Happiness is a Villa in the Tuscan Countryside

I know I've been scarce lately. I've mentioned how crazy things are at work and in my personal life. But I've recently been off the grid because I went on an amazing vacation. To Italy.

Go ahead, hate me. Because it was everything you've dreamed about and more.

I've got lots of posts lined up, about everything from art to food to how to make high-quality olive oil. But I thought I'd kick things off with a look at where we stayed.

There were lots of us on this trip: my mom and dad (who so graciously rented the villa and did all the planning), my mom's two sisters, my brother, his girlfriend, my husband and me, Flapjack and Lil' Goldfish, and my husband's mom and stepdad. Whew. So of course we needed a place that could sleep a lot of people. And we wanted a convenient location, close to a highway and train station, but not in the middle of a city.

Villa Mimmi fit the bill. Located in the stunning little village of San Casciano dei Bagni on the Tuscan/Umbrian border, Villa Mimmi is owned by a British interior designer. And it shows. This place looks good. It's just rustic enough to be completely authentic, but because it's owned by a city-dweller, the villa also sports all the mod-cons that make life comfortable.

The locals call Villa Mimmi "La Scuola," which means "The School." That's because it used to be the town's schoolhouse. In fact, many people we met in the village grew up going to school there. Once we knew it was a schoolhouse, we understood Mimmi's architecture a bit better. There's one long central hallway with all the rooms on one side, and each room has a little pull cord hanging from the ceiling. When we pulled the cord, a buzzer would go off, and a light would flash by the front door. I guess that's how the teachers used to signal that they needed assistance in their classrooms.

But today, Villa Mimmi sports a crystal-clear pool, a large, welcoming kitchen, lots of spots for lazy lounging and a lawn big enough for petanque or for letting little boys run wild. In fact, as my boys ran full-speed up and down the hallway, screaming at the top of their lungs (the marble floors made a great echo chamber), I imagined that Villa Mimmi was happy to be La Scuola once again.

So here are some pictures of my Tuscan dream home. This is the view down the hallway from the entryway:

This is the living room. It's hard to tell in this picture, but those are massive custom-made sofas. They seat about six each. And yes, someone did take the time to wrap almost all the books in white paper.

And here's where the magic happened. It's just what you expect from an Italian kitchen: a large, rough-hewn table with room for the whole family, lots of cooking utensils, a huge oven and stovetop and a breathtaking view of the Tuscan countryside.

Although it rained almost every day, we did have a few chances to lie around by the pool. And we had a beautiful feast under the stars one evening.

Here's the master bedroom. This picture doesn't do it justice:

This was my bedroom. The bed was hard as a rock and about two inches off the ground. After a long day of touring and walking all over a city, it was hard to get in the bed. And it was even harder to get my stiff, sore, creaking body out of it each morning. But I swear that was my only complaint.

Another bedroom:

This was Flapjack and Lil' Goldfish's room. Of course they wrecked it. Their dad had to scrub stickers off the floor the day we left.

Another bedroom:

This was my brother and his girlfriend's room. They wrecked it even worse than my boys did theirs.

The awesome bathroom in the master bedroom:

A view from the backyard:

(all photos courtesy of the Villa Mimmi website)

So there you have it. That's where I've been hiding out. I've got so much more to tell you about everything we did, so please stop back by soon!