Our week at Villa de Teatro could not have been a better way to spend my husbands 50th birthday and family reunion. His mother, brother and sister and their families met us from Holland where they live and we flew from Los Angeles with our two sons.

We were a group of 13 (ages 15-76) in an authentic, roomy 9 bedroom Tuscan villa with all of the modern conveniences. The grounds were park-like and included a swimming pool and lots of places to lounge around.

There was a small table and chairs on a deck overlooking vineyards and the country side where we could drink coffee in the morning and a large enough picnic table for all us of to sit around and have dinner at night. One night our host and villa owner served up the best meal we had in Italy with fresh vegetables and pasta and homemade torte for dessert.

The younger members of our group enjoyed walking into the town of Bucine at night for a game of darts at the local bar. The stairs behind the villa led to the train station which we took to Arezzo for the once a month antique market on Sunday. During our week stay, we visited San Gimignano, Siena, Cortona, the designer outlet stores and the local sights around Bucine, all of which were in a days drive.

WE CAN'T WAIT FOR THE NEXT FAMILY BIRTHDAY TO DO IT ALL OVER AGAIN!