first sunday of advent

the first light of advent is the light of stones, 

light that lives in seashells, in crystals and in bones.

i walked to the lower east side today and stopped at di palo's italian food store for ravioli, soppressata, provolone, parmesano, seeded semolina bread and piave cheese. there were several tourists in the store ordering sandwiches and cakes. in fact, all of little italy was busy with tourists for the holiday season, and many of the restaurants were playing christmas carols. i also stopped at ferrara's for christmas treats and tre colori cookies for dessert tonight.

 

 ferrara's cakes . .

and cookies all wrapped up and ready to go.

walking north with the empire state building in the distance . . 

 

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dinner at home - ravioli with butternut squash . . 

and cookies with the french chocolates i made last week.

a very grey day

it was such a dark day, so much so that i stayed in bed thinking it was still early in the morning and then the phone rang and it was marlene, who i was supposed to call at 9:30. 

somewhere around 2 pm greg and i decided to take a walk to the arlo hotel which is a new space chanda and emily have found to get coffee and do schoolwork. 

 

 it might have been very grey, but the trees were beautifully golden, and the sky was brighter in the east. (on the way home, i actually caught a glimpse of some blue).

it was a nice walk until we were almost there, when we came upon a very loud construction site . .

so much clanging and banging . . i don't think i've ever passed such a noisy one before . .

inside the cute hotel . . we bought our coffees at the tiny cafe by the front door and went to sit in the back where there were several couches along the windows and a door that led to a small patio. the tables chanda likes to work at were on the other side of this corridor, with outlets for people to plug in their computers for charging.

greg read his book after checking his phone for important information (?!) (he's been reading uncle tom's cabin) and i worked on my poncho for the bayron handmade knit-a-long i'm doing. (it's coming along nicely now and i'll have to put up a photo soon.)

 

there was a family to our right who were on their last day of visiting the city, and were flying out in the evening. some of them were trying to decide whether or not to visit rockefeller center and go ice skating. one of them (rightfully!) decided it would be too crowded . . i'm not sure what they were going to do instead . . maybe rest in their hotel room!

a mural on the patio which is tucked in amongst some other buildings . . one of those niches which can be confusing because you don't know where one building ends and the other begins.

heading back out . . 

wintery snowflake decorations . . 

this balloon turkey had "don't eat me" written on it.

and then we were back at home . . i worked on the poncho and watched the 1947 version of miracle on 34th street (i had watched the 1994 one last night) and we had leftover lasagna for dinner.

peace, hope and love on this thursday

i actually watched the parade on greg's computer this morning. i could tell the performers were so incredibly happy to be working again; dancing, singing, guiding the balloons . . it felt extra joyful this year. 

 

the macy's chorus sang so beautifully.

 (greg kept talking to me while i was trying to film . . i think one of the cats was attempting to drink my coffee which was on the table - he was complaining to me that i had left my food unguarded.)

the last float of the parade - santa claus rides into town.

morning panettone . . i had bought a little $2 one the other day. (usually we don't open a panettone until christmas morning.)

afternoon walk along the river . . 

we walked to the dog run to see what dogs were out and then back home for an early dinner.

no french bulldogs this afternoon . . 

purple blooming asters - michaelmas daisies . . 

and a rose still in bloom . . 

back at the apartment i watched a little bit of the national dog show. we loved the english bulldog and were hoping he would win best of show, but the deerhound won for the second year in a row (the first time any dog has won consecutive years).

dinner at 2:00 . . 

buon appetito!

we had our family zoom call and we played our "caption this!" game with an old photograph from my extensive photo collection (!). i'll include that a little later as i'm writing this on friday and greg is waiting for me to go for a walk. happy thanksgiving!

 

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this year's photo was of my paternal grandfather and grandmother at the 1964 world's fair in flushing meadows, queens, and the captions that we came up with:

kathy, warren and jason (two entries): "and i thought they had big schnozzes in sicily!"

"this is who you meant by your goofy american cousin?"

 

morgan: "give me all the meatballs!"

 

me: "josephine! these americans are getting goofier every year! i think we need to go back to sicily!"

 

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dessert in the evening . . 

 

our apple pie which finn ended up stepping on (last night while i was putting the lasagna together), but thankfully it was covered by a cloth.

and that's all, good night everyone.

a quiet work day

 

 we're all busy here with our various pre-thanksgiving day tasks . .

 

pluto is perfecting his lounging technique . .

 

finn is adept at resting in his little house . .

 

i've been busy preparing lasagna and an apple pie . .

 

oh! it looks like someone is interested in branching out into a different work field . .

adoption day

hello! someone is getting adopted today.

this little fellow . .

just lounging around in the afternoon sun, waiting for the nice lady to come pick him up.

i think they'll be very happy together.

we sat and talked for a little while about how cute and smart andy is . . and about cat food and cat litter, litter boxes and cat toys, and about how cold it was outside and would he be warm enough walking to the train?

there's not much of anything nicer than a warm home and a warm heart.

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as mirella and andy went on their way, i started dinner preparations with a new cooking companion.

christmas kitten (i think that's a james herriot story).

scallops, kale and black bean soup . . 

after dinner snuggles . . 

good night everybody . .