Christmas cheer

by

Yes, I’m Still Shopping! Stocking Stuffer Options

Well, Internet, I am only the barest squeak further along in my Christmas prep than I was on Friday. By which I mean I have finally ordered most of the presents I need to (but not all, oh no, not all), my holiday cards have arrived and the address labels have been printed (but not applied to the envelopes, which means the cards remain unsent), and I have contemplated what to order for Christmas dinner (but have not ordered it). Instead of oh, decorating or wrapping the gift that arrived and must go in the mail immediately, I am now thinking idly about stocking stuffers. It is much more pleasant to give into one’s mindless only shopping fixation rather than to give into panic about how far behind one is. 

My husband and I have slightly differing views on stockings. I feel like they are an opportunity for whimsy and fun but one person’s “whimsy” can slide so easily off the cliff into a chasm of “junk.” Anyway, every year I try desperately to temper myself when it comes to stocking stuffers and then the closer we get to Christmas, the more sure I am that I’ve completely underdelivered on gifts and the more I succumb to Stocking Stuffer Syndrome. So: here’s what I would shove in ALL the stockings if I could.

Spa Headband: The sixth grade set are all into skincare, and my daughter has expressly requested one of these holds-your-hair-off-your-face headbands. If it encourages her to cleanse and moisturize, I’m all for it.

Aesthetic Highlighters: Here’s me not really understanding The Current Kid Lingo, but “aesthetic” seems to be one of the highest compliments you can pay a noun? Not sure what Carla would be highlighting with these, but why not.

Fabric Pens: After attending a free embroidery class at our library, Carla has gotten back into clothing arts, like sewing and embroidery. She loves these fabric pens because they are purportedly washable, which means she can decorate and redecorate a shirt as often as she likes.

Harry Potter Miniverse: My niece loves Harry Potter and it seems like all kids love these mini brands balls, so I really want to get this for her.

LaNeige Lip Balm: I love a good lip balm and this pack of three could so easily be distributed among three wonderful people in my life.

Scrapbook Tape: I am sure Carla could come up with endless applications for this roll-on glue.

Fidget Pen: What kid wouldn’t appreciate this fun (and practical!) fidget?

Hot Sauce Travel Packs: I usually end up filling my own stocking, and this is what I’d like to fill it with.

Eye Masks: I would also like to find these in my stocking. Anything and everything with the slightest potential to detract from how old and tired I look.

Silicone Whisks: I am IN NEED of more silicone whisks. We only have one and it’s kind of big and unwieldy but nonetheless I use it all the time. 

Cooling Towel: I am not quite sure WHAT to put in my husband’s stocking. Maybe this cooling towel, which I think he’d make use of while he works out?

Chili Crisp: Speaking of my husband, he did mention this collection of chili crisp in passing. Every gift I’ve gotten him is something he specifically asked for, which makes me feel quite dull, but at least I know he’ll appreciate it?

Gilmore Girls Ornament: I would love to get this ornament for my GG-loving friend, but I’m not sure if it’s Gilmoreian enough???

Only Murders in the Building Ornament: Maybe this ornament would be better? Plus, it makes the song spring instantly to mind.

Only Murders Decal: I love this Only Murders in the Building Decal… but I don’t know if my friend is a decal person?

Only Murders Notepad: This is super cute and fun and useful.

Bombas Socks: Here’s a whimsy-free but semi-luxurious option for my husband’s stocking!

Croissant Throw Pillow Crochet Pattern: Some people in our home are opposed to croissant stuffies, so I am toying with getting Carla a croissant crochet pattern. My mom has been teaching her how to crochet, and this little throw pillow is SO CUTE.

Magnetic Shoelaces: This might be too practical a gift, even for a stocking stuffer, but boy would it be practical. My kid pretty much REFUSES to tie her shoes and it drives me bonkers. (Is this a My Kid Thing, or is it one of those Middle Schooler Things, like refusing to wear a coat when it’s 30 degrees outside?)

Swedish Dishcloths: I love my Swedish dishcloths – they are helping me ever-so-slowly wean off of my horrific paper towel habit – and it’s so fun to have them in cute patterns instead of plain solid colors.

Warmies Eye Mask: I think Carla would love this warm-up-able fuzzy eye mask. (I promise it is not invisible.)

Personalized Notepad: My husband got me some personalized stationery earlier this year and I love it. How fun would it be to get personalized notepads for everyone on my list?

Herb Scissors: Not sure how often I would actually USE these, but I still want them.

Zebra Hilighters: Again with the highlighters! But they are fun and the perfect size for a stocking.

Cat Post-It Note Dispenser: Carla asked for this little guy specifically, and how can I not buy it for her? (And one for me as well.)

