November 8th: 18th Bday Celebration Continues, Thankful Trees, Black Bean Chili & Cozy Sweatshirts

I stayed home to work today, and did nothing but work on my laptop, do laundry, pick up the house, and make a black bean chili.  Oh, and I did ALL my laptop work laying on my bed.  I know, totally indulgent. Let me backup though. First off, I have a head cold. Second, my rib muscles still kill from my coughing fit last week during which I literally tore intercostal muscles.  I’m not a fine specimen at this moment. Also, the house is invaded with painters. They are only doing three rooms, but there are probably 3 guys coming and going, everything is draped in tarps, and it’s a mess everywhere.  Except my bedroom.  Now you are getting the picture.

So my indulgent day was pretty glorious.  I never put on makeup, I lounged in my new Velvet sweatshirt (it's this style to the left) which is so cozy and soft (and I bought it two sizes too big so it’s roomy and slouchy), and I drank hot tea and went crazy on a box of tissues.  Even though I felt fairly crappy, it was completely wonderful to slow down and be at home after a long series of days where I was traveling, running around and NOT at a home.

Our random stuff to love today is what I call a thankful tree, and I love it and sing it’s praises every November.  It’s a tree I bought at Pottery Barn kids probably 10 years ago, and every year we hang it up on November 1^st.   The kids put in their little paper leaves on each day with their gratitude for the day, and then by Thanksgiving we have a whole pile of leaves that we read out loud at dinner.  It’s a great idea, and although I did have the tree up on November 1^st, I didn’t make them paper leaves until today so they all had 7 leaves each to fill out.  I suck a little for not getting it together earlier, but at least it’s not the 17^thright?  I'm not sure why sometimes just walking down a flight of stairs and digging around for construction paper and a pair of scissors is seemingly impossibly hard?  

We got in another box of People Tree today with some cat lover’s delights….these will make great gifts for those of the feline preference (vs. dog camp). Also arriving was a straggler, and totally amazing, Eileen Fisher cashmere sweater. My thoughts are that it’s really expensive, but totally worth it and the reason is because it combines the perfect weight, style and color, so it really is something you’ll wear almost all year round and it will never fall out of style. Most sweaters that strive for that combo miss on at least one front. Plus, I love ballet pink.

Today is the official "first day" of our anniversary event in the store, and it'll be so much fun to see what people think of the holiday decorations, and all our spirit filled touches (like little bags of candy with every purchase in the store OR on the web).  It's the perfect jumping off place for a wonderful season ahead.

Signed,  ME {lv}