Getting Ready For The Holidays
NAME: Lily
STATUS: Decking halls, donning gay apparel, etc.
PEEVE: People who won’t share gossip but don’t mind hearing it
GLEE: Warm kitty on a cold night
Ask most people about their gift-giving woes and they’ll tell you: It’s the men in their lives. They just can’t shop for a father with no hobbies, a boyfriend who only likes expensive gadgets or a 14-year-old boy who speaks in monosyllabic grunts and doesn’t admit to liking anything. But in my life? It’s quite the opposite. My dad is happy with anything that will help him get a fish into a boat – from top-notch tracking fish radar (or whatevs) to simple fishing lures. I swear the man would be happy with a box of worms. (Note to self…) And my sister’s DH (dear husband) is enamored of all things foodie: cookbooks, spatulas, pithy aprons, rare truffle oils, etc. Easy-peasy.
But then there’s Mom. And Rose. They’re not music fans. They don’t like TV. They don’t collect books. They’re not especially technologically advanced. No hobbies, unless raising kids counts as a hobby (I’m told it doesn’t). And they are SO not fashionistas – I don’t think either one of them has worn anything resembling a high heel since Rose’s wedding.
So what’s a poor broke girl to do? Sure, I could give them half of a sheep or a cadre of chicks for some poor village in Africa. But let’s face it: That’s no fun to wrap.
Did You know?On average, it takes five trips to the mall to complete all holiday shopping. source
Given the different time zones, Santa has 31 hours to deliver gifts, but his reindeer really have to fly, since that means visiting 823 homes per second. source
The first candy cane dates back to 1670 in Germany. source
Household waste increases by 25 percent between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day. In the United States, trash from wrapping paper and shopping bags totals 4 million tons. source
So, away I sped to the Interwebs, where I inevitably find my solution. Yes, Virginia, you can wrap sentimentality. You can slap a bow on a memory. All you need are a couple hundred digital photos, a long block of time devoted to a little online design and – voila! – instant gift. Family vacations, baby books, wedding albums – all there for the plucking. There are so many online companies that make it easy to, essentially, digitally scrapbook. Plus, no glue sticking to your fingers and you won’t be covered in glitter for the next 2 and a ½ days.
Mom will have a conniption fit when she sees all her babies’ sweet smiling faces on the same page. My sister will positively squeal when she sees all our vacation photos through the years. That plus fishing gear for the old man (and a couple thousand pounds of toys for the tater tot) will just about wrap up my family obligations.
Create your own handmade holiday cards.
Test your holiday knowledge with this fun quiz!
Enjoy some downtime while doing holiday crosswords, wordsearches, and word scrambles.
As for my gal pals, we’ve decided not to worry too much about gifts this year. Two of us are under-employed, one of us just got laid off and none of us are exactly rolling in dough. So we’re going to do a little dough-rolling instead. We’re all getting together at M’s house (she has the biggest kitchen) and making Christmas cookies! The chances that any of the edible ones will survive to be given to co-workers as gifts are probably slim to none, but who cares? It’s the perfect season for celebrating the sweetness of friends in your life.
Ugh. Entirely too sappy. I’ve been doing too much digital scrapbooking, clearly. Oh, what the heck. I guess cynicism deserves a holiday, too.
Let Mary Carter, our gifting expert, answer your questions about giving food as a gift!
All the above information has been reviewed by this week’s expert.