Clean/Dirty Dishwasher Sign: Our dishwasher is not magnetic, and it’s nearly impossible to tell if the dishes inside it are clean or dirty, so I got a little sign you can hang inside the dishwasher to make it clear what’s going on. I have at least one person on my list who has explicitly requested one of these for her own house.

Emotional Support Pickle: I don’t know exactly why I have the urge to give one of these to every person I know, but the urge is strong.

Magnetic Leather Bookmark: Oh, how I love a good bookmark! No one can have too many bookmarks.

Sparkle Freckles: Is there any reason that my child needs sparkle freckle tattoos? No. But I cannot think of a reason that she does not need them, either.

Farting Pen: Even though this makes me groan, I can think of at least two people in my three-person household who would get a kick out of this. See? I believe in whimsy even at my own expense!

Screaming Christmas Goat: Last but not least, I sent this to a friend who loves goats and it was a HUGE hit. Someone in your life needs this goat.

by

Tuesday Randomosity: The Let’s All Pretend I Didn’t Completely Miss November Edition

December already. Another Tuesday. Grey has returned to the sky. Skiff of snow. Never-ending laundry. Blurry hold music, third phone call of the day. My wrist buzzing with notifications from a group chat I did not consent to join. I should be writing. What to make for dinner? A goat bleats in my brain. The persistent grey.

Let’s try to break through the grey and the goats with some bullets, shall we?

  • Dinner is killing me lately. I have whined continuously for the duration of this blog/my marriage about the Sisyphean tedium of trying to figure out what to make for dinner, and lately it seems to have come to one of its periodic peaks whereby I cannot envision even one dinner or its components. My list of Reliably Delicious Dinners looks like gibberish. My husband is infected, too; last night I asked him for ideas and he listed several options, all of which were side dishes made solely of potatoes. The added pressure of cooking for visitors is not helping. I did, finally, come up with something for dinner tonight: one pot salmon with peas, alongside savory garlic farro. My visitors love salmon; my child enjoys salmon; I like salmon; my husband dislikes salmon but has bravely agreed to eat it for the sake of harmony and wifely sanity. 
  • I am gearing up to cancel a service and ask for it to be refunded. I don’t actually think I will get a refund, but I am kind of gleeful at the prospect of talking to someone about why I am cancelling this completely worthless service. The only problem is that I don’t do great with confrontation, so I’m trying to prepare in advance what I’m going to say. Perhaps then I can be very methodical in my explanation also prevent myself from going all shrill when I enter into confrontation without warning. I don’t want to yell or be mean to whoever I talk to; it isn’t her fault that her company sucks. But I do want to be very clear about why her company sucks and that I Am Done. It would also be nice if they listen instead of writing me off as a Karen or a crank.
  • Speaking of companies that suck.  I got a letter recently from a financial service that there is an error with how my name is spelled in their system, and that it does not match how the IRS spells the name, which of course is going to result in, I don’t know, my imminent execution or something. Fine, whatever, I can fill out a form with the correct spelling. But guess what the misspelling they have on file is? My correctly spelled first name, my correctly spelled last name, and an ampersand. Like… couldn’t the people at the financial services company just… remove the ampersand? Is it not obviously a typo? 
  • The above reminds me of an issue we had years ago with our health insurance. The health insurance company was rejecting a fully covered claim because the name that the hospital billed under was not exactly identical to what the insurance company called the hospital in their own system. I can’t remember the exact ridiculousness, but it was something like, the insurance company covered Polkadot Rainbows Hospital and the hospital sent bills to the insurance company under the name Unicorn College – Polkadot Rainbows Hospital. And then I was stuck calling both the hospital and the insurance company and trying to get them to understand this stupid, stupid discrepancy that should not affect the coverage of my claim in any way. I am still salty about it, nearly two decades later. 
  • Perhaps could I come up with a bullet that isn’t quite so grumpy? Hmm. Hmmmmm.
  • Carla is in the most delightful holiday mood.  I woke up on December first and thought, my goodness, it’s December, and I have done NOTHING to prepare for Christmas/Hanukkah, and was about to slide down a long dark hole of holiday despair… but then Carla came skipping into my bedroom wearing a Santa hat AND reindeer antlers with jingle bells on them and announced that she’d already started decorating. Then she played “All I Want for Christmas Is You” on repeat for the rest of the day. THAT is the kind of Christmas energy I want to slather on myself like body butter. 
  • Should we do a cookie swap? One thing I have been eagerly thinking about as December sneaked up behind me and shoved me headlong into the holiday season is what cookies am I going to make???? Since I love talking about cookies as much as I love baking and eating them, I wonder if anyone would be interested in doing a bloggy cookie swap? Like, we all make cookies and document the process and then blog about it? Is that dumb? Does that require more organization and planning that I can handle? Alongside some of my old standbys and Nicole’s gingersnaps, I think I am going to try making these cranberry lemon bars. 
  • Where are you in the Christmas prep process? So far I have: 1.) finally ordered holiday cards, which I kind of threw together at the last minute on Sunday, but that’s okay because they are ORDERED, 2.) purchased a few presents for Carla and for my husband but zero presents for the other eight family members for whom I usually buy presents, 3.) bought a last-minute Advent calendar for Carla only yesterday, 4.) grabbed a little bag of gelt for Hanukkah from Trader Joe’s, and 5.) thought extensively about cookies. Oh, and I also sent my friend a Christmas goat. In terms of decor, the decorating process stalled shortly after Carla came into our bedroom and announced that she was decorating, so we have stocking holders up on the mantel, two reindeer kissing on the sideboard, the Christmas countdown figurine sitting on the kitchen table and a bin of other decorations sitting on the floor of the living room. All the other bins of decorations AND the Christmas tree are still on shelves in the basement. December is only three days old and already I feel very behind. 

