You may
have noticed that over the last month I have hardly mentioned Christmas. It
seems that every four years or so I don't have any spirit and can't be bothered
with a tree or lights or anything. This was that year. I never even got around
to putting up my three-foot, hot pink tree. Oh well. This probably means I'll
have an overabundance of spirit next year and will cram three trees in my tiny
condo, one of which will be a recreation of the elf from Rudolf the Red-Nosed
Reindeer or something equally ambitious.
Fortunately
for my friends and family, my lack of decorating spirit didn't mean I didn't
get in the gift-giving spirit. I picked up a few things that have thus
far been well received. (I still have a few to give.)
I was
big on Etsy finds this year. My friend Alyson loves Marilyn Monroe so I whipped
out my credit card immediately when I found this:
It's
obviously very cute and the seller
was super-sweet, which was a nice bonus. So much of what we buy is from
anonymous corporations that it's a refreshing change to have interaction with
the actual creator of a product.
Another
great Etsy find from another sweet seller
was this Fortune Favors the Bold print:
She had
this design with some other quote, but one quick email exchange later and she
was creating a custom version for me. If you're looking for typography art and
are loyal to a specific quote, it's worth the effort to send an email to the
seller to see if they can change out the quote. Depending on how they create
their art, it may be very easy.
On the
receiving side of things, my sister and brother-in-law gave me Nate Berkus' The
Things That Matter. Did you know he and his partner were in the 2004 Boxing Day
tsunami? Sadly, his partner didn't make it.
We had a really nice
holiday. Between myself, my parents and my sister, we have five dogs, so we
made a trip to the dog park in an effort to wear them out. The wind was biting,
but the dogs didn't seem to mind and we accomplished our goal: they all slept
the rest of the day.
My Dad and I also spent
hours making cookies this weekend. Has anyone ever made Spritz cookies? The
main ingredient is butter, so it goes without saying that they're delicious.
You have to work for them though. You make them with a cookie press, and every
year my Dad and I end up waging war with that press. The dough either doesn't
stick to the pan or is too goopy and doesn't form shapes. We've tried more
flour, less flour, heating the butter, using room temperature butter, chilling
the dough, cooling the pan, picking up the press quickly, holding the press to
the pan an extra second, twisting the press, lifting the press up from the
side. None of it worked. Eventually we resorted to making blobs with sprinkles
on top. Didn't stop me from eating about 25. Good thing my parents gave me new
running shoes for Christmas.
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| Taste at Home |
As an FYI, Anthropologie is
offering an extra 30% off sale merchandise today. I currently have $531 worth
of merchandise in my cart, so I clearly have some culling to do.
Hope everyone had a wonderful
Christmas! I'll be back with more frequency next week.
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