Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

I love Christmas (as long as it starts after Thanksgiving Day), and there's nothing like New York City at Christmas time. The last two years here have been magical, with everything transformed into a winter wonderland by more than a foot of snow on the ground. This year, it's been unseasonably warm all month. And it's hard to get into the Christmas spirit when you're walking around without a coat on in December. (Not that I'm complaining...)

We started out the Christmas season by attending the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade with our friends, the Majors. It was a bit chilly, standing in the shade, and we were far enough back that all we could see was the balloons, but I'm glad we went. Here are a couple of pics (to see them all, visit my FB page):

(That last one is Tim Burton's contribution to this year's parade.)

Skip forward to this weekend...On Saturday afternoon, thanks to Ed's Aunt Joanne and Uncle Bob (and their friend who sings with the Metropolitan Opera), we had tickets to see La Fille du Regiment. I don't know anything about Donizetti operas, but this one was really funny. Ed balked at 3 hours of listening to a soprano, so I took my friend, Suki with me. It was wonderful. And we got to see Kiri Te Kanawa perform, which was an unexpected treat. Afterward, we went to look at Christmas windows and lights, visiting the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree, Saks and Bergdorf windows. Saks was a huge disappointment, I have to say, but Bergdorf's were amazing as usual:

You can't really tell from the photos how gorgeous that blue and green window was--all kinds of sea creatures created out of metallic mosaic pieces. Can you see the lobster in the bottom foreground? Incredible. I had visited Macy's a couple of weeks ago as well, and while I didn't take any pictures, their windows this year were beautiful, too.

Ed and I spent Christmas Eve feasting on stuffed sole from Omaha Steaks, compliments of my in-laws, drinking wine and opening presents. (He's like a five-year-old when it comes to gifts, starting about Dec. 20th: "Can I open them now? Why not??") He bought me Mondel's chocolates (which is now on my must-do-when-in-NYC list) and the complete Blu-Ray Harry Potter series. Bring on the blizzards!

My very dear friend, Neda, who lives in CA is coming for a visit tomorrow, which will add to the list of things for which I'm so grateful this year. Merry Christmas to all!