In the vineyard
Vacations with children were and remain the same...
After getting married and moving to Slavonski Brod, Ivana plunged into everyday family life. She gave birth to eight children, and she would describe their incidents and accidents in the letters she sent to her mother in Zagreb. That's how she once vividly described what the summers spent in the summer house Brlićevac looked like.
"The same story begins about how beautiful it is in our vineyard this year! But what is true is true! In fact, our entire villa, the plateau in front of it, the arrangement, etc. Everything is beautiful! (...) I'm sending you the vineyard program right away: in the morning you eat sour milk with profunta or coffee with bread rolls and butter. Then it is washed or not washed. This is immediately followed by the cursing of Ivo, which continues throughout the morning, as he either says he is hungry or asks when the meal will be ready. At noon, they eat outside, but since there is a sudden storm, thunder, cannon fire and fear of hail at the breaded chickens, everyone runs under the veranda with their plate, Zdenka knocks over the jug of water and breaks it, Naca runs up and down carrying glasses and wine... - Pancakes are then eaten under the veranda, without a tablecloth, the rain is pouring... - And now comes the last, most beautiful point, a living picture. Naca and I are sitting after dinner in the moonlight in front of the house, the children, barefoot and in their shirts, run outside to say good night, we take them on our lap, while Zdenka scrapes her leg on the kid's straw armchair. After the leg is washed with hypermanganese, the idyll continues, over the moonlit plain where the Sava winds like a golden streak."
