New York in Autumn

I forgot to share with you all my visit to NYC with K to see my sister and some friends... it was a beautiful day there, too! My sister is visiting for a month (November) to get some work done, and also to see her friends, and me. :-) She brought along our friend, Lucy, and her new baby, M! She's soooo cute!!

Taken by my sister, S. Me next to K, in sunglasses.

M, up close. Isn't she adorable?

The leaves in the park were glorious, and we were all snapping away! 

K and I had gotten there earlier than they did, so we trekked through Central Park and had lunch at Caffe Grazie, a two-story restaurant along the east edge of upper Central Park. It was cozy, and the service was nice, and at the end of our meal, my sister and Lucy showed up! 

A Kir Royale at Caffe Grazie

Hilariously, we were all supposed to meet up at the Neue Gallery, but when K & I found out that it was $20 to get in, we figured we'd eat lunch then meet up with the ladies after... only to discover that they didn't plan to go in, either, they just wanted to go to Cafe Sabarsky, inside! Soooo... we left Caffe Grazie and stood in line to get into Cafe Sabarsky! It took a while... that place is hoppin'! 

Kaiser Melange, at Sabarsky... mmm....

The draw there is the authentic German food, and the (for us, at least) the Kaiser Melange, a cup of Viennese coffee with hand-whipped cream on top! It was soooo good. Perfect for such a chilly day. K tried the spiced, mulled wine and liked it a lot. I tasted it, too, and it was yummy! A few people got lunch (those who didn't eat with us previously) and K & I got desserts. Sooo good! I highly recommend a visit to this place the next time you're on the Upper East Side.


Afterwards, we crossed Central Park (again! boy, were my feet hurting...) and saw boat races, people walking their dogs, and enjoying the fall sunshine. It was nice.

Tiny sailboats on the pond

K admiring the foliage above

Marisol, Sharlene, Lucy and Keith under a tunnel

Bridges

Afterwards, we made our way towards a meeting place/dinner location that wasn't too far away, though it was far ENOUGH for my aching dogs. We wound up at another Italian restaurant for wine and appetizers, which turned into dinner.

Delicious wine from the wine bar

I can't recall the name of the wine bar, but it was cozy, and we had fun! After we finished our food and wine, we all left, K & I for the Port Authority bus terminal, and everyone else for Brooklyn. I had a lot of fun, and enjoyed meeting Marlowe for the first time that day. She's a real sweetheart... she fell asleep while K was holding her, giving Lucy a break, which was the cutest thing ever! :-) I think he was a little smitten with her. Well, who wouldn't be?

Keeping in Touch

Hello Friends. I don't want to always start out my increasingly sporadic posts with apologies... but I do feel a bit out of touch these days. It seems that my life is about work, and though I enjoy it, I'm not finding much time for myself lately. When I'm not working, I'm doing chores, or lately, trying to heal from a cold. 


I take a lot of photos on my walks to and from work, however, so that's something. It will have to be enough for now, as I don't have the energy for much more. 


The holidays are approaching, and Bethlehem is readying itself: Christmas trees are being attached to all the light posts along the streets, lights are being put up (if not yet turned on) in the downtown area, there have been one or two wreaths that have shed their fall leaves for holly berries... the evidence is out there! Christmas is coming! (I'm totally not prepared for it, although I've picked up a few presents during the year for one or two individuals... yay, me!)

This squirrel narrowly escaped a hawk!

The hawk that's standing on the corner of this house, see?

Squirrel's eye view

The squirrels are running around, eating everything they can find and getting plumper by the day. There are still amazingly colored trees everywhere, which is lovely. It helps to stave off the winter blues that are lurking around the corner. I've been making lots of soups at home: vegan split pea (which is so delicious that I've made it twice!), vegan mushroom barley, and a chicken noodle soup because though we don't eat chicken often, we had some left over from a dish I made for a party, so I used it up in the soup. I love home made soups in the cold weather months... it's just so warming! Especially with some fresh buttered French bread on the side! Talk about comfort foods! (Wish I had French butter to go with it, as their butter tastes SOOOOO much better than anything I've found here.)

