Please check my Rome itinerary

I would view Sunday as too much because of distances and you will still have a little jet lag. I would just focus on the gardens and area around the Spanish steps would could include the Pantheon.

The Capucin crypt thing (if it's the same one my hubby and I did...with the mummified monks?) was maybe 25-30min max, so not that long to see, and you may hang out at the Spanish Steps for 30-45 min (I think we spent about 30min there), but again, not a giant chunk of time...I think it looks doable...

The Santa Maria della Vittoria is a 6 minute walk from our hotel, while the Borghese Gardens is a 15 walk from the Santa Maria, so I am not too worried about the distance. If we walk from our hotel to Santa Maria della Vittoria, then to the Capuchin Crypt, then to Borghese, the walk from start to finish is 25 minutes. I was trying to keep activities during our first day in one small area. There is going to be lots of stops and breaks in between. What about the other days?

I think this is good. When you go to the Colosseum, go to Palatine hill for your ticket to avoid the hideous lines. Or sign up for a tour right outside the colosseum. The line is people waiting to buy tickets. With a tour, you bypass everyone. Our guide gave us the tour, and then left us on our own to poke around at our own pace. It included a free tour of Palatine hill, and our guide was amazing, an expat history teacher. We liked him so much that we signed up for his evening tour that took us to Vittorio Emanuele monument, Parthenon, some lovely churches, many important sites, the Trevi fountain, and ending at Piazza Navona where we had a memorable evening. A tour of the Vatican is essential -- reserve through your hotel. The line is literally a mile long, even early in the morning. With a tour, you bypass all that, get right in, and get great information on everything you are seeing. There are 8 hour tours available, that would give you plenty of time to see everything you want to see, well worth the price. Have fun!

Since you are planning to see the Ecstacy of St Teresa on a Sunday, I suggest you carefully check the Mass schedule; churches are typically open to tourists very limited hours on Sunday (and some less touristed churches aren't open to tourists at all on Sundays). And if your daughter really enjoys art/museums, you may want to book a tour. I've used Context Travel in multiple cities/countries and always had a remarkable experience. You may want to check offerings on the Context Rome website. Groups are small (typically 6 or fewer), guides are academically well trained and interesting, their English is excellent, and they usually adapt the tour based on interests of participants. I took a tour of Vatican Museums and St Peters with them and learned so much... even though I had been to the museums and St Peters many times before. It was led by an American living in Italy who teaches Baroque art at the university level and had a thorough theological grounding in the art.

On the day you go to the Vatican, you might want to take a stroll through the Janiculum Hill area across the river. There are great views of Rome. Trastevere has some beautiful old churches (particularly Santa Maria in Trastavere). Keep in mind that most museums are closed on Mondays now, if you are thinking of adding anything to Monday's itinerary.

We did the same thing Jan did - did a guided tour of the Coli and got to skip past the huge line waiting - then had a tour (with a really nice Canadian fella fr Toronto) of Palatine...I thought it was a good value - also, we had just bought our Roma Pass, so we had free admission (but of course paid for the tour)...but I think we still could have jumped the line with the Roma Pass...but it's nice to have someone telling you about the place instead of just wandering about (unless you have a tour downloaded to listen too - I'm sure there must be a RS one)... If you had time and energy after Vatican Museums, maybe Castel Sant'Angelo - not that far a walk if I recall from Vatican(but we only did St Peters and not the museums, so we had a lot more time).

Unless you want to eat RIGHT ON Campo dei Fiori (and there's nowhere right on the Campo I would recommend for anything other than a drink), I can recommend Hostaria Farnese a few yards off Fiori. We just left Rome for Siena and had two wonderful meals there.

Great suggestions, thanks1 Jan, was the tour of the Vatican done through the Vatican website, or did you use an independent company. Sherry, thanks for the tip re: Context Tours. I will look at their Vatican tours. It appears that Santa Maria della Vittoria is open from 7am - 12pm so I think we'll have plenty of time to see it in the morning, as our plan was to go there first. Celeste, thank you for the restaurant recommendation. I think we'll try it! Nicole, do you remember the name of the guide from Toronto? It would be nice to meet someone from my hometown. I am assuming that you booked through Context Tours as well?

Thanks for the link R. Gordon. Looks like the guide from Toronto was probably Anthony Majanlahti. The guides look very knowledgable.

Looks good to me. Check out http://www.contexttravel.com/tour-guides We used Sara Magister and we did a two day tour of Rome. Half day at the Vatican and St. Peter's seemed like plenty to us and we are Catholic! Sara, as any docent will, show you 1) what you want to see, and 2) what is important. Hiring a guide really maximized our enjoyment and our ability to see Ancient (Roman) Rome, Medieval Rome, and Christian Rome. Borghese Gallery is a must see. I like the idea of Janiculum, it is a great place to get beautiful views of the city. The touristy stuff, like Trevi, Piazza Navona, etc don't show on your list but you should take the time.

Another trick to enjoying Rome is what RS recommends: Pretend you're Catholic. It really helps you appreciate a lot of what you'll see.

Melanie, I suggest you follow-up carefully re Sunday church hours. The hours you note are the hours the church is open, provided there is no Mass (or other liturgy) ongoing. However, there will be Masses on Sunday morning, probably a number of them, given the size/location/prominence of that church. I just looked at their website (last updated in 2008, so info should be double-checked): http://www.chiesasmariavittoria.191.it/files/Orari.html For Sunday, it says there are Masses at 9.00, 10.30, 12.00, 18.30. Visiting during Mass is prohibited. Each of those Masses will last at least an hour, and some churches don't allow folks inside during the few minutes between Masses (too chaotic before Mass). So the church will be closed most of the morning.

Actually, we just got 'picked up' outside the coliseum by one of the many 'on the spot' places there offering tours right outside the metro station/coliseum ...couldn't even tell you the name of the company(if there even was one)...and this was 2008, so I can't rem the tour guide for Palantine (tho the tour guide for the Coliseum was Italian)..