My Best.

Happy belated Thanksgiving! I hope yours was excellent. I'm still full, though that may be due to the excessive amounts of leftovers we've eaten for the past four days.

We had a white Thanksgiving, which was pretty and made me hopeful that we will also have a white Christmas. And then after Christmas we can have a white nothing because snow is mostly just irritating after the new year. So is cold weather and the absence of almost all sunlight, but that is a topic for another day. Oh, and if you need any Christmas gift ideas for me perhaps you should look into one of those lights for people with seasonal affective disorder. Maybe it'll keep me from feeling on the brink of death come March.

So while I'm clearly not thankful for the bulk of winter weather, I am definitely thankful for many other things (not just leftovers). Here is a list, and certainly not a complete list, but a sampling, of things I am feeling thankful for right this very moment:

• Seeing old friends. As in, friends I've had for a long time, not friends who are literally old (though most of us do turn thirty this year...).  One of my best friends, who lives in Louisiana, called to say that she made a surprise visit for the long weekend with her two young boys. A few hours later I was sitting in her parents' family room visiting with her and her family for the afternoon. It was a fantastic way to spend the day. Every time I go back to that house I'm reminded of being a kid and teenager again, and I mean that in a good way. I don't know how many hours of my life were spent there at sleepovers, birthdays, graduations and barbecues but it was many and they were all good. Going there feels like coming home after a very long trip, every time. 

• This, which I can't really explain other than I found it on Pinterest recently and it made me laugh too hard and too long. And then I texted it to my brother while he was in a meeting and  almost cost him his job (not really, but he definitely found the humor in this as much as I did and may have had to excuse himself from the meeting to have a laugh). 

Image source

• My new washing machine, for playing a song every time it finishes a load of laundry. I know it's just doing its job and doesn't actually have thoughts or feelings, but that little jingle it does at the end of every cycle just makes it seem so excited to have done another load that it can't help but sing about it. I don't feel the same way about laundry, but it's nice to know someone does. Rather, something.

• My outdoor Chrsitmas lights, for not breaking. I plugged in all 8 strands this weekend fully expecting at least 7 of them to be dead, but to my surprise every single bulb was working. I wish I could say the same for my pre-lit Christmas tree, but since this is a list of things I'm thankful for and not a list of things I hate I won't discuss my pre-lit Christmas tree. Here we are at Lowe's buying new lights for said hated tree.

• The Harry Potter series, for being some of the very few books I've reread. I'm a reader, but not generally a re-reader. Even my most favorite books that I own copies of I've only read once. Harry Potter is the exception; I'm currently reading the series again and enjoying it just as much the second time.

• Our zoo membership. Having a membership is the best because it means we can go whenever we want and aren't forced to visit during the busiest times (like free Mondays). It also means we can go for just an hour or two, long enough to see an adorable sleeping koala bear, ride the choo choo and eat lunch.

• Seeing more old friends, like the ones who this weekend. One lives in D.C. and the other is always busy directing some sort of theater production, so we only see them once or twice a year. When we do it's like we just saw them yesterday. It also meant that on Saturday night I willingly stayed up until way past midnight while still wearing makeup, contacts and clothes that weren't pajamas. I felt like I had super powers.

• This girl. The one who turns two and half years old today. The one who stopped dead in her tracks when she saw the Sesame Street float during the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, the one who loves Elmo, Caillou and Katy Perry's Roar with almost equal intensity, who told me her grandma really wanted a kitty for Christmas, and who declares things that are her favorites to be "my best". I am most thankful that I get to spend my days with her. Despite toddler stubbornness, potty training woes, and the occasional meltdown over something ridiculous, I would still rather be hanging out with her than doing anything else. She is, without a doubt, my best.

Donuts. Donuts are also her best.

Happy Thanksgiving!

~Stacy