Yesterday, I shared a little bit about our experience in Rome and today I’m going to kick-off my 40 EATS series with a fun food experience we had while touring Rome.  After several hours at the Vatican and St. Peter’s Basilica, we were starving and asked our tour guide if he had any recommendations in the area.  Since we were in a really “touristy” area, most of the good restaurants were further away so we were hoping to find something decent close by.  The tour guide mentioned a little pizza place that he said was really good but he didn’t know the name of the place (which we thought was really strange!).  We followed his directions on how to get there and found this cute little hole-in-the-wall place that was packed with people.  We walked up a few steps and were greeted by someone behind a long counter.  We placed our order and they cut the pizza into rectangular pieces and then sold it to us by weight.  It was super cheap and absolutely delicious!

The place didn’t have anywhere to sit so we joined the rest of the crowd and sat on the steps or stood outside to eat.  While we were standing around, we looked up and saw the sign that said “Pizza al Taglio” and thought “oh, that must be the name of the place”.  As we made our way back to our hotel, we saw other places also called “Pizza al Taglio” and for a few minutes wondered if it was a chain.  Later that night, I was reading through one of our Rome guide books and learned that “Pizza al Taglio” means “pizza by the slice”.  My husband and I both started laughing since we were obviously so clueless and finally understood why our tour guide didn’t know the name of the place!

If you’re ever in Rome in the vicinity of the Vatican, you should definitely try out this hidden little gem.  When you exit St. Peter’s Basilica into Piazza San Pietro, walk to your left and through the large columns.  Then walk straight and turn right at the fourth street.  There will be a free-standing news stand on the corner.   Walk a few feet and you’ll see the little “Pizza al Taglio” storefront on the right!

Thank you for all the sweet comments on my first blog post!  Welcome to the first post in my series of 40 PLACES.  To celebrate my 40th birthday, my husband took me to Rome and it was awesome!  We actually went before my birthday and flew to Rome the first week of April – the perfect time of year!  It was my husband’s first time there and my second.  (However, my first time was part of a whirlwind “backpacking around Europe” adventure right after college so this was definitely a different experience!)  We took off from Tampa and flew through Newark to get to Rome.  We arrived early the following morning and spent most of our first day getting acclimated and rested.  And then the fun began!

The Vatican, Sistine Chapel and St. Peter’s Basilica

We signed up for a couple of “skip the line” tours prior to our arrival in Rome and I’m so happy we did.  When we arrived at the Vatican, I was floored by how many people were waiting in line to get in.  We would have been waiting for hours!  With the tour, we met our group and got right in.  The Vatican Museum was beautiful with such amazing works of art and the Sistine Chapel was spectacular to see in person.  Unfortunately we weren’t allowed to take any pictures of the Sistine Chapel so I don’t have anything to share but I’ll tell you it’s definitely a site to see!  After spending some time in the Sistine Chapel, we were taken into St. Peter’s Basilica which was another grand experience.  I don’t have the best photos from inside since it was quite dark but I think you can get a sense of what it’s like based on the photos below.

The Spanish Steps and Trevi Fountain

I loved that our hotel was in walking distance from the Spanish Steps and Trevi Fountain.  It was so much fun to wander and watch the hundreds of tourists visiting these landmarks.  One of the funniest things I saw was the number of people taking “selfies” at the Trevi Fountain.  I wish I took a picture of it because it was hilarious!  There were tourists from all over the world – all taking selfies!  I even offered to take a photo for one couple and they said “no thank you” because they wanted to take a selfie instead!  Too funny!

The Colosseum

The Colosseum was another place where we opted for a “skip the line” tour.  The tour was awesome because we got so much detailed information about the history, what took place inside and lots of stories and tidbits about life at that time.  It’s amazing that so much of this structure is still in tact and it’s even more amazing to imagine what it was like to attend an event at the Colosseum based on the stories told.

I have hundreds and hundreds of photos from our trip but just chose a few to share here to document the highlights of our journey.  We also went on a day trip to the Amalfi Coast and Pompeii during this vacation and I’ll be sharing that with all of you soon.  And, make sure you come back tomorrow for my first edition of “40 EATS” – Roman style!

Hello and welcome to my blog! Today is my 40th birthday (yes, I’m 40!) and I decided to start a blog that celebrates my past, present and future. Over the next year, I’ll be sharing the following 4 series of 40 to commemorate this milestone in my life.

40 places | I love to travel and have been fortunate throughout my lifetime to visit many fun places. I’ll be sharing pictures and stories from 40 places I’ve visited over the years. There will definitely be some “vintage” photos from my childhood and I really think this will be a fun trip down memory lane. Of course, as I go on new adventures, I’ll include them as well.

40 eats | Who doesn’t love to eat?! I’ve been to some fun restaurants and made some yummy recipes and I’ll be sharing them here. The restaurants will include anything notable from our travels as well as a few local ones here in the Tampa area. Recipes will be some of my tried and true favorites, Pinterest finds or anything else I come across that’s worth sharing!

40 pages | I love to scrapbook and started a #scrapliftingmarathon last year to use up my never ending stash. I will continue to make more pages this year and will use this space to share layouts I’ve scraplifted, layouts created from online class inspiration, layouts from sketches and maybe even a few designs of my own!

40 peeks | I read tons of blogs regularly and it’s always nice to get a little peek into other people’s lives. In this series, I’ll be sharing little peeks into my heart and home. Special stories, peeks into my scrapbook room, organizing projects (I’m hoping this will motivate me to get those unfinished projects finished!), etc.

In addition to the above, I’ll also share some of my Project Life spreads and other fun tidbits along the way.

Thanks so much for stopping by! Please leave a comment to say hello and I hope you’ll wander, explore and create with me! 🙂