In our final pre-Christmas issue of Three Beautiful Things, we offer these up for your enjoyment:

1. Our friend Phillip gave us some beautiful gifts over the weekend — photos he took himself, mounted and framed. Rudi’s is of a D.C. bike race; mine is of Butterstick.

2. Maria, my boss, had no problem letting me work from home today so Rudi and I can head out a bit early this afternoon. I know myself and know that no matter how much I tried to get to work on time this morning, I wouldn’t have if I’d had to shower and dress before I left. The ability to work in my living room in my bathrobe lets me be on time and productive.

3. The Christmas package to my brother was mailed by the online shipper and I’ve been tracking it via the internet. The Post Office emailed me yesterday to let me know of its progress and my breath caught in my throat — it had been misdelivered to someone in Nevada! But then I realized it was just a weird coincidence — it was routed through a town in Nevada that shares our last name (minus a silent “a”). How freaky — but oddly wonderful — is that?

It’s been a roller-coaster of a week, with most of it feeling like I was heading down a big hill screaming my head off (or wanting to, at least). These are the weeks when it’s hard to find the beauty — and probably the ones where finding them is the most necessary:

1. I went to a mass held in Facundo’s memory at Catholic University this morning. The priest gave a nice sermon about how in the literal darkness of winter, the Advent candles are lit to remind us that there is light in the world and that that can be translated into the more figurative light of love within the darkness of our grief. He also said that when looking back no one says they would have preferred not to have loved a person in order to avoid the pain of grieving. These are good lessons for me to keep in mind, as I am prone to dwelling more on the depth of the darkness and less on the love that makes the darkness worth slogging through.

2. Phillip was really excited about getting to see Butterstick. When he talks about him, he gets a little kid expression on his face that expresses pure joy.

3. Since getting sick last week, I haven’t slept terribly well (which impedes getting better). But last night I slept through the night without coughing myself awake (or being awakened by Jeremiah dumping stuff on my head from the shelf above the bed). Can recuperation be far behind?

Before I launch on my own list this week, I just wanted to alert my readers that Clare, the original Three Beautiful Things author, now has her own independent domain to rule: http://www.threebeautifulthings.co.uk. I only come up with a list once a week, which gives me plenty of material, but Clare manages to come up with three things every day. I read her site each morning because it reminds me that no matter how crabby I might be there are potentially beautiful things out there that I’m just not seeing.

My own list from the last week:

1. I have always taken sick days for granted, having had relatively good health. And when I had mono shortly after starting at Wesleyan, they didn’t believe in counting sick days, giving me the flexibility to recuperate. I am taking advantage of one of my sick days today to recuperate from whatever bug I picked up from a poor coworker who had no sick days left to take despite her miserable condition this week. I just wish I could share my remaining days with her so she could stay home in bed, too.

2. Rudi emailed me last week to say that our sheep/garlic farmer would be at the market on Sunday with some beautiful yarn. The colors were gorgeous and had been dyed using a new technique for Gretchen. I bought three mini hanks — two raspberry-colored and one in the hues of rust and ripe peach. Gretchen said it was hard to part with this particular yarn — and I understand why. I don’t think these will be knit into gift projects; these are staying with me.

3. Last night I was feeling so poorly that I didn’t notice the packages sitting outside our door and didn’t really care when Rudi came home and brought them in. Inside one was a cd from my monthly music club (always fun), but the second was from my college roomie. She sent me a belated birthday present — a handmade cat card from one craft fair and a gorgeous necklace from another. The necklace is on a peach ribbon and looks like a Christmas bon bon. I can’t wait to wear it!