Every day I walk under this brilliant maple tree.

I miss my blogger friends these days. It was at this time last year that I was really posting a lot of creative posts, since I was home all the time, trying to find things to do and share. I hope you understand that I want to blog more.... I've just been at a loss to gather up the energy! However, there are events coming up which I'm planning on blogging about, as they should be fun and creative, too! Until then, I hope you'll keep in touch!


If you have an iPhone, you can check out my Instagram pictures.... My nickname there is the same as my Twitter name: Sunkitten. Hope to see you there, if not here, in the future!


xox

An Interesting Weekend...

Hello Friends. This was an unusual weekend that just passed. It started with an unseasonal winter storm watch, which turned into a warning. A big snow system was supposed to move into the area starting Saturday morning. No one really seemed to accept it as a possibility, though, which I think is funny. I was certain it was coming in, because so far, the weather predictions in this area have mostly been reliable.


It started out on Friday, with sun, fall foliage everywhere, and plans for a Halloween party after a day at a bonsai class in New Jersey. Fun, with no drama built into the plans. The predictions for snow came, and we figured that it would maybe drop an inch or two on us, which would melt away fairly quickly. So we headed out on Saturday morning, early, as our class started at 9 am and was almost an hour away. (We thought.)

At left is what it looked like when we left in the morning... what was falling looks like rain, but it was actually a giant slushy, sprinkled on us by the powers that be. It sort of looked like snow, but after landing, it was like rain... it's called rain/snow. Ha ha. 


As we got up to the All Shapes Nursery for our bonsai class, it was actually snowing, and had accumulated about an inch of snow or maybe a little more, and was looking like it was going to be an interesting return trip back to PA.


At one point, I came out of the greenhouse to go to the main house to use the restroom, and below is what I found outside!

Fall trees with snow...

It was a winter wonderland, somehow! In October! Now, in class, we'd been hearing that tick tick tick of snowfall on the plastic sheeting above us. However, as the plastic wasn't transparent, we couldn't tell if it was actually snow or rain falling. I found out it was snow when we came out for our break. THEN, as we were back in class, we'd hear swoooshhhh.... as sheets of built up snow slid off of the roof, sections at a time. Tick tick tick swooooshhh.... tick tick tick tick tick swoooooshhhh.... my mind kept noticing that it wasn't stopping. Although the class was interesting and fun, part of me was worried. We'd brought my Mini out to Jersey, and there was a snow storm going on outside. Were we going to be able to get OUT of here? That was the question of the day.

The snow-covered trees beside the road

A leaf trapped in snow on the roof above

The leaves on the ground outside , after some snowfall

Outside of the greenhouse we were in

So while all this snow was building up, we were actually cozy inside the greenhouse, learning how to control little plants and make them look like old miniature trees... it was really fun!

K was especially adept at it. He saw what he wanted, and he made it happen. His tree looks amazing! I was in awe, actually. Mine started out with good intentions, but didn't turn out quite so nice.

How my tree started out

It could be that I was distracted by the snow. Or I'm just not cut out for the Japanese art of bonsai. I don't know. I'm a fair gardener, but apparently that's where the talent ends!


Anyway, there were all kinds of lovely bonsai trees in there with us for inspiration...

Look at that trunk! 

Love all the greenery at the base

Very exotic! The yellow flowers belong to it

Like a rainforest floor... so cool

A ficus made special

 After the class was over, we used the restroom, and came out to leave. Everyone had gone except for a guy in his BMW, which K had to help push to get through the thick snow in the parking lot. Well, guess what? He also had to push the Mini. Once out of the parking lot, and then twice more after we got onto the long, unpaved road leading out of the nursery... it was a long road... and K didn't get to ride down it. After the last push, he told me to go down to the road, and not to stop, so he had to run about fifty yards in the snow behind me!

