Sunday, December 20, 2020

Sunday Salon: A Week of Birthday and Christmas Celebrations and a bit about Books

                                                      

                                       Deb Nance at Readerbuzz runs The Sunday Salon. 

This week was a week a celebrations. It was my birthday and if you recall we normally did a big family brunch with Santa ay a nice restaurant the Sunday around my birthday but, of course, 2020 was not normal but, I still had a wonderful birthday thanks to my loved ones.  Flowers, birthday balloon, hand made knitwear and lots of gift cards for: J. Jill, Amazon, books as well as for food and wine stores. 💝


Yesterday we all gathered here to exchange Christmas gifts and take (3) cars to a Christmas Lights Festival.  It had snowed 10" a few days ago so it was quite festive. The kids really loved it and us adults thought it was pretty special as well.  It was really crowded and because of COVID you could not get out of your cars so taking pictures was challenging but, I tried to take a few from our (1) hour tour of more than 100 animated light displays.
















This week will be more low key, just the (2) of us and actually it will be nice for the kids to be able to stay home and enjoy Christmas, Santa deliveries etc without having to rush to see everyone.

My Reading -- so far I read 126 books in 2020 and plan to finish (3) more by 12/31. These (3) are in progress and (2) almost done : 
  1. A Promised Land; Barack Obama NF - in progress (audio)
  2. Behind the Red Door; Megan Collins - in progress/eGalley
  3. When I Hit You; Meena Kandasamy - eBook/in progress
I sent my First Book of 2021 pic to Sheila@Book Journey, it's one that has been on my shelves unread for several years - more about that later. Have you decided on that first book.

                                                      Have a good Christmas week.

36 comments:

  1. Happy birthday! Despite 2020 being what it is, it looks like you had a nice festive celebration. Those Xmas light pictures are amazing. We have a house down the street that is all decked out, and I've been meaning to get a picture of it, so you have inspired me to try to remember to do that tonight!

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    1. Thanks Jane, it was a nice, memorable week. Have a nice Christmas.

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  2. It sounds like you had a wonderful birthday. Wow. Flowers. Gift cards. Plus hand made knitwear, that is useful and beautiful, too. Lovely.

    What a great light display! I think I like the blue carousel best, but it is all pretty.

    You had a sensational reading year. I'm not sure what I'm going to pick for my first book of the year. I'm thinking about Before the Coffee Gets Cold. I've heard lots of great things about it, and I ended up with two copies of it during my birthday in November.

    Happy holidays!

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    1. Thanks Deb, it was a terrific week considering COVID. I just looked up Before the Coffee Gets Cold and now I'm curious of course. enjoy.

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  3. Those Christmas lights are so pretty. Happy Birthday from all of us!!!

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  4. Happy birthday! And yay for gift cards. those are always nice.

    Love the pics!!

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  5. Sounds like you managed to have a fun birthday even though COVID lurks all around.
    On Friday night we waited in a line for nearly 1.5 hours to see the Church's drive thru service and I have to say, once we got to it it was pretty cute and worth it. It was good to see church families that I recognized from the safety of our car.

    Today was also a good day. My daughter had an audition so we packed up the pup and headed to the Beverly Wilshire area to visit an Indie bookstore I've never been to before. They are small and only allowed three people in at a time but I browsed and grabbed Interior Chinatown and then walked the nice neighborhood. We then found a dive burger place and had the best lettuce wrapped burgers. The pup had some too.

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    1. Glad your day went well. A walk on Wilshire and new book store sound awesome.

      COVID is all consuming and, today I got my state inspection sticker for the car and, although it was fast, no one who worked there wore a mask including the guy who was inside my car and took my credit card! Crazy!! I couldn’t believe it! I was riding around with my mask on afterwards and all the windows down in 30 degree temps plus I used alcohol wipes on steering wheel and door handle too ugh

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  6. Happy Birthday, Diane! Lovely photos. The knitwear is gorgeous!

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  7. Happy Birthday! I have read on two different blogs about picking the first book of 2021 and I hadn't even thought about it until now......and I feel like I should start thinking about what I want that first book to be. So many choices!

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    1. Thank Tina, yes, we have too many book choices these days. Have a nice Christmas.

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  8. Happy birthday, Diane! Thank you for sharing your fabulous, festive photos! The snow makes the holidays even prettier.

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  9. Happy Birthday! It looks like you had a very festive week. What a spectacular display of lights!

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    1. That was just a small sampling of the display as it was too hard to captures everything on both sides of the park as the cars had to be moving.

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  10. I’m glad you had a lovely birthday despite the current circumstances, I adore the colours in that scarf!
    How fun the light show must be!

    Wishing you a great reading week, and a Merry Christmas 🎄

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  11. Happy birthday and thank you for all the images. So pretty.

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  12. Happy belated birthday, Diane. It sounds like it was nice despite the restrictions this year. I enjoyed your photos of the lights. Wishing you and yours a happy Christmas and a healthy New Year.

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    1. Thank you Wendy, yes we need to make events special in a new way this year.

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  13. Happy birthday! Looks like you got some lovely gifts. Gorgeous knits, for sure and can't go wrong with wine and books!

    Glad you were able to see some holiday lights. I like that Seussland theme! Fun.

    Wishing you all a Merry Christmas and a safe holiday season!

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  14. Happy Birthday, Diane! I think your photos captured the lights very well. I am glad you had so much celebratory fun!

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    1. A very fun few days. It's funny this year anything out of the ordinary felt so fun!

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  15. A belated happy birthday to you. Those pictures are lovely. The lights are really amazing. I'm still working through my 2020 TBR list. I won't be able to finish so there'll be plenty left over to choose from in 2021. So far I've read 89 books this year which exceeds my goal of 84. I might make it up to 92-93 by 12/31. Congratulations on your 126 (so far). That is quite an accomplishment.

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    1. Dorothy, thank you. I've been compiling my favorites of 2020 list. I always look forward to seeing everyones faves.

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  16. What a pretty light show! And happy belated birthday! In fact you just reminded me my husband's birthday is on the 30th! I almost forgot b/c of Christmas gifts. I like your snow hats. Merry Christmas!

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  17. Happy belated birthday, Diane. It sounds like you were well-celebrated! Great pictures of all the Christmas lights. I'm planning to read the latest Louise Penny book for my first book in 2021. I'm still wrapping up my modified nonfiction challenge (November & December) and can't wait to get back to fiction!

    Merry Christmas!

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  18. Happy Birthday! How wonderful that you got to spend it with family and seeing the Christmas lights is amazing; those houses look fantastic! Have a lovely quiet week and holiday.

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  19. Happy birthday! 2020 has definitely made everything more then a little strange but I'm glad you still had a good day. What gorgeous Christmas lights!

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  20. Happy Belated Birthday, Diane! Sounds like you guys had a wonderful time. The lights are wonderful and love the knitted gifts you got.

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  21. Happy Birthday. It's like the light celebration was just for you :)

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