November Inventory

Reading lots.  Since my last inventory, I've been busy.  I read most of Elizabeth Gilbert's Big Magic.  Although I didn't finish it, my takeaway was that to live a truly creative life one must choose the path of curiosity not that of fear.  I was reading Bill Clegg's Did You Ever Have A Family in tandem with Gilbert's tome, and it high jacked me, thus turning me into a one book woman.  Since being touched by the amount of grace the characters displayed in Clegg's must read book, I've been back on a fiction kick. I followed up with Fates and Furies, which kept the bar high.  Groff's novel was a gem in most every category.  Unfortunately, The Good Neighbor fell awfully flat for reasons I cannot reveal here without ruining the novel for anyone that might like to read it.  It was a small two day investment so nothing to really gripe about.  Read it if Girl on the Train and Gone Girl are your thing.  I've cobbled through some of Voracious.  I expected Nicoletti's combination of cooking and literature to speak to me loud and clear, but a third of the way through I'm not finding ample meat on the bone,  I'm probably giving up in order to get through Girl in the Woods and Boys in the Trees.  May as well begin and end the year with my best loved genre of all...the memoir.  I may try and finish The Art of Tidying Up as well.

Wondering not if, but when it will feel like winter.  It's been in the 40s and 50s this week.  I'm not complaining, but the spring weather at the end of fall is making it hard to believe that Christmas is in a couple weeks.  I'm a four season girl and I'm ready for a little cold and snow.

Noticing that I don't really love big parties anymore...at all.  It was my company Christmas gathering last night.  It was very nice to see and chat with a good many of the attendees, but I had anxiety before and exhaustion after.  I am just much more at ease in more intimate settings. 

Watching  Simon and Garfunkel Live at Central Park on PBS. We came across it Saturday night and it was so nostalgic.  I love when music connects the generations.  Our parents introduced us to Paul and Art when we were young and we've done the same with our kids.

Listening to the Christmas classics sung by the legendary crooners.

Eating to live not living to eat.  But have you tried those chocolate covered Ritz crackers?  I was watching a Christmas cookie baking competition on the Food Network the other day and I had such a taste for some of our favorites.  Nonetheless, we won't be turning the basement kitchen into Martha's work shop, but I felt permission to do what I never do: consume store bought cookies.

Drinking coffee, water, hibiscus tea and wine in that order.

Wanting to finish my shopping.  The lion share is done including the kids, but I have a couple near impossible people in my family still to shop for, and I have zero desire and no plan to stroll around the mall in search of inspiration. I went to send a couple boxes the other day and was shocked at the cost of shipping.

Wearing lots of black.  A little grey.

Hoping that we love all the choices we made in the design of our new kitchen.  So far so good.  Cabinets were finished yesterday.  I love them.  The floors go in tomorrow.  Granite and back splash in two weeks.  Then it will be finishing touches like fixtures and hardware.

Thinking that we're born dying, that never's a liar and how strange the things we remember versus the things we forget.

Enjoying Fred, our elf, just a little, reminiscing as I pull out all the decorations we have lovingly accumulated over the years, holiday traditions and time together.  

Loving a month filled with moment after moment of gratitude.  A little evidence of joy moments below.