.....Some examples of the beautiful blown glass items for sale in shops on every corner. These particular ones are extremely expensive, but smaller items sell for much less, of course. We found out that it is definitely frowned upon by shop owners for tourists to take photos of their window displays. Hmmm, we found this out AFTER we had already photographed all the store windows you see in our pictures! ; - )
Maybe they are afraid someone will steal their ideas or designs!
.....THIS SERIES OF 4 PHOTOS ARE OF THE ISLAND, "MURANO" (in case you can't tell the difference!)

....Again, these 4 photos are of MURANO, (including a church we saw on the way there), ....an island about 20 minutes from mainland Venice, which we visited on our second last day in Venice. Very small, but charming , it only takes a half day to see it all. A great place to buy blown-glass gifts or just see how they make them, as they give daily demonstrations. There is little else of interest here, but worth the trip if you LOVE pretty glass! I do! But we bought very little of it, since we had already purchased enough on our last trip to Venice in the 1980's. Again, even the glassware was MUCH more expensive in 2007 - especially with the very weak dollar/ strong Euro , making it a bad exchange ratio. I read that in 2005, just 2 years ago, you could buy a Euro with 85 cents. Now that same one Euro cost you and us $ 1.50 - plus.