giving thanks in the carolinas

textures from the country
The holidays are officially here. I spent yesterday putting up the tree, realizing we've misplaced all our ornaments, making origami paper cranes from old Anthropologie catalogs to fill the branches with instead, baking french and zucchini breads, shelling pecans that we brought back home from the Carolinas, listening to Christmas music, watching Christmas Story, drinking hot chocolate, and jogging in the humidity-free crisp air.

We just got back home from spending Thanksgiving with my family in North and South Carolina...each year there is a big family reunion during this week, and it's been three years since we've been back. The last time was the year before we moved to Italy, and even though it doesn't feel like so long ago, it was great to see dozens of my extended family members again.

scenes from Carolina
It's always like stepping through a time (and culture) warp when we head up there, and in many ways, a great way to get away from the day-to-day. Plus, as I've gotten older I've grown more interested in my heritage and learning about my family's past. Last time we were up there we went to one of my family's gravesite plots dating from the Revolutionary War with some of the the first family members who came from France. This time, my dad took us to another small gravesite in a section of forest which has some of the first settlers from another branch of my family. There was even a plaque stone with the inscription that this block of land was granted and conveyed to that English side of the family by King George III in 1767. One of my great aunts is full of stories and knowledge of my genealogy and I hope to learn more from her when I'm up there again.

Micheal Jackson the cat • old truck • Chris stirring the Brunswick stew
With the Thanksgiving festivities always comes lots of traditions, lots of food, and lots of people...and this year was no different, as we had about 80 people there for lunch and several more people showed up for the BBQ the next day. Some of the fun included: barn exploring, saw-mill walking, kitten finding, piano and guitar and fiddle playing, bluegrass singing, pecan gathering, fire pit warming, rocking chair napping, stew stirring, pork roasting, turkey frying, horse riding, frisbee throwing, collards and turnips and field peas and macaroni and sweet potato and coconut cake and brownie and pumpkin pie eating.

Now it's on to a few more interim weeks of normal days mixed with a seasoning of Sufjan and Nat singing songs in my ear, holiday cookies baking in the oven, and Charlie Brown dancing around a stick, before heading north once again for more family and Christmas!

fall in the city

I've been quite a slacker on here, as I just noticed it's been over a month since my last post, and I haven't even written yet about our trip to NYC to enjoy some fall weather. I really can't believe how fast this year has gone...and I know people say this every year, but seriously, this one is different. Life is rushing by.

fall in NYC
Because it's been so hot here in Florida lately, and only this week started to cool down a bit, we were really wanting to feel some chill in the air and see some colorful leaves. No place better to do that than Central Park, I say...so a couple weekends ago we headed up to the city for a few days. Nothing really on the schedule, but it's never hard to find something to do.

where we stayed • 350.org event • Reverend Billy
On Saturday I'd found out that it was International Day of Climate Action, and that the organization 350.org were holding environmental action demonstrations around the world (there ended up being 5200 events in 181 countries that day). From the miracle of twitter, I found out that there was something going on in Times Square and so off we went. Chris spotted Reverend Billy from the "Church of Stop Shopping" and I got to talk with Colin Beaven, the "No Impact Man", who I've followed on his blog for a couple years now and have mentioned before.

evening at the Met
There was supposed to be an awesome rooftop sculpture showing on the top of the Metropolitan Museum that night, complete with martini bar and an awesome view of the park at sunset...all of which I was super excited about. They host these "Evenings at the Met" during the warmer (or not bitterly cold) months, but unfortunately we ended up going on one of the "not-too-cold-but-pouring-rain" kind of nights. So no rooftop. But there was still the ginormous museum which we got to check out and one of my "want to do" things, on that random mental list I keep, got checked off...seeing a Chuck Close painting in real life. He's one of my favorite current artists and the modern art sections offers one of his older pieces of huge, hyper-realism across from one of the newer style pieces which are broken into small abstract pieces all put together.

Luckily the next couple of days were rain-free and absolutely gorgeous. We stayed in the Lower East Side, so there were plenty of fun vegetarian restaurants to check out - and they were all SO good. Even a vegan gelateria! Found a couple sample sales, an awesome Italian food store at the Chelsea Market, lots of red yellow and orange trees in the park, and even met up with some friends after dinner. They said they were in the meatpacking district watching the Yankees game and to join them. We said ok, and had to remind ourselves on the way over what, exactly the Yankees played. As soon as we walked in, we were introduced to about 8 new people and I joined in the cheering when A. Rod made a good play...they asked if we were Yankee fans, and I had to admit that I wasn't 100% sure that it was even baseball we were coming to see. But now I remember after seeing all the "NY" caps everywhere. I won't forget again :)

atmospheric view from the Brooklyn Bridge
It's always nice to meet up with the locals in the city, because they can take to you places you would have no idea existed otherwise. Like when we later went into the basement of an Italian restaurant on the edge of Chinatown, or then when we walked a few more blocks, down a weird little alley where everything looked closed, no windows, under an all Chinese red sign with a bad translation like "Kung Pow Chinese Laundry"...and into a door which led to a super chic club that even smelled nice and had small tables of pretty people all lounging and chatting over votives. Yep. They don't want you to know they exist.

on the Brooklyn Bridge
Before heading out we went across the harbor and then walked back over the Brooklyn Bridge. I can't believe I'd never done this before. It was a beautiful day for it, and I kept wanting to reenact the scene with Miranda and Steve...and then cry happy tears. Instead though, I didn't :) and enjoyed the walk towards the wonderful skyline!