There are no words to describe how lucky and amazing these past 14 days have been traveling through Europe.❤️🇫🇷🇭🇺🇪🇸 I am so thankful that I was able to provide my girls with these outstanding experiences that they could not get sitting behind a desk in school! Also so lucky that we had a great family of friends to do this experience with! 💑👫 Our kids learned about art🎨, adventure🗺, geography🌍, volcanoes🌋, famous sights🏟🗼 and festivals📽🏎, foreign currency 💶, history📜, sports ⚽️, religion💒, foreign cuisine 🍝🐌, courage 💪🏽and responsibility🎒, culture 🇭🇺🇫🇷🇪🇸and language👄. They learned to use and weren’t afraid to try to speak Italian and French. They learned about famous artists🎨, and art periods and enjoyed critiquing the pieces of art. 🖼As I sit here on the plane back to NY ↩️🗽 and go through my pics📸 and reminisce of the adventures we had and the sights we saw I think the most fitting would be to have a top 10 list. 📝So here it is in the order of our trip. The TOP 10 MOST Memorable/Beautiful/Special/Amazing Moments of our Europe 2016 Vacation with the 4 Shaps!!!! 💑👭

1. Visiting the Ancient Greek Theater 🏟in Taormina with Mount Etna🗻 and the Meditteranean Sea as our a backdrop. Most notably when the random lady sung Josh Grobins “You lift me up” 🎶and silenced 100s of people. Awe. Then dining that night at the most romantic and beautiful restaurant I’ve ever been to!🍝🍕#goosebumps

2. Day trip to the Aeolian Islands🏝, when we set sail⛵️ during sunset and had the most magnificent rainbow pastel skies🌅. Most notably was the Volcano 🌋on Stromboli and the juxtaposition of life and death on the mountain that was separated by lava landslides. #mothernatureinallherglory

3. Pisa has been on my bucket list ever since 2005 the first time I went to Italy. We could never fit it in until this time. Not only did we get to see the Leaning Tower of Pisa and the Baptistry 🏛but we basically had the whole piazza to ourselves. An anal photographers dream come true! 📸Most notable moment was tucked behind the leaning tower inside a quaint little church.💒 Housed behind the glass was one sacred thorn from Jesus Christ’s crucifixion crown🗽. #breathtaking

4. Arriving at the playground for the rich and famous in the French Riviera was one big bucket list check after another:Cannes, Monte Carlo and Nice were the highlights and they were spectacular! These towns are known for the glamour and beauty and that’s exactly what we got on my 37th birthday.🎉🎈🎁🎊 It was fun imagining what it would be like to be part of the glitterati come May during the Cannes Film Festival 📽and the Formula 1 Grand Prix Race🏎. The highlight was driving a lap of the Grand Prix and crossing the finish line all the while watching the views from above down to the megayachts⛴! #goalsformy40thbirthday

5. The 1st time we came to Marseilles on our cruise 🚢a few years ago we had to stay in the port because Shane was a baby and the cruise tours were too difficult. Not this time. We found a cab 🚖and we were on our way to Aix en Provence! Little did we know that on Saturday’s they had a huge flea market. 🛍💶Half way through our trip we were already tiring 💤and this is exactly the kind of down day we needed. We slowly winded our way through the stalls snagging great bargains and enjoying each other’s company. Shoutout to the stand that sold me my handy dandy black scarf that I used for the rest of my trip! #unpreparedforwinterweatherinfrance

6. I like soccer but I love watching my kids play soccer. ⚽️Put that together and watching Dylan’s excitement as we toured Camp Nou, the FCBARCELONA stadium 🏟was definitely a huge highlight of the trip. The colors of the grass and signage around the empty stadium were bold and bright and you can only imagine the pandemonium that ensues during a soccer game. 👏🏽#feeltherush

7. Arriving in Naples for the 3rd time and attempting the Blue Grotto in Capri made me anxious.🔵 Was it finally going to happen this time? Once we arrived outside the grotto and saw how many boats were waiting packed with tourist and then counted the amount of rowboats 🚣🏽carrying 4 people in a time, I started to feel hopeless once more. Since I believe in signs I figured this was God’s way of telling me to let go and it just wasn’t meant to me. But it was hard to give up hope on seeing one of the worlds greatest wonders. But when the rowboat 🚣🏽finally arrived by outside 2 hours later I never jumped so fast. I imagine this excitement is what it felt like for Gilligan once their boat came and rescued them. After seeing the Blue Grotto 🔵in all its glory we came to find out that the grotto was closed for the past 4 days because of inclement weather and would be closing once again in the next hour because the waves were starting to get too choppy. 🌊Frozen to the bone but happy as can be is how we felt heading back to Capri! #whenthingsaremeanttobe

8. It’s easy to understand why Paris is called the most beautiful city.❤️ It’s clean, it’s ornate, it’s romantic, the history is rich and the buildings and the sights are beautiful. Having dinner on the top of the Eiffel Tower took the cake. 🗼Then the cherry on top was standing on the bottom and watching the dazzling and twinkling lights 🌟🌟🌟of the tower, even if it was for just a minute, the memory will last forever in our minds, and on my iPhone…#welcometothecityoflights

9. Disney is the happiest place on earth, and this held true for Disneyland Paris and Walt Disney Studios as well. 🐭🏰The kids were super excited but so were we because for once we didn’t know what to expect from a Disney park. Having been to Disneyworld and Disneyland several times, as fun as it is to experience, you already know the drill…you wait over and hour for a mediocre 1 minute ride. The highlight was Space Mountain and not knowing it was an upside roller coaster! 🎢🔄We were lucky enough to fit both parks and dinner in Disney Village in, in one day! #HongKongDisneyyourenext

10. Having only 1 full day in Paris to do all of our sightseeing seemed very daunting. 😱But we basically got it done in one full day and 1 hour the next morning. The highlight was the amount of culture, history and art history 🖼🎨the girls learned in 24 hours. The pictures we took were priceless and thankfully the weather held out for us. The Mona Lisa, Starry Night, Picasso paintings, Notre Dame💒, famous Eiffel Tower pic…I’m not sure which was my favorite memory! #jetaimeparis

15 days of fun. 🎉Making memories, spending quality time with half our brood. Late nights and early mornings, foreign food and aching feet. Pasta, pizza and more pasta and pizza. caprese salads, 9 euro cokes, frizzante waters. French and Italian, google translator and broken English. Sunsets, rocky boats, warm sun, bitter cold and even some hail! Major sights, spectacular views, hidden gems. Best friends👭👫, happy kids and parents👸🏽👸🏼👨🏻👨🏻, memories being made, recorded and photographed📸. Thank God for Facetime because we were able to keep up with our boys and we eagerly awaited 1pm everyday which is about when Shane would FaceTime us with his messy hair and pjs. Thankful for Facetime, dropcams and text messaged videos. And then just like that it was over. Back to real life. Time to daydream the next one…🙎🏽💭💭💭