un cap de setmana molt bo - a really good weekend

We were fortunate enough to be invited to spend the weekend with some friends in their family country house in the village of Arbeca in the Catalan countryside.  I didn't get nearly as many pictures of the highlights as I would have liked but I suppose that meant I was having too much fun just enjoying it.  It was so nice and we're still happily recovering ; ).  Ahhh.

For this post some guest writers are joining me because they have a lot to say about all of this --

Aoife & Aine:  We're going in the car to see Maria's little house.

Aoife:  We're still riding in the car.  I love Maria a lot and we're going to her house.
Aine: Hey, there's Maria's car (the little blue one to the right)!

 Aoife:  I liked playing dominoes.

 Aine:  We didn't do the horses one yet (that's still to come).

Aoife:  We're drivin' that truck.
Aine:  Where's Maria, Mommy?  I don't see her.

 Aoife:  I'm riding the horse that was at the toy museum. 

 Aine:  It went around.  Around.  Around.

 Aoife:  Here I am riding the Mickey Mouse thing.

 Aine:  For starters, I'm the one with blue and the really big smile.  We're riding with each other.

 Aoife:  We're going to ride with the horses and we're going to have lots of fun.

Aoife:  And I had fun on it.  And Maria had fun on it.
Aine:  Me too!

 Aine:  Daddy and Aine riding the carousel, the horses ... carriage!

 Aine:  I don't see Nuria and Isaac.

 Aine:  Now I see them.  There's Nuria and Isaac and Maria and Aoife!

 Aoife:  We had fun on the horses and I got the purple balloon, Maria got orange and Aine got white.

Aine:  Those are the chickens and roosters.  They're a little the same.
Aoife:  But they're a little different.  'Cause the roosters have a crest.
Aine:  And the chickens go, "Bawk, bawk."  The roosters go, "Kikiriki, Mommy."
Aoife:  You mean, "Caca-doodle-doo."  ... and that babies say, "Pio-pio-pio."  And the chickens lay eggs for the babies to come out.
Aine:  And we get the eggs and eat them up.  Like we did this morning.

 Aoife:  We were picking tomatoes in the garden.

Aine:  It's Maria's little house.  We're playin'.

 Aoife:  It's Maria's little house (all four stories of it).

 Aoife:  We were peaking out the door to see the flowers.

Aine:  We each had our own umbrellas.
Aoife:  And this is of us seeing the really old castle.

 Aoife:  Jumping.

 Aoife:  And petting the horses.

 Aine:  I have my baby and my hat and I didn't want to pet the animals.

Aoife:  That's a picture of us leaving and wanting to go back home.
Aine:  And we sleeped in the car 'cause we were sleepy.
Aoife:  'Cause we did lots of things.


Aine: My favorite thing was riding the horses and the balloon and the toy museum.

Aoife:  The most favorite thing that I liked was riding with the horses and getting a balloon and going to the toy museum.

Some quick notes:

Arbeca is about an hour and a half drive away from the city, so it was a quick easy get away.  Nuria is Ana´s, Aine's teacher, sister.  Maria and Aoife are in the same class at school, and great friends, as you can see.  This is the home that their mother grew up in and it now serves as a great little family retreat.

The ruins we went to are Iberian and nearly 3000 years old, so I suppose "old" is a bit of an understatement.

We ate a ton of great food including the best paella we've ever had, made at home by Nuria -- she even made the fish stock to cook it all in from scratch!  We also had the best baby clams we've ever had the next day at lunch.

The village was fantastic, the neighbors incredible.  We came home with fresh eggs and tomatoes that the children gathered plus a full tray of fresh, delicious nectarines.

It was a wonderful time and we feel so fortunate to be making such great friends.