"Night goes with silent steps
round house and cottage
o'er earth that sun forgot
dark shadows linger:
Then on our threshold stands
white clad, in candlelight
Santa Lucia"
HAPPY SOLSTICE!
The sun is shining brilliantly today, belying this being the Winter Solstice; but we are truly reveling in the light and warmth
The moon last night and this morning was so beautiful, so ethereal:
it was so big and luminous I felt like I could just reach out and touch it.
It made me think about early peoples who saw these same sights, only they were surprises -
joy and fear experienced simultaneously - what could this mean?
Sometimes when I read how afraid and anxious people of today are, I wonder what happened to make us that way - where is our sense of adventure, our feelings of self-reliance and hope, our belief in something higher? Today I am so filled with a deep happiness and peaceful spirit - I am blessed in so many ways and I am so grateful for all of these blessings.
A few random photos and thoughts -
the buds on my cactus plants are like timed photography - each time I look at them today,
the blossoms are opening a bit more
I baked some Mexican wedding cookies this morning (used the recipe in Martha Stewart's Baking Book - she recommends that you wait until the cookies are cool before you roll them in the powdered sugar - I have to agree with her). YUM!
a basket of cards and tags on my coffee table
and a mix of old and new decorations -
I was given the Mr and Mrs Santa and the candy cane man (there are 2 more that you cannot see in this photo) when I was a little girl
and
my son gave me the wonderful Pottery Barn woodland stick reindeer last year for Christmas - I think the reindeer looks like something out of a fantasy novel, don't you?
I got a special little surprise today - the local library called me this morning and they had been able to get 2 books for me through interlibrary loan. I had read about these books on a blog from the UK and was really intrigued but knew that our library didn't have them. The librarian told me that she could find only one copy of one of the books in a participating library in the US and that she was very pleased that they would send it here. I am super excited to get the book - it is Nightingale Wood by Stella Gibbons and was written in 1937. I had read Cold Comfort Farm many years ago (actually I have read it several times and seen the movie with Kate Beckinsale) but had never seen any other books by Gibbons. What a lovely surprise!
The other book is the Leavenworth Case by Anna Katharine Green and was originally published in 1878, nine years before the debut of Sherlock Holmes. It was one of the first examples of detective fiction and actually was one of the best-selling novels of the nineteenth century - and just think, it was written by a woman!
Well, I have rambled on quite a bit today - thanks for staying with me and I hope you have a lovely evening. We are having pork chops, sweet potatoes, and some leftover stuffing for dinner along with a bottle of some special wine. I set the table with extra candles (by the way, did I ever mention that we always eat by candlelight in the winter months - that means when the a/c is off - usually Oct 15 - May 1) and put out holiday napkins and funky snowflake napkin rings. I got a beautiful white poinsettia for the table for the holidays.
JOY TO THE WORLD
and ttfn
Chris
3 comments:
Loveeeeeeeeeeee the painting! And those books sound AMAZING!!! Merry Christmas!! :):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):)
Beautiful pointsettia, Chris! And those cookies just scream Christmas to me. My mom makes them every year! :-)
What a beautiful blogpost you wrote Chris! We had a moon eclips here last week, and you got me thinking that people in ancient times would have been very afraid of that. My English isn't good enough to write what I thought while reading your post, but I did connect with you somehow. Ah - you understand what I mean, don't you?! Enjoy the days dear one!
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