Often in Italy holidays collide.
This Sunday is Palm Sunday and the locals all went to church… to get not palms, but olive branches. So is it Olive Sunday?
It happens to coincide with the trimming of the olive trees for the season, topping them off to be easier to harvest in winter.
It is also April 1.. in Italy pesce di Aprile…
april fools, so it is rather appropriate I found this lovely fish mold at the newly established Festa di Boccaccio, a market for Boccaccio, author of the Decameron who was born in Certaldo.
At the market I found other treasures too, like this woven heart, unfinished from this artisan from Scandicci. The reeds used for weaving the heart are from the Salice plant, weeping willows, the white ones have been cleaned of the dark outside bark.
The reeds are also used to tie up the vines , preparing then for the season.
Nothing goes to waste in the countryside.
Spring has been saved, no snow hit us in the Val d’elsa Valley,
my neighbor’s cherry is blossoming
I saw my first red poppies in the fields below olive trees down the hill from me.
Usually these appear in June!
a quick light lunch on a sunny spring day…
aglio olio e peperoncino.. with a touch of tomato
Perfetto!
