Thankful for Books, Cats, and Christmas Trees

I haven't yet written about Thanksgiving day or my weekend at home yet, but it was lovely, so I don't want to forget it.  It sounds quite simple: I went home for a the long weekend.  I spent time with my beautiful cats (and my parents, of course).  We watched the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, and I took advantage of online sales to get most of my Christmas shopping done.  We ate delicious food, including two kinds of pie.  After dinner, we went for a walk down DoG Street; the air was cool and crisp and perfectly autumnal.

Over the weekend, my mom and I visited a rare bookstore, and I found quite a few goodies-- including a facsimile of the First Folio (Shakespeare)!!!  Merry Christmas to me!  I also got a lovely edition of Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass from the 1940s-- hardcover and fully illustrated for just twelve dollars (!), a first edition of a book of poems by Edna St. Vincent Millay for eight dollars (!) and Princess Mary's Gift Book-- a book put together for Princess Mary during WWI (around 1918) with all proceeds going to the Queen's "Work for Women" fund (on sale for three dollars!).  It has in it a specially written Scarlet Pimpernel story by Baroness Orczy!  Oh I love bookstores full of old and interesting books!!!  Perhaps I should take this as a sign that I should get into the rare book business.  Such joy in books and bookstores!

After spending the afternoon in the bookshop, my mom and I finished decorating our Christmas tree.  We had started that morning with my dad before he returned north for work-- we hung our traditional first ornaments-- then that night, we put in Mickey's Twice Upon a Christmas, popped popcorn, made hot chocolate, and finished decorating.  Decorating the tree just after Thanksgiving-- usually within a day or two-- is one of my favorite ways to usher in the Christmas season.  This year, we even put out this little Hallmark ornament set we got when I was very little called The Bearingtons of Victoria Circle.  Everything looks so festive and bright.  I just love Christmas time.

But as much as I loved the Thanksgiving food, the Christmas decorating, formatting The Tempest script for performance, and those gorgeous hours in a rare bookshop, my favorite moment of the weekend came Friday night.  All was still and quiet; a kind of drowsy, contented quietness.  I sat with my both of my kitties on my lap, the only light coming from the glow of the Christmas candles in the window, the only sounds the soft purrs and snores of Rhett and Felix.  Happiness.