy child, and saved him from being lost in the wilds of Tuscany without his family.  Joe is on probation.

My Twink, and the Florentine skyline.

My Twink, sitting on a wall over a 3948739847938 foot drop straight into the Arno.  I was across the street, peeing my pants, watching this whole process.  I hope you guys appreciate this picture of her and the Ponte Vecchio, considering how Joe risked her life to take it.

The Mona Viola.  I overpaid to get us into this completely lame DaVinci museum, but it all seemed worth it when we found this beaut of a photo-op.

"I WANT TO GO ON THE CAROUSAL!!!!!"

So we went on the carousal.  How could we not?

I have very strict rules against posting pictures that don't actually have any of us in them on this page.  If I ever set up a "travel" page, I'll put the 349837 pics of the Trevi Fountain we have on it.  For now, though, this is supposed to be about the kids. Which is why this shot of the leather market made the cut.  Look carefully - you can clearly see me, with Jonas in the sling, checking out purses.  See?  Kid page.

Joe knows I won't use photos without the kids in them, which is why he sometimes gets sneaky and sticks the stroller in front of something he wants a photo of.  Slick, huh?

Poor Jonas.  First he's posed with purses, then sculpture, and now jewelry.  Why does Violet get to ride the carousal, and poor Jonas just gets put in front of things for pictures?  He's not a lawn gnome!

Wow.  Someone's having a good day.

First the ride, now a donut as big as her head.  Nice.

These pictures tell a story.  First - "I want a bite! I want a bite!"

Yeah!  A big bite!  I want a big HUGE bite of that slushie!

WAAAAH!  Brain freeze!

Whoa.  That's a lot of birds. I wonder what could possibly be possessing them to stay this close to a two-year-old?

Huh.  Could be that 10lb bag of bird seed.

Yeah.  We totally caused a bird RIOT in St. Mark's square.  Apparently, we were the only ones with bird seed.

This is because they have outlawed feeding the birds.

Because they're gross and pushy and disease-ridden.

But there were no signs posted re: this new rule.

Last time we were there, we had bird seed and still the birds would not get near enough for the kids to touch them.

This time, the stupid things are landing on their arms.

Or their heads.  These are birds that have actually had to work for their food for a few months, and are SO EXCITED to see stupid tourists who don't know the new laws. They swarmed us.  It was freaking me out.

Much like the pics from Florence - this is a totally legitimate "kid photo".  Look there.  See?  Off in the distance?  Look for my striped top.  See the small person in pink walking next to me?  KID!

Ooh!  Look at this lovely piece from the Guggenheim's sculpture garden!

While in Venice, we play the "Can you find a lion with wings?" game.  They're everywhere.  On flags. In mosaics.  Paintings.  Statues. 

I can't remember who spotted this one first, but we know a photo op when we see one!

The boys manage to get a shot of both the big church in Sienna, AND the cutest father/son pair on the planet.

But whyyyyyyyyyyy can't I go in the fountain?  Huh?  What's with this fence?  Where's the fun in that?  I was just going to splash a little bit...

I'm trying to figure out why there are no pictures of Violet here, and I think the answer is she was with me and the camera was with Joe.  Please enjoy yet another shot of my Boobah in Sienna.  :)

This, right here, is the best girl in the world. 

Full story of the bag can be found here.

Violet gets in, decides the water is freezing...

...then dives in and swims around, anyway.

Jonas sticks his toes in, yells at the water for being so cold...

... then climbs in my lap and spends the rest of our pool time napping on me.

Every night, our resort had these "mini discos" for the kids.  The staff was great at getting them up and dancing.

Well, some of them just sat on their Mom.  It was past bedtime, after all.

Violet was always right up against the stage, though.  They danced, played games, sang songs - it was great.

The kiddos get up close and personal with some parrots...

... I get up close and personal with this stink bomb.  See that green on the right?  That's my shirt.  This hairy beast was breathing on my neck the entire camel ride.

Violet, enjoying the ride from the Captain's seat.

Jonas and I, not so much enjoying the ride from the seat that hung off the side of the mountain.

No really - see? 

Here we are, trying to look like we're enjoying ourselves.

And here we are afterwards, refusing to get any closer to the camels for a final pic.  Seriously - if anyone ever offers you a camel ride, punch them in the nose.

At the reptile show, first they passed around a gator..

..then they let them get as close as possible to my kid, sizing her up for snack possibilities...

.. then they handed on to her and walked away.

This is me, trying to keep at least one child safe from the hungry reptiles.

This is Joe and Violet, thinking I'm really lame.

Pony ride!

This zoo has PONY RIDES?!

This is the best zoo EVER!

Joe spent like 20 minutes trying to get a picture of Violet and me walking toward him in the jungle.

We kept getting separated by other tourists, or distracted by a flower or whatever.  He tried so very hard, however, that I'm putting not one, but TWO of his pictures up here.  There you go, hon.  Violet and Jenn in the jungle. :)

YOU GO SEA LIONS!  YOU SLIDING!

The sea lion show was just thrilling.

