A delightful morning in Strasbourg

Today, I had a fun morning, so I thought I would share it. Don't be too excited........nothing exactly note-worthy happened. But since we aren't traveling as much, less of our life here seems blog-worthy. So I thought it might be fun to share a few of the simple pleasures of a typical day here.

This morning was delightful for a few reasons. The first of which is my new sneakers. Every woman in Strasbourg between the ages of 15-30 has these exact shoes. So, when I needed new sneakers, I thought, "why not?" There is something fun about a new pair of shoes that are exact replicas of shoes I wore in middle school. 7th grade Whitney would be proud.
Voilà my brand new converse all-stars.......


My friend Patty is teaching me to cook Indian food, so today she took me to the local Indian and African grocery stores. So, another factor in my joyful morning was all the beautiful spices I bought. Sunday night I will be preparing my first Dahl.......Even though I have no idea what I'm doing, I figure you can't wrong with lovely ingredients like these:


On the way home from the grocery store, I saw several beautiful things that also brightened my day. For example, I watched these swans fishing for a few minutes. We have swans like these all over the city and they are one of my favorite things. I love that they are rarely alone. Usually they are in a family of four or a couple like these guys:


I also walked by the main square in Strasbourg, Place Kleber. This will be the site of the biggest of several outdoor Christmas markets that will be held all over the city in December. More tourists visit Strasbourg in December than the summer months combined to experience France's "capital of Christmas." Today, I was so excited to see preparations in process. Here is the gigantic tree that will be lit next weekend to kick off the season:


And these decorations are already hanging:


Finally, near my apartment, I came across the most beautiful tree. It is huge and so brightly colored. I'm trying to soak in all the beautiful fall colors, because I know that gray winter is just around the corner.


Next week, I will prepare a Thanksgiving meal for the first time. Thankfully, our guests will not know the difference if I ruin a couple of things, this being their first Thanksgiving. So expect a post next week chronically my great success or horrible embarrassment. Hopefully, it will be the former.