{"id":86,"date":"2020-03-09T07:52:02","date_gmt":"2020-03-09T07:52:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/?page_id=86"},"modified":"2026-05-01T13:03:23","modified_gmt":"2026-05-01T13:03:23","slug":"our-story","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/our-story\/","title":{"rendered":"Our Story"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Our Italian farmhouse sits tucked into a south-facing slope below the medieval center of a small city in the Piedmont region.&nbsp; How we got here, how we found and remade the house, and what it\u2019s like to live here\u2014all these are parts of the story I want to tell.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Our love affair with Italy began in 1983.&nbsp; During the next 25 years we returned for milestone birthday and anniversary celebrations and to renew friendships, and at some point the fantasy of retiring in Europe shifted from aspiration to intention to reality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">We arrived Mondov\u00ec in August 2012, traveling by road and two ferries\u2014from Tbilisi to the Black Sea; across Anatolia, Thessaloniki, Macedonia, Albania, to Brindisi; up the coast and then overland from San Marino to Mondov\u00ec&#8211;a journey of almost 4000 km (2485 miles).&nbsp; A year to find and buy the house, a year of planning and obtaining permits, 15 months of demolition and reconstruction; by December 2015 we were at home.&nbsp; We continue finishing and improving, decorating and burnishing, gardening and landscaping.&nbsp; We have friends, both English speakers and Italians; we have doctors, an accountant, a banker, a pharmacist.&nbsp; We buy fresh food in year-round open air markets: vegetables and fruit in season; alpine cheeses and artisanal breads; fresh fish; chicken, rabbit, and pork from local producers.&nbsp; It\u2019s a quiet life full of simple pleasures&#8211;time for coffee with a friend, a walk in nearby mountains, pottering in the gardens or the woods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Welcome to our website.&nbsp; <strong>Who We Are<\/strong> tells you a bit more about us.&nbsp; <strong>Our Story<\/strong> tells how we realized our dream of retiring to Piemonte, it continues below.&nbsp; <strong>Postcards from Mondov\u00ec <\/strong>is a collection of articles previously published in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.margutte.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Margutte<\/a>, an online literary publication.&nbsp; In <strong>Other Places, Other Times<\/strong> you\u2019ll find the chronicle of our road trip from Tbilisi to Mondov\u00ec, plus writing about places we\u2019ve been privileged to travel, from Alexandria to Zanzibar.&nbsp; In my <strong>Blog<\/strong> I post photos and brief observations to keep you current with our life as it rolls on. Thank you for reading.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-8f761849 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/2012-2013\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"681\" src=\"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/BEFORE-May-2014-1-2-1024x681.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-90\" srcset=\"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/BEFORE-May-2014-1-2-1024x681.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/BEFORE-May-2014-1-2-300x199.jpg 300w, https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/BEFORE-May-2014-1-2-768x511.jpg 768w, https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/BEFORE-May-2014-1-2-1536x1021.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/BEFORE-May-2014-1-2-2048x1362.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><strong>2012-13<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/2014-2\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"681\" src=\"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/DURING-scaffolding-all-around-11-Dec-2014-1024x681-1024x681.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-39\" srcset=\"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/DURING-scaffolding-all-around-11-Dec-2014-1024x681.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/DURING-scaffolding-all-around-11-Dec-2014-1024x681-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/DURING-scaffolding-all-around-11-Dec-2014-1024x681-768x511.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><strong>2014<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/since-2015\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"681\" src=\"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/AFTER-Oct-2015-1024x681.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-87\" srcset=\"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/AFTER-Oct-2015-1024x681.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/AFTER-Oct-2015-300x199.jpg 300w, https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/AFTER-Oct-2015-768x511.jpg 768w, https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/AFTER-Oct-2015-1536x1021.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/AFTER-Oct-2015-2048x1362.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><strong>2015<\/strong> (to be continued) <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Our Italian farmhouse sits tucked into a south-facing slope below the medieval center of a small city in the Piedmont region.&nbsp; How we got here, how we found and remade the house, and what it\u2019s like to live here\u2014all these are parts of the story I want to tell. Our love affair with Italy began<br \/><a class=\"moretag\" href=\"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/our-story\/\">+ Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"templates\/page-fullwidth_template.php","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-86","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/86","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=86"}],"version-history":[{"count":27,"href":"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/86\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2050,"href":"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/86\/revisions\/2050"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}