As it’s the darkest month of the year, I feel the need to note more of the lovely. Here are another three beautiful things from the last week (or so):

1. On Thanksgiving morning, Dad and I always go out to buy doughnuts. I don’t remember when we started getting Dunkin’ Donuts for Thanksgiving breakfast, but it must have been while I was still quite small. When we were kids, Josh would come, too, but once he was older, he opted to stay home. During college and for a couple Thanksgivings after, my friend Rebecca or my cousin Caroline and her friend would spend the holiday weekend with us and joined us for the excursion. Rudi may have even come along once or twice. But in general, it’s just me and Dad. He orders some and then I order some. No one ever complains, so I guess we must do pretty well. As Rudi and I were driving up to Connecticut last week, I asked him what he was looking forward to most over the holiday. He talked about relaxing and eating a festive meal. Then he turned the question back to me. “Going to get the doughnuts with Dad.” And, you know, it was.

2. As I was talking to Rudi’s mom on the phone last night, I started to hear a cat crying. With three cats, it’s not surprising to hear one make noises out of sight, but it turned out that my cats were all accounted for. The mewing got more insistent as I walked to the window, when who should appear on the wall above our window, but a tiny grey fluffy kitten? It was probably no more than 10 weeks old, and it gave one look at Jeremiah and me peering up at it from the window before disappearing into the night. I looked for it a few minutes later but didn’t see it up close again.

3. Yesterday, a holiday craft bazaar/flea market opened in a parking lot near my office. I stopped at one booth to examine some wares and the merchant started chatting with me about what he was selling and how his family and neighbors back home in Morocco make them. As I told him I’d be back again today with some money, he looked at me and smiled. “Don’t worry about how much you have,” he said. “We’ll make it work.” A line, perhaps, but still he seemed like a nice guy on a chilly December day.

Welcome to December. The world is all sparkly and pretty at Christmas so I’d expect that to be a theme over the next month.

Three beautiful things from the last week:

1. Mum and I spent Friday making batch after batch after batch of Christmas cookies. It took all afternoon and we were both exhausted by suppertime. Once upon a time, Mum and I couldn’t have spent an afternoon together without it ending in frustration for one or both of us. It’s nice that those days are past us — and that we have the cookies to prove it.

2. Last Christmas Rudi put up a string of lights along two walls in our living room. The intention was to go all the way around, but we didn’t have extra lights at the time and it looked pretty as is. Eventually the strands died. Last week, Rudi did half the room in lights, and he finished the job on Monday. Now we can sit in the room with the overhead lights off and bask in a cheerful pink glow.

3. This morning, I was walking to the Metro station, contemplating what to include in today’s post. I was absorbed in my thoughts and might have made it all the way underground without really seeing the day, but a gorgeous tree stopped me and made me stand, staring, mouth agape, for several extra seconds. Most trees have dropped their leaves already, but this maple has tiny scarlet leaves that stood out against this morning’s bright blue sky to create a vibrant lacy look. It just made my morning — and I’ll be sure to check on it on my daily trek to the Metro.

Welcome to our Three Beautiful Things of Thanksgiving edition. Please have a seat and pass the mashed potatoes. Would you like some wine?

1. Several years ago I asked my grandmother to write down some of the recipes that she makes so I could have a copy available at my fingertips. In the last week, I’ve made a batch of raspberry-almond shortbread thumbprint cookies to take to a party and consulted it for Mum, who needed Gramma’s pumpkin pie recipe so we could have pie for tonight’s dessert. It’s one of my treasured possessions because not only does it give me family recipes, but it’s also like having a bit of Gramma nearby when I’m far from her.

2. We got a bit of a later start than I’d hoped for yesterday and the roads heading out of D.C. were bustling. But the snow held off until after we left, accidents had been cleared, and most people seemed to have left earlier than we did. So we sailed through Maryland, paused for a while in Delaware, and then had a quick drive through New Jersey, New York, and Connecticut to get us in shortly after midnight. Less than nine hours on a holiday weekend with a stop at a grocery store and a stop for dinner on top of our normal bathroom and refueling stops seems really lucky.

3. Rudi awoke me this morning just before dawn to tell me it was snowing. By the time Dad and I went to get the doughnuts at breakfast, the driveway was coated and slippery. But the world looked very Currier and Ives as the deer sprang through the yard and the snow covered the remaining fall leaves that had eluded the rake. The perfect start to the holiday season.