Shiny Presents

Well, after saying yesterday that hubby and I are pretty low maintenance, we went on a mini shopping trip today. We'll do better tomorrow. But it's the holiday season, and even though we're trying to be good – well, some days it just doesn't happen! So we went to the local store. We have some peppermint hot chocolate mix and holiday candy now – and we stayed under $20, so I think we're still good. It felt good to get out for awhile.

Most of the snow melted off today with the bright sunshine......except for our driveway. Our house faces north, and there's a very VERY large building next door that blocks the sun off the front yard and driveway. We figure the snow will be there until spring, unless the temp gets above freezing for a good amount of time!

My cousin is coming in for an early Christmas in a couple of days. He's retired and living in Pompano Beach, Florida. He also just got back from a Caribbean Cruise. Poor guy, he's going to freeze when he gets here! I missed him during his last trip home, so hopefully we can connect for a few minutes without taking time away from his immediate family. We find ourselves keeping in touch more now that he's retired, thanks to social media.

There have been several conversations lately about Christmas cards and that people don't seem to send them like they used to. Today there was a conversation on TV about the social etiquette of actually hand addressing the envelopes and including a brief hand-written note with the card....versus having everything pre-printed and just popping the cards in the envelop, then peeling and sticking the addresses. The thought on that was definitely generational.

We got our second and third cards today – I was happy to see that younger daughter and her hubby hand addressed their cards and included hand written notes, in spite of the fact that they send out somewhere between 80 and 100 cards. She did, however, mention having their contact list of names, addresses, etc., on a spreadsheet in her computer. That's okay – I'd probably do the same thing if I had Excel on my computer!

The Christmas d-o-l-l for the five-year-old whirlwind arrived today, so I'm set for Christmas. The only thing I have left to do is wrap the gifts. I thought the doll and its clothes would be best in a Christmas gift bag with tissue paper. We found a large bag with a big penguin on it. She loves penguins, so I have to have that bag for her gift even though it's larger than necessary......that's okay, that's what tissue paper is for!

I think beautifully wrapped Christmas gifts are wonderful. Unfortunately, I'm evidently not genetically disposed to beautifully wrapped gifts! I've made peace with that years ago, I finally realized nobody but me cares how well things are wrapped.

When I was a kid, we were always very careful about unwrapping our gifts. I'm still careful, I don't rip into a package.......unless that's the only way to get it open! But like a lot of other people, we would smooth out, carefully fold, and re-use our Christmas wrap from year to year. If there was a small tear where a piece of tape had been, we would carefully trim that side and re-use it. I can remember a time or two suggesting to Mom that a piece of wrapping needed to be retired! But, I can say, it saved a lot of money!

I've always thought Christmas presents are fun, whether you're giving or receiving......which is probably why I'm easily distracted by pretty shiny things!