That’s all I’ve got for today, Internet. I hope you are well. I miss you and I’m sorry for being such a crap blog friend lately. 

by

Five for Friday: It’s Almost Christmas! Edition

How many hours of TV watching is still considered “acceptable” while one’s child is on winter break? Asking for a me. 

Carla is feeling nearly back to normal. No fever since Sunday, and no more sore throat. Just a little sniffle and a bit of congestion.

We have SNOW this week, which is delightful!!!!! Probably because I am not obligated to drive in it. But I loooooove snow. I think it is supposed to warm up in the next couple of days, so it may not linger. But it’s so lovely while it’s lasting.

  • Carla and I spent FIVE HOURS running errands on Monday. Five. Hours. It was… not pleasant. She is a real trooper, though, and maintained her good humor throughout. Me… not so much. Somehow, despite the marathon, I still need to go to the grocery store and I really really want to go to the garden center because I continue to have Porch Panic about the state of my front stoop. It is so dumb, but I feel like the dead mums (which I panic bought three days before Thanksgiving, by the way; they were beautiful and lush at that time) are emanating a Gross Dead Vibe and the entire neighborhood is whispering about me behind my back. (Going to a neighborhood Christmas party and having one of the neighbors teasingly ask why we don’t have any lights up didn’t help. THEY ARE PAYING ATTENTION.) Maybe I could just swirl some twinkle lights festively on the dead mums and call it a day???? I still would need to purchase twinkle lights though. I also have a strong urge to buy more poinsettias. I have two small ones, one of which is trying to die already, but I want MORE POINSETTIAS. Part of this is a case of Christmas Décor Envy, which I developed while attending the aforementioned holiday party: the hosts’ house was GORGEOUS and every inch of it was bright with Christmas magic. There is no point in comparing oneself to other people – and in reality, I have no idea WHERE they store all their Christmas paraphernalia, and I have only a creeping horror in my bones to hint at what kind of time and energy is required to dress the house in such a fashion – but still I WANT MY HOUSE TO BE A WINTER WONDERLAND. Poinsettias would go a long way toward helping me achieve that goal, right? RIGHT? 
  • The real problem, I think, is that I have no idea how to decorate this house for Christmas. The living room is weird, so our Christmas tree is weird. It was kind of a battle, to be honest, to figure out where to put it. And I was the one who gave in, which makes me feel crabby. It’s a very open space, with really only two full walls: the other walls are the kitchen (which is a partial wall separating two doors) and the stairway/entryway which isn’t even enclosed; there’s a balcony that overlooks the living room. The longest wall isn’t even a wall wall, it’s a wall of windows. And the other wall is taken up by cabinets and the fireplace. So there’s no REAL place to put the tree. We ended up putting it in the middle of the wall of windows, which I think at least makes sense symmetrically. (My husband and child wanted the tree off center, which just felt wrong in so many ways.) My big idea was to put the tree up against the stairway, but my husband hated that idea so vehemently I think he might have simply declined to celebrate Christmas if I’d pushed. (I still think it would look great.) Also, we are planning to get new furniture for the space, so NEXT YEAR it will be even weirder, but my husband said not to think about that now. (Does he know me?) And that’s just the living room! It’s definitely the most Christmassy of all the rooms. The other rooms have… nothing. Which feels so unfair! (The party host had FIVE CHRISTMAS TREES. That is more Christmas trees than I could ever handle, but maybe I could handle two????) I could fill the piano room with poinsettias! What I really want to do is to line the doorways with something festive (yes, I know I mentioned this already) – I originally thought pine garland. And I have seen so many Instagram videos of people putting shower tension rods in their doorways and decorating them with pine garland and ornaments etc. that I have started thinking that’s a viable idea. (Keep off the internet, kids.) My mother suggested ribbon, which sounds not only economical but also less dusty (and less of a pain to store) than pine garland. But I am not crafty like my mother is, so who knows. I did end up buying some bow-things at Joann Fabric (70% off!) (I also got a box of Hanukkah candles for next year, also 70% off, so perhaps we will have enough candles to light the menorah FULLY every single night of Hanukkah next year lol cringe.) and a spool of ribbon and I’m going to see what I can do. It may be very Preschooler Makes a First Ornament, but it will be Something.
