Hi again! Glad to see you back! Don't worry about taking a break, I'm all in favor of getting away from the computer now and again :) It's great to read you again, though - I really enjoy our chats, it feels as if we've known each other forever :)

For Thanksgiving, we invited some friends over and had pumpkin pie outside in the backyard. Oh, and hot chocolate for us kids. It was pretty cold, but it was worth it. My sister and I cut some leaves out of colored paper and threaded them, and each of us chose a few leaves and wrote down on them what we were grateful for. Then we hung the leaves on an upside-down branch that served as a faux tree (we actually used it for a Christmas tree one year, with ivy wound around it). I wrote that I was grateful for interesting people, health, and the beauty of the world in general... Your Thanksgiving sounds wonderful! Is there anything in particular you're especially grateful for this year?

Thank youuu :)  And yeah, that song should definitely be like our anthem or something! It also really describes my only irl friend, who shares so many similarities with us three (she likes horses, she plays Settlers of Catan, she has a large family with cousins galore, she likes to read, she's Canadian like you, and so on)... I guess there are a lot of us out there lol.

Mwahaha you have unwittingly asked me for song recommendations and now you shall be BURIED UNDER A DELUGE OF THEM-- okay, not quite. I like practically anything that's not pop or heavy metal or another less harmonious genre, but off the top of my head right now I would say basically any of the country songs by Lisa McHugh (like Hillbilly Girl, Y'all Come, Country Girl [hmm, I sense a theme in her song titles]). A few of my other favorite songs right now are:

-Did She Mention My Name by Gordon Lightfoot

-Me and the Wildwood Rose by Carlene Carter

-A Risa by Antonio Fierro

-My Beloved Country (Russian Imperial Army in WWI) - it's just some Russian song I found when I was researching WWI songs for school, but I find it strangely plaintive and peaceful, both at once.

I hope you enjoy them! Do you have any recs you'd like to share? I'm always up for listening to new songs :)

*nods* I agree about reading bios of famous authors. I've always found Maud Hart Lovelace's life really interesting, because it's really close to Betsy's life in the Betsy-Tacy series (which actually follows Betsy all the way through her teenage years and early married life). Meeting Tolkien would be fascinating, I agree. I have a long list of people I'd want to meet, but if I had to narrow it down I'd probably say Dolly Parton, because she's one of my favorite singers and from what I've seen she just has such a warm, caring personality; several soccer players, including Cristiano Ronaldo and Harry Kane, because I love watching soccer games and it would be really interesting to actually meet these people instead of just seeing them on a screen; and Shakespeare. There are/were so many fascinating people in the world! Do you have a particular favorite fictional character you would like to meet?

I'm not sure if I've asked this before, but do you have a favorite movie? Now that it's past Thanksgiving, it's the season for watching Christmas movies, which makes me very happy :)