He's So Cute...Happy Holidays!

Cheers!
Lori in Blue Ridge, GA

Wait...You're only Seven?

I had a funny and surprising conversation with my 7 year old Granddaughter this weekend. I asked her to write out her Christmas Wish List so we could complete our shopping. Off she skipped with pen and paper in hand to work on the list. 

About an hour later she returned with a nicely written list containing about 10 items. She announce with an impressive sweep of her hand "You can get me all these things". I think she mistook my look of surprise at her decree as a look of bewilderment, because she launched into a detailed description of each item on the list

She emphasized that she wanted "a lot of this" and "really fast that" and "not the small one, get the large one".  She repeated the word "real" several times when describing a phone and a car; not the toy one mind you, the "REAL" one. 

Since I retired early, our budget for gifts is much reduced this year. To get her expectations in line with our budget, I told her that we would only be getting one item from her list. I also told her that Grandma and Grandpa would decide what to get based on the items on her "Wish" list. 

She thought about that for a minute and then asked for the list back. She scratched everything off the list except for the "real" car, handed it back to me, and skipped off. LOL She's a hand full....but I'm glad she is using her brain to troubleshot a problem. Look out world! 

Cheers and Best Wishes!

Lori in Blue Ridge, GA

Handmade for the Holidays

This holiday season I’m trying to give handmade items as much as possible.  I believe that a handmade gift expresses so much more than something pulled off the end-cap display of a mega store. Hopefully the gift recipient will realize that I care enough about them to seek out something as individual as they are.

Even if you aren’t the crafty type, you can still gift fabulous handmade products this holiday season.  I love looking through the handmade shops on Etsy.  It is absolutely unbelievable the amount of beautifully crafted one-of-a-kind gifts that are available. I can find almost anything on Etsy and the items are delivered right to the front door. No black Friday shopping for me!

Many of my gifts this year will be handmade jewelry that I created, but I’ll need a few other items too. I put together a list of great Etsy shops for you to check out- just a teeny tiny sample of what is offered.

 1.  Taylor Crafts Engraved

 2.  Peg and Awl

 3.  Sherris Photographs and Crochet

 4.  Babies Bugs and Bees

 5.  Pole Star

 6.  LuLu Bug Jewelry

 7.  Ceci Capen Clay Studio

 8.  Jen’z Art Bazaar

 9.  Wooden Toys NW

Also, when you shop handmade, you are supporting the future, family, confidence, mind, body and soul of that artist. It creates an amazing relationship between 2 people: the buyer and seller. You are not just a customer; you become a supporter, a fan, a collector of their art.

Etsy, the place for all things handmade...Cheers!

Giving a Hostess Gift...

The holiday season is quickly approaching and with it comes a lot of seasonal social obligations: cookie exchanges, open houses, dinner parties, and cabin weekends away. We still live by this simple rule: never arrive at someone’s home without something more to contribute than our company. No matter what the occasion, a considerate guest never arrives empty-handed.

When we do remember to bring a nice little something, it’s invariably a bouquet of flowers or a bottle of wine from the corner liquor store. Really!?! Can’t we do better than that? I’m on a mission to plan ahead and purchase meaningful gifts for this social season. 

Here are some of my ideas… click on the picture if you’d like to go to the seller’s website.

 Party wear is a great choice for hosts that frequently entertain in their home. This unique cheese board is also a 'lazy susan', making it easy for guests to help themselves to appetizers or a selection of artisan cheese.

For the cookie exchange, handmade pot holders are a functional and fun hostess gift.

This gift is perfect for a formal dinner party, a high quality stainless steel cake serving set with hand worked bead and pearl embellishments.

If your host for the event is a gentleman, an organic vegan shaving soap gift set might be a good choice. The ceramic cup is a nice touch.

 

If the event is an afternoon open house, cookies in a pretty tin box would be a nice gift for your hosts. Not your ordinary chocolate chip cookie, but something like the Brooklyn Market Cookie. It’s fully loaded with chewy dried cherries, crunchy macadamia nuts, rich chocolate and white chocolate chips, oats and cocoa nibs. Yummy!

A great hostess gift for almost any holiday occasion is a set of handmade screen printed tea towels or a set of handmade coasters.

Remember The Rules of Appropriate Gifting:

A hostess gift doesn’t have to be expensive, but it should be thoughtful. Consider the types of activities your hosts enjoy, and gift accordingly. As a general rule, your budget should be around $15 to $30, depending upon the formality of the occasion.

Cheers!

Christmas Catalogs on Halloween?

Yesterday our mailbox was stuffed full of Holiday catalogs…really... on Halloween! I’m curious; do you start your Christmas shopping/decorating on Halloween?  This morning the coffee shop was promoting their newest coffee flavor “Christmas Cookie”.   What happened to the “Autumn Brew”?  While some shoppers may welcome early holidays, I’m not one of them. I believe the fun-size candy bars in the little plastic pumpkin should be gone before candy canes hit the shelves.

It's a phenomenon called Christmas creep or in the project management world scope creep. It’s when holiday sales, shopping and decorations show up earlier and earlier each year. This year, it's more evident than ever. Starting well before Black Friday (the day after Thanksgiving), which is the traditional start of the holiday shopping spree.

Thankfully there are still holdouts. Nordstrom is adhering to its long-standing policy of no holiday decorations until Black Friday, I just love that policy!

Here are my two firm rules:

First, and this goes for all holidays, no celebrating until the previous holiday has passed. This means you should wait until at least Nov. 23 to put up the tree, but feel free to give yourself a couple more days to digest all that cranberry sauce.

Second, Christmas evokes thoughts of snow, ice skating and ugly sweaters. If it’s too warm for all those; then it’s too warm for Christmas.

The first rule is the most important, but if a warm December is a possibility (like here in Atlanta), at least wait for all the leaves to fall.

I hope you don’t think I’m a Scrooge. I really do love Christmas! I don’t want to take away Christmas; I just want to make the preparation a bit shorter. Besides, you don’t need more than a day to shop anymore, go to Amazon, they’ll even wrap it for you (wink). Happy Holidays!