  • Where I have excelled, at least in volume, is baking. I have made not one but TWO batches of cranberry crumble bars, and they are still by far my favorite Christmas treat. They are just the perfect combination of buttery/tangy and crunchy/chewy. Carla wanted to bake, and her very specific baking request was snickerdoodles with buttercream frosting, so she made those. She really wanted colorful buttercream, and while she was rummaging around for food coloring she found the box of candy eyes we used last year and so she went wild with the eyes. Very Christmassy. I wanted to make molasses cookies, but they turned out a) completely smooth, not crackly like molasses cookies are supposed to be and b) very dry and crumbly on the inside. I tried to save them by adding an eggnog glaze, which I think does help, but… meh. From my online troubleshooting, it seems like my oven is the problem. (My understanding is that the crackly tops come from a combination of rolling the dough in sugar to dry it out, and having a nice hot oven.) I am pretty irritated with our ovens. Yes. We have TWO OVENS and neither of them seems to heat appropriately. SO FRUSTRATING. You should have seen how pale our Thanksgiving turkey was. It was cooked through, but it needed some time on the Jersey Shore with a bottle of baby oil. 
  • During our marathon errand day, Carla came across a selection of dog toys. She promptly burst into tears because she wanted to give them to all the dogs in our old neighborhood. Listen, I am a heartless bitch when it comes to I Really Need That tears. But I got a little misty, too, and I allowed her to buy them. She wanted to use her allowance, but then I had a discount situation that made them free. A Christmas miracle! She wrapped them and I texted our old neighbors and we spent an afternoon going from house to house, giving dog toys (and cookie plates) (although they were last-minute cookie plates, so they were on Hanukkah dishes because that’s all I had) and lots of pets. It made Carla’s day, although I think it also made her sad. It’s so hard to find a balance between honoring her grief by allowing her to visit these old neighbors, while also helping her to move on. I don’t think I’ve got it right. But it was lovely to see our old neighbors, who EACH had a little gift for Carla.  
  • Stocking stuffers have been procured. I feel as though I didn’t give you the full story, on Monday, when I alluded to shopping for stocking stuffers and how difficult that would be with Carla in tow. The thing is, I ordered stocking stuffers for Carla (and for my husband) long ago. Or at least long enough ago for them to have arrived already. However, my parents are spending Christmas Day with us, and I feel super awkward about them coming to our home and NOT having stockings to open. It is probably very silly, especially because they are minimalists at heart. But my desire to have Stocking Equity overruled my knowledge of their minimalism, so I got them stocking stuffers. (We have anonymous stockings that we set out for guests, so they will have stockings as well.) And also, I had NO IDEA what I wanted to get for stocking stuffers. The only thing that I really wished I’d learned about earlier was this flexible screwdriver bit. My dad would use the heck out of that bit! It’s so handy! But alas, I only learned about it on Monday when a YouTube ad interrupted my workout video. Next year, for sure. What I really needed to do was wander around a store and happen across the exact right stocking stuffers. And I got the chance during Carla’s music lesson and found a bunch of stocking stuffers that will hopefully be fun and/or personal-ish enough while also not making the recipient feel too guilty about throwing them out. So now there will be Stocking Equity and I am super relieved. 
Kohl’s is the place to go for stocking stuffers. I also got everyone candy. And Carla, shockingly, will get a bunch of other stuff because she is spoiled beyond belief.

Well, that’s it for me before Christmas, I think! I still have the grocery store/garden center to visit, and I still have to wrap some presents. (And Santa has to wrap gifts AND stocking stuffers – WHY, Santa, WHY did you begin such an arduous tradition????)  (Then again, maybe this is the last year Santa will visit our house, and I will henceforth be sobbing about NO SANTA GIFTS????? Parenting is so fun.)

Oh, by the way, I just have to include this here. Carla went to the orthodontist this week (yay, braces in our near future woo) and the orthodontist was very chatty about Santa. He said he sets TRAPS for Santa, to which Carla reacted with scorn. “Do you want to HURT Santa?” she asked, voice dripping with disapproval. No, the orthodontist just wants to SEE Santa, in person! “Why don’t you set up video cameras?” Carla suggested. Oh, but the orthodontist has tried that. And it didn’t work! Didn’t capture a thing. “That’s because Santa deletes the footage,” Carla said, and she might as well have added, “you idiot” because that’s what her tone conveyed. 

SANTA DELETES THE VIDEO FOOTAGE. You heard it here, folks. Don’t try to mess with Santa, even via digital surveillance methods.