Villefranche-Sur-Mer

We ended the trip in the French Riviera in Villefranche-Sur-Mer where we were hoping to find the sun and the beach. While we did get the sun on the first two days, the rest of our trip poured rain. We anchored ourselves in the town of Villefranche each night, but hopped along the Riviera by train each day to visit the towns of Nice, Cannes, Antibes and Monaco.

Dan finishing one of his great e-mail trip updates on the train

Our hotel in Villefranche

The town of Villefranche-sur-mer...beautiful!!

Dan being silly at dinner


As you can see he was cracking me up :)

More scenes from Villefranche

Beach in Villefranche

NICE

We spent one day in Nice on the beach

BACK in VILLEFRANCHE

a little snack on our balcony

The best gnocchi ever!! We had it 3 times we loved it so much

CANNES

We spent one beach day in Cannes

location of the Cannes film festival

BACK in VILLEFRANCHE

We walked along this cobblestone path each day to get to our hotel from the main town/train

chilling on our hotel balcony

ANTIBES

We spent one rainy day in the charming city of Antibes

Picasso Museum in Antibes

views from the Museum

We are drenched

I bought this cute plaid umbrella in town so that I could continue shopping :)

MONACO

We spent our last day in Monaco--another rainy day

Monte Carlo

lunch with views of Monte Carlo

Royal palace

church where Grace Kelly is buried along with her husband

Grace Kelly's burial stone

LAST NIGHT in VILLEFRANCHE

BACK HOME IN SEATTLE

Our painting beat us home from Bruges

Happy Autumn!

Well it seems that Fall has officially arrived in Seattle. I hope you all had a wonderful summer and are easing back into the school year. Once again I have fallen WAY behind on our Rossi blog. Dan and I are leaving for Ohio tomorrow for his brothers wedding. I had hoped to post pics of our recent Europe trip before leaving, but will instead let you catch up on the rest of our spring/summer and will goal myself to post pics of Europe/the Ohio wedding after we get back next week. Hope you are all doing well!!

Mandy and Dan

Anniversary #7

On August 17th Dan and I celebrated our 7th Anniversary. We had a wonderful evening that began with flowers and a cute card from Dan. No itch here :)

Visit with my Che-town Girls!!

On August 10th I met up with my high school girlfriends at Carrie's house in Mill Creek. We try and see each other every summer if possible and had the best time catching up. I feel so blessed to have such wonderful friendships that go WAY back!!

Kara, Carrie, Becky, Aryn, and Me

A cake for the summer birthdays

Chehalis BBQ Competition

On August 8th and 9th Dan and Dad competed in their annual Chehalis BBQ competition. They placed 4th with their chicken this year. Dad also won a trophy in the car show portion of the event for his 55 Chevy.

Sounders vs Barcelona

On August 5th we attended the Sounders vs Barcelona game. Dan was thrilled as he was able to see Lionel Messi play. Messi is Argentine and one of the best players in the world. He scored two goals on the Sounders in the first half -- eek!

Messi

Messi was named Man of the Match

Neighborhood Block Party

On Tuesday August 4th our neighborhood had our annual block party to go along with the National Neighborhood Night Out. As always it was a great showing with good food and friends.

Our neighbor Kylee

Record Breaking Heat in Seattle

On July 29th Seattle hit a record breaking heat wave of 103 degrees. Since none of our homes have air conditioning most of Seattle was congregating at the Lake to cool off. This is a picture of Greenlake at 10pm. There were at least 200 people on different sections of the lake cooling off.

White Salmon with the Millers

On August 1st through the 3rd we joined our neighbors, Dustin, Dania, and their dog Lilly on a trip to Dustin's home town of White Salmon, Washington. We had a wonderful weekend touring the local wineries, swimming with the dogs, and checking out White Salmon and Hood River. The area was just beautiful!

We made a stop at Multnomah Falls before reaching White Salmon and we all hiked to the top of the falls

Upon arriving at Dustins parents home Rufus found an apple to play fetch with. Look at how happy he is

The view of the Gorge from Dustins parents home

Maryhill Winery

Rufus and Lilly

view of Mt. Hood from Dustin's parents home

Swimming with the dogs in the river. Rufus was in heaven again!

Sunset while eating dinner on Dustin's parents deck