Isabel in Florence
My name is Isabel and I am six years old.
Here I am dancing with lots of other children made of marble and who are playing musical instruments and singing.
I am in Florence.
Please go to Florence, it’s a lovely place.
I recommend five days in Florence. We took the train from Rome, the trip is one hour and a little bit more. Go to the hotel everyone loves, it’s a hotel we recommend to all of our clients. If you go there near Christmas it is going to have a presepio.
A presepio is something with little baby Jesus with Mary and other figures and Joseph and the donkey and the ox. It is in the hotel’s window so everyone can see it and if you are good you can help them to arrange it. There are also very nice lollipops at the desk. Try one, they’re excellent.
There are also little candies but I do not recommend these as much as the lollipops.
There is a wonderful children’s toy library in the Hospital of the Innocents.
It’s not a library where there are books. No, no, here there are toys. I recommend playing here, especially if your parents are doing something that is not very interesting to you like a museum that you don’t like.
Maybe your mother can stay with you while your father is at the museum. There are excellent dolls, mirrors, a Noah’s ark, Lego, animals to play with (they are pretend). And children’s books in Italian and in English.
If you get hungry, don’t ever go to a place with enormous ice cream.
Don’t even touch those. And don’t just go anyplace. I recommend “Perchè no!” where I had chocolate and lemon. One was sour and one was sweet but very good sour and very good sweet.
These are the owners.
This lady and this man and their children make all of the delicious ice creams. They sometimes give children samples. I sampled pear and it was yummy.
And to eat at lunch or dinner, there is a very good restaurant I recommend. It is called “Acquacotta” , and it is run by a lady who can read your mind.
I wanted to have the dessert menu and the lady brought it. I had wonderful homemade crema ice cream and chocolate ice cream. The first thing I had to eat was penne con pesto, which was my first course, which I think you will like.
There is something funny in Florence which is that they don’t put salt into their bread. You won’t like it at first. There is one bread though that you will like right away, it is called ciabatta, which is slipper, or ciabbattina, which is little slipper.
This tastes so good and it is cute and it has a little bit of salt in it.
There is a toy store that I recommend, called City of the Sun. In Italian it is Citta del Sole.
There is a doll’s house. There are magic wands. If you are very small or a baby, there are a few special things here that I recommend, for example sea creatures that spin.
If your parents insist on a morning museum, you should insist on a morning fratte. These you can find really in just one place. These are doughnuts and they are very good. They have sugar on the top and they are warm.
They look and they smell like a pastry and they taste like a pastry too. I thought I would never love a doughnut but the fratte is different. You can sit down to eat them or stand up.
There is a very nice store with art supplies in it. There are many people here buying painting things and chalks and crayons and everything you might want to draw and paint Florence. It is near the City of the Sun and is very good.
I love her.
It’s not that she takes everybody with her on her tours, she takes a few people, like a father and mother and one child or two children with her.
Meet Marjorie
Insider’s Italy is an experienced family business that draws on my family’s four generations of life in Italy. I personally plan your travels. It is my great joy to share with you my family’s hundred-year-plus archive of Italian delights, discoveries and special friends.