The road from the nursery

Roads weren't quite plowed

Our backyard when we returned

Neighbor's power was out, luckily ours wasn't

 I won't describe the harrowing trip back to Bethlehem. Let's just say it wasn't the most relaxing trip. Then when we got back, we thought we'd be out of power, but we got so lucky! Most of the area had no power... the downtown area was mostly out of power, but the block my work sits on was fine! And our apartment had power, also... though most people we know didn't have any power. It was COLD, too. Especially that night. People stayed with others who had power, or stayed in the booked up hotels and motels. It's been crazy. The next day, I had to go in to work, and here are a few things that I saw along the way....

 It was a mixture of autumn and winter, dramatically juxtaposed. I had a lot of fun photographing the variety of foliage and snow. (Though my fingers and hands got really cold in the process!) It's been so cold that the snow hasn't actually all melted yet. There were downed tree branches on every street, and the power still hasn't been restored to everyone's homes. It's pretty crazy. The weight of the snow on the still-cloaked trees caused lots of branches to break off from the weight, and there was a lot of property damage as a result. No one has cable, and a lot of people don't have phone service, either. It's so wild that one day of rampant nature can do so much to disrupt our lives.... and yet... it's so beautiful, don't you think? 


xox

Sensational Fall Colors~

These days are full of color. The trees are resplendent in their glorious fall foliage! I walk around with my camera out half the time and my phone out the other half! (My mouth open the entire time, probably catching a few flies... yuck!)

Due to the season, K & I have pulled out an autumn-themed Charles Wysocki puzzle. He has puzzles for every time of year! They're fun to do because of all their little scenes within the puzzle. 

Of course, the cats get up on the table where the puzzle is... and when Beckham gets up there, he struts about, shaking a foot with a puzzle-piece stuck to it, tossing the puzzle piece across the room. One foot shakes, one puzzle piece flies, another foot shakes, another puzzle piece flies in a different direction; walk, flick, fly, walk, flick, fly... Argh! I chase him off, of course, but five minutes later, and he's back up there!

Downtown, people have decorated their flower boxes for the season, too. As I've shown before, there will be pumpkins in there, and squashes, and above, cabbages, dried corn and mums. So pretty!


Our front porch has my lone little piggie for now. But we're not downtown, and so we don't get many passersby to enjoy a festive display. I've thought of doing one for ourselves, except we don't even enter the apartment through the front too often. We typically just go in and out of the backdoor. Our red mums back there are in full bloom! And somehow, the golden cherry tomatoes have kept producing! Probably not for long, though... we heard that it might actually SNOW this weekend! What? In October?? Crazy!! It's rainy today, but it's definitely nippy out. I actually wouldn't be surprised if it snowed today. 


I hope you're keeping warm, my dears. I have a purring cat tucked into my hoodie, ha ha, as I write this. I'm so lucky to have a cuddle cat to snuggle with on these chilly days. Soon I'll be at work, though, in the warm and cozy cave I work in. Haunting Gregorian chants will be playing in the background, the chocolate truffle candle will be infusing the air with it's warm, sweet scent, and everyone who comes in will eventually float out with smiles on their faces. It's a nice world I live in.... and I wish all that and more on you, dear friends.


xox

Yesterday's Rain Walk

As I was walking downtown, I noticed that my feet cross many different types of walks. It kind of intrigued me. So I took photos of the various types of sidewalks as I went... here's what I got:

I also noticed that many people have started decorating for the season at hand...

Fall has only just begun... but here and there are brightly colored trees, ahead of the game...

I love when I walk into the grocery store now, it smells like cinnamon and spiced apples! It's such a heady fragrance.... it makes grocery shopping a delight, except for the crowds. It seems that now that I'm working, I tend to get to the store when everyone else is! Here, it's the time for pumpkin treats, apple cider, cinnamon scented pine cones and hot chocolate. What a delectable time of year! Also, I'm preparing for our now annual Pumpkin Carving Party, and plan to make some yummy treats for it...  more on that afterwards!


I hope you're all staying cozy and enjoying what nature has to offer, whether you're on the east coast, west coast, the tropics or down under!!


xox