Christmas was a lot of fun, and even though I'm exhausted by the driving and the running around, I'm feeling better than I have in weeks.
This year turned out to be the year of the kitchen as far as the presents I received, and I'm still trying to find room for all my new kitchen toys. I also need to find the time to actually play with them! :)
My mom and dad loved their iPods and the tunes I loaded up for them. (Southern rock and classic rock for Dad and 60s pop and country for Mom.) That was my biggest gamble in giving presents this year, and I was so relieved that they enjoyed them.
Now it's time to relax a bit and get ready for my favorite month January and a ton of family anniversaries and birthdays.
Show us your desktop.
Submitted by Anthony.
The wallpaper is from Colonial Williamsburg. I'm just a bit obsessed with Colonial Williamsburg, and my current ringtone is harpischord music from their site with a special ringtone of fifes and drums for Matt. I like this snow photo because of the colors and because it's the closest I'm going to get to snow for a while.
Where do you do your online shopping?
Lots of places! Probably 95% of my shopping other than groceries is done online, and for special grocery needs like yummy cheeses that I have a hard time finding here at reasonable prices, I shop online at places like igourmet.
For other online shopping, there's Amazon of course, which was where I made my first online purchase ever in December 1996 because the book selection was not so great in Fairbanks at the time. I'm also using Barnes & Noble a lot because I'm always getting coupons for them and because we have a membership card there.
I'm a frequent shopper at Lush and The Body Shop because I love taking baths and having a nice variety of lotions. I do all my clothes shopping online, so there's too many stores to even mention when it comes to clothes. For geeky items and cool T-shirts, there's ThinkGeek, J!NX, and OffWorld Designs. Levenger, K. Schweizer, and FLAX art & design are places where I do more "window shopping" than real shopping because they can be a little outside my budget, but I still love them.
Speaking of budgets, some of my favorite shopping sites are ones that help me save money like FatWallet Forums, The Bargainist, and Current Codes.
This year, I find myself coming back again and again to songs talking about the human side of the birth of Jesus. I'm thinking about what it was like to be a part of that, and I'm in awe of what these people experienced. If anyone out reading this is in a similar frame of mind, then I highly recommend Do You See What I See? from Todd Agnew and friends to you. It's my most frequently played album this month. The album concept is a series of songs shared from people like Mary, Joseph, and the innkeeper in Bethlehem. Each song is beautiful and powerful. It's hard to explain, but I feel Christmas when I listen to this album.
Over at his MySpace page, Todd is sharing some of the stories behind the songs, and I recommend those short videos even if you don't give the album a listen. You can listen to a couple of the songs from the album there as well.
What books did you love as a child?
Submitted by hearts.
I also have to spotlight my favorite children's book author/illustrator Tomie dePaola. I brought home The Clown of God from the library one day when I was 4 or so, and I fell in love with the pictures and the story. Every time I went through it, I found some new little detail in the pictures that I'd missed before. I couldn't get enough of his books, and Fin M'Coul: The Giant of Knockmany Hill in addition to the many others quickly became favorites as well. I still buy his books, and I still love them.
Show us a nice, warm scarf.
Here is Malachi, my sweet kitty from Build-A-Bear Workshop, showing off a scarf I crocheted a few years ago. I'm not a scarf person, but I find myself making them from time to time because they're quick little projects when I just want to make something. My niece and other children in my life seem to enjoy them for their dolls and stuffed animals, so they have some use at least. :)
This article - Letters to Santa flood Alaskan town - brings back so many wonderful memories. For those who don't go to the article, it's about a little town in Alaska called North Pole that gets a lot of letters to Santa this time of year. Volunteers write replies for Santa as he is a very busy guy. :)
We lived in Fairbanks, which is about 12 miles from North Pole, and I loved volunteering as one of Santa's helpers. Some letters broke my heart, but the experience is one I'll never forget. It also gave me a special status with my two youngest cousins who were at just the right ages to be big Santa fans during the years we lived in Alaska. They wrote me directly as well as Santa each year because they were convinced I had some special access to him.
Just in case anyone wonders where my blog's new tagline "Penguin, James Penguin. Secret agent bird." comes from,I thought I'd share my source material, a funny Christmas song from Brad Paisley. His song "Penguin, James Penguin" makes me giggle, and I just had to include it with my beautiful new theme when I saw those adorable penguins!
Santa didn't need much help,
But with more and more kids every year
He soon got overwhelmed.
He told the elves one Christmas,
"We can't do this anymore."
Then a knight in shining polyester
Waddled through his door
And it was Penguin, James Penguin.
He was there to save the day.
He had wireless
And GPS outfitted on the sleigh.
I had such a hard time picking a theme today. I may be changing my blog's look daily for the rest of the year because there are so many great seasonal themes released today. I ended up with the fantastic Aurora theme because it reminds me of living in Alaska even though I never saw cute little penguins there. :D
Finish this sentence: "What in the world was I thinking when I...?"
Submitted by jammin15.
What in the world was I thinking when I moved here? Originally, we came down for grad school, but I didn't expect us to get sucked into this place like we have. I really thought we'd be somewhere else by now. It just seems hard to pick up and move. We'll figure it out though, and really, it's not so bad since Matt is here too. :)
