one lovely afternoon in August, me and Diego we went for a bicycle ride along the lido, at one point we were attracted by the sweet frying onion fragrance in the air which brought back memories of the celebration of July 1st in Ottawa, where hotdog wagons selling the mouth-watering hamburger, hotdogs, and sausages....so we decided to find out where was this wonderful smell from by following the trail of it...here we go they were busily preparing the succulent "porchetto" piglets on the skewers, one of the famous plates in Sardegna, the owner told us that it would take at least 3 hours to prepared them, of course, sausages were also included in the menu... to finish with the plate, there were also barbecued eggplants, red pepper, oh yes, the onions.....yum, yum.  We did not have any of them coz we had our lunch before heading out for a bicycle ride.  We went through the old city and stopped in front of the harbour and admiring all the luxurious boats waiting for their next journey to the sea....it was such a lovely ride, the best way to enjoy the elegant old city,  great excersize and environmental friendly, why not??!!!

It was such a great feeling to be immersed in the crystal-cleared water .  We were lucky to find such a warm weather in November.  I am glad we did go to the beach because down in my heart I know that I will have to wait for the next summer before I can plunge into the water again plus outside is pouring since Sunday and we have to endure another few days of this grey and wet days before the weather changes, sigh....

It's wonderful to find these delicious red fuji hanging on our apple tree after being away for months.  The unique fragrance, nothing can beat fruits being matured under the sun (the natural process), which you really cannot find it from the stores:-)

王菲 - 但願人長久

Happy mid-autumn festival. I wish all of you out there will have a great celebration with your families, friends, loved ones etc., also I wish that this song will give you a special mood and warm feeling about this special and magical night....enjoy it.

MINA MAZZINI "Se telefonando"

bravaaaa...

Elisa - Almeno tu nell'Universo

lunch in the garden

Diego, Fabio and myself (invisible, as usual) are having lunch in our garden. Hammock hanging there always gives an idea that we should glide our body especially after meal to take a nice nap with birds chirping all over...peaceful...and then came the ant to pick up all the left over for his lunch? dinner? dessert???

keep calm and carry on

When I saw this fabric I told myself I had to do something with it and I did.  The serene country and farm's living gave me the inspiration to stitch that appropriate phrase and it is on sale now...

summer, beach

 

After 5 minutes by foot going through the pine forest and sandy path, here we go the amazing blue and pristine sandy beach close to our apartment!!!Oh, summer...that's what you really need...

lullatone - morning coffee

lovely music sounds like raindrops....soothing...

snow to cool you down in July

alright it's not the right theme for the summer but I think with this hot and humid heat blowing all the way from Africa towards the whole Europe, we really do feel the sizzling heat!!!  By looking at these photos will surely cool you down.  Don't get me wrong, these photos were taken while I was visiting my parents and my son at Ottawa, Canada in January this year...

mint leaves and ginger roots fried omelette

While I have prepared the pesto for Enrico, I have made myself this fried omelette for lunch.  I love it so much that I usually eat it with white rice and soysouce.  The wonderful smell of fresh mint and the ginger when they  are sizzling in the frying pan, release the fragrance that  it is able to trigger my sweet memory of  my hometown far far far away, my childhood, my parents (especially my mom when she was preparing this plate), dinners that were shared with the rest of the members of the family, and relatives that I have left behind...here you go,try it out...

Ingredients

A punch of washed mint leaves
A piece of fresh ginger root cut in julienne
One or two beaten egg or whole egg if you prefer
Some cooking oil
Soy sauce

Wash the mint leaves, cut the ginger in julienne.  Heat up the one spoonful of cooking oil and fry the ginger til brown and add the mint leaves.  Fry the mint leaves until soft then add in the beaten or whole eggs.  Once is done enjoy it alone with some soy sauce or with the warm cooked rice....

pasta con pesto

After these few days of rain,  basil plants are growing bigger and bigger each day from the garden.  So today I've prepared a plate of pesto with gnocchetti sardi (a small shell  pasta) for Enrico.  Pesto in Italian means grind, pound, or crush. Collect some basil leaves or buy them in the supermarket.  Here I have used a special knife "mezzaluna" half-moon knife to cut the leaves on the chopboard.  Add the garlic while you are cutting the leaves and, of course, pine nuts if you have some around.  Once you have reduced them  in a paste add good olive oil and salt to taste.  Obviously the last thing you must add to you plate is parmesan cheese...buonappetito

Ingrediets

A bunch of basil leaves        
Some pine nuts
2 or more cloves of garlic
good olive oil
100g  fettucini pasta or gnocchetti per  person
parmesan cheese

sunset

I could not resist but took out my camera to capture this beautiful sunset from my window, it was so breathtaking and I just could not stop jumping and uttering out "ooo!!!", "wow!!!", calling everyone away from watching world cup and admire this great scene.

Carmen Consoli - L'eccezione

Adore this female Italian singer...

two white dresses

These two dresses were made with letters that my dad sent to me.  I had photocopied them and glued them with a piece of fabric as backing and carefully cut them into strips, then machined stitched them on the white dresses.  Apart from the machine stitching,  Black threads were deliberately left hanging on the the dresses as though they were my thoughts.  I had also added hand embroidery and a mixed of white fabrics to give a feel of lightness to the ideas of  "thoughtfulness" and wishes to my dad...