THRILLING.

Joe, apparently, was less than thrilled.

Because instead of watching the show...

.. he spent the time taking all these great pictures.

"Self Portrait with a Twink"

I love this family photo.  All four in one shot!  That's talent.

Like a zoo full of animals isn't enough.

They also had a big park.

With trampolines.

Look at the air these kids get!

Here we have some serious jumping.

Here, too.  When did this kid get so big?

Look at the size of him! 

And that's it for pictures of our zoo trip.  It was quite a day.

I'm willing to brave the frigid pool...

.. if I have a couple of warm bodies to snuggle with.

Madam dressed up for the kids-only pajama party.  Really, I can't recommend a Thompson family resort  highly enough, if you're traveling with small children. Because the beach and the pool and the zoo aren't enough, they also have a big park, and a "kid zone" where you can drop them off to play and do crafts, and the "mini disco" family dance parties at night, and the kid-only parties where they feed them 76 cookies and 4 bars of chocolate right before bedtime, and kid-friendly staff, and kid-friendly menus, and little kid pools...  it was wonderful.

Where the heck are we now?  The desert?

Did we get lost?  Have we left the island?

Oh!  Wait! I see something there in the background..

Ahhhh.  Look at that gorgeous water!

Totally worth schlepping a mile across monstrous sand dunes for.

The kids seem to think so, at least.

After a turn in the cold cold water, Madam has a lie down in the hot sand to warm up.

Joe and Jonas build a "kiddie pool". 

The theory was the water would be warmer in it, after it had a chance to bake in the sun a bit.

Unfortunately it didn't work out.  Those pools are hard to build.  More brave wading into the 40 degree ocean was in order.

The problem with walking for 30 minutes across the sand to get to the beach,

is that you then have to make the same walk back across to the car.

Please click on this and see Jonas's fierce look of concentration, as he attempts to climb the dune.  Hysterical. (If you could ignore me in the bathing suit, that would be great. Thanks.)

Different day, different beach.

This one was a much longer drive away, but totally worth it.

No big hike to the water, and once there there were all these cool tide pools full of warm water and fish.

Jonas?  What are you doing with that handful of sand?

Oh, duh.  I don't know why I ask questions when I already know the answers.

Violet always appreciates getting buried in the sand.

Jonas always appreciates getting to do whatever his sister gets to do.

See the tide pool?  It was like a little kiddie/wading pool.  Sooo much warmer than the deep water.

Perfect for wading and splashing.  (Yes, I'm wearing a tank top over my bathing suit.  My boobies were sunburned.  Why do they have to make one-piece suits so freaking low cut?)

Perfect for sitting very, very still and waiting for little fish to swim by.

Perfect for posing and smiling cheesy smiles for the camera.

Mommy?  Violet?  Why are you burying my feet?

Augh!  Come back!  I'm stuck!

Nothing can keep this kid still for long. Look at him - he's actually airborne here.

More cheesy posing for the camera.

Just a little bit sandy here.  It was fun trying to brush her off to get in the car.

One last shot of the Boobah at the beach. Both are so photogenic. :)

All that wading and digging and throwing sand really takes it out of you.

We managed to get him bathed and dried off, but he fell asleep before we could put a diaper on him and put him to bed.

Last day on the island...

.. just enough time for a visit to the park.

It's always a good idea to burn off some energy before hitting the airport.

Not a lot of climbing opportunities on the plane.

Joe tells me that immediately after this picture was taken, there was an incident which leads Joe to believe that we can only count on grandchildren from Violet.  Apparently, there was a lot of high-pitched screaming.

Here he is, though, looking fine.  Hardly walking funny at all.

Hey!  Are you telling the entire WORLD about my personal business?

I'd thank you to keep these little stories to yourself, please! Geesh!

This is a pretty lousy picture.  It's supposed to show you how excited the kids get when there's a fire truck outside.  How they rush out and stand there and yell "HI FIREFIGHTERS!" at the guys in it.  How they stand there, transfixed, staring at it.  Even when it's not doing anything exciting.  Even if it just sits there, idling, for 30 minutes.  Staring.  Transfixed.  But, all that's hard to capture on a little balcony with poor lighting.  Like I said - this is a pretty lousy picture.

This is the "rocket ship" climbing thigamabob at our park.  As you can see, Joe clearly feels it's time to "BLAST OFF!"

Oh, the kids are done patting and have jumped on the BLAST OFF wagon.  If you don't know what I'm talking about, you don't have enough Little Einsteins in your life.

Love the look of happy adoration Joe has here.

Jonas is looking back at him the same way, but the  view is blocked by a cute little camera hog.

Cheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeese!

Sigh. I swear I had those markers up where he couldn't reach them.

  Freaking growth spurt.

All cleaned up, and trying to look harmless.

And sweet.

Look at this face, Mommy? Does this really look like the face of a terrorist to you?

When I told Madam that I was going to take a picture of her for Daddy, she ran for the accessories.

Nothing says "Hi Daddy!  I love you! I miss you!" like putting on every bracelet you own for the camera.