prugne e miele

Today was the wild bees first day out to feast on the plum blossom.

cuore di bue

A soft hint of summer this crisp March weekend.

mountain breeze

It is the perfect day for laundry and the low, clear light of winter is exquisite up here at 600 m. Who needs fabric conditioner when you have your very own mountain breeze. ..

Message from Le Marche

We found this tile on the roof of our house. It's message, we concluded, was written for those who found it, therefore for us. Thank you person who wrote these words, who made this tile, who built our house, who sent this message down the centuries to remind us that 'life is a flash of lightning'.

New Year gift

Three lorry loads of gravel were recently delivered. When moving the piles of perfectly graded stones one finds the occasional small foreign object, a fragment of ceramic tile, a broken piece of plastic tube, something from another kind of industrial environment. But when Sam found this, tossing it at my feet, it seemed like a talisman from a different place, a world of hay and straw and horses breathing warmly on our year ahead.

Surprises of Le Marche 1: snake cake

We were given many delicious cakes over Christmas, but the most surprising one was a decorated chocolate cake in the shape of a snake. I am trying to find the symbolism of this fanciful dolce di natale as I don't recall a serpent in the nativity scene. More soon.