more reading

 Monday afternoon we drove into the "city" to Barnes and Noble.

It's been a l-o-n-g time since we've done this

(used to be a once-a-week habit)!

I gathered a few magazines and leisurely paged through them.

It felt like the ultimate luxury.

I used to subscribe to a couple of the magazines above,

but they seemed to fill up with more and more advertisements 

at the same time the subscription rates increased,

so I dropped them.

I still have stacks of the old Victoria magazines.

It used to be my favorite along with Country Living which I couldn't find at B&N  yesterday...

Hmmmmmm.  I wonder where it was...

..one particularly intriguing photo...

reflections

Not the greatest pose - but probably the better picture of the two available..

I'm dressed to attend the funeral mass for a friend's mother later this morning.

Clothes - ALL from thrift stores!  It's my favorite vintage black jacket, by the way.

 Yesterday, I found the "lost" stockings.  Was I ever relieved!

 They now are hanging on our staircase banister.
The one on the top in the picture was recently added to the collection
to assure that all 11 of our grandchildren would have a stocking.
(I believe ALL of them were thrift store purchases.)

 I'm enjoying the occasional reflections of the sun shining in a window

 off my "new" vintage tree.

We've decided to enjoy the tree unadorned this Christmas...

...and kind of right out in the middle of the room, too!

all style; no thrift*

Sunday, we toured Brookside, formerly known here as the Bass Mansion.  John H. Bass was founder of the old Bass Foundry and Machine works and dean of Fort Wayne's pioneer manufacturers. For more than 60 years, Mr. Bass was a leader in the financial and industrial life of Fort Wayne, Indiana.  His country home, "Brookside", was one of Northern Indiana's most attractive suburban estates. The Bass mansion, surrounded by 300 wooded acres and artificial lakes, is now the home of Saint Francis University.

 Local florists decorated each of the rooms and halls for the Christmas tour.

This place is ALL style and NO thrift!
*(I don't mean anything negative by that "NO thrift" comment.
The restoration was done "correctly", I think,
thanks to the generosity of many donors.)

What a pleasure to take in the beauty of this lovingly restored place!

 Obviously I had difficulty knowing which photos to eliminate!