1. This morning over breakfast I posted three new items on the BYKOTA Zazzle store. All three feature the same photograph, taken at the pumpkin patch last week and made to look like a painting thanks to the cool effects on Digital Image Pro. One’s a fall card, two are prints. This one is my favorite:
The quote on the print is from a poem by John Donne, “No Spring, nor Summer beauty hath such grace, As I have seen in one Autumnal face.”
Do me a favor? If you like it too, click over and give it some stars? Or, if you don’t really love that one, maybe check out some of the other stuff at the Bykota store and give your favorite five stars? You know how it is, you’re so much more likely to buy something that’s been rated highly by someone else, even though you don’t know that person from Adam … why is that, do you think?
2. Yesterday I got an email from Zazzle telling me that someone bought the poster of my leaf photograph. This made me very proud. Very very proud. Because this is the first time anyone has bought a photograph that I took since my friend’s mom bought a candid I took at his wedding. She gave me like $5 for a 4×6 print and I felt SO cool and almost like a Real Photographer. Clearly it takes very little to swell my head. But you know, it’s not very often I feel like something I do is good, or even noticed. The plight of the SAHM, I guess. So, I’ll take these little ego boosts wherever I can get them…
3. Speaking of that, guess what came in the mail today? A package from The Pemco Guy! Look at all the stuff he gave me!
If you can’t make it all out, there’s a coffee table book of Washington state nature photographs, a t-shirt that says “Blue Tarp Campers” and also a “Blue Tarp Camper” trading card and a little Pemco key chain. Wasn’t that nice of him? He also wrote a very nice letter about how he knows what it’s like to be homesick that almost made me cry. I put it up on my bulletin board. I seriously considered framing it. Which, I know, is kind of pathetic. But um, see #2 above regarding my desperate need to be validated…
4. Small group is tonight so in my usual procrastinator fashion I read the chapters for the lesson this afternoon. The theme this week is Marriage Can Build In Us A Servant’s Heart. I read
Each day we must die to our own desires and rise as a servant… We die to our expectations, our demands, and our fears. We rise to compromise, service, and courage.”
I nodded my head, thought how Very True this is and committed to do this. And then, about half an hour later, I yelled at Hubby for leaving a box of stuff at the top of the stairs because doesn’t he know people are coming in just over an hour and I’ve been cleaning all day and how self-centered can one person be? Geesh! Oh yes, I am very very good at applying what I read.
5. This afternoon Hubby showed K and I the Dana Carvey Choppin’ Broccoli skit online. It still makes me laugh. Also I feel somewhat proprietary about it because well, duh, it’s about Broccoli. And so now I must share it with you too.
You’re welcome.
6. Ack, people are going to be here in ten minutes and I’m not ready. It’s possible that I should have waited to blog AFTER small group. Note to self: Work on that “Priorities” thing. Again.
7. ADVICE TIME: My family is once again attempting to hammer out a Gift Exchange Plan for Christmas. We go through this every few years and no one is ever completely happy with The Plan. So now I’m asking you guys for help. Here’s the dilemma: There’s 12 (soon to be 13) children who need presents to make Christmas a happy day. There’s four siblings/parent sets. Three of us each have 4 kids. One has a baby on the way, who will be a newborn at Christmas. Guess which sibling thinks its too extravagant to buy gifts for all 13 kids? Said sibling thinks we should do the Pick-A-Name thing, which would mean each kid only gets one gift at the big family gathering. Frankly I don’t care if my kids get a ton of gifts, but big surprise THEY DO. What should we do? What does your extended family do?
Check out more Quick Takes at Conversion Diary. And have a great weekend!
October 17, 2009 at 2:20 am
I’m not a big fan of the crazy Christmas toy extravagence either. We try to keep it simple… and focused on Christ!… but don’t have great luck convincing our families =). Everyone buys for the kids, but we don’t buy for each other. The only adults we exchange gifts with are our parents. It keeps it fun for the kids but cuts down a little on the overall craziness. Maybe consider letting each kid pick their own gift at a certain price point to open at the family gathering. Mix them all up and have an extra fun gift for the child who can correctly match the most gifts to their recipient. I’ll keep checking back for ideas others might have!
October 17, 2009 at 7:34 am
I’d be in deep doo-doo if I had to buy gifts for 12 nieces and nephews!
We also go through this every few years with our families – I think a lot of families are going through it this year as the recession has hit some so very hard and a lot of $family traditions might need to be restructured for now.
At our large family gathering, we do draw names for the kids and then the parents also sneak in one wrapped present per child (their own children) that is put in the Santa sack and delivered by Santa during the party. We make sure those “santa sack” gifts are really fun and things that can be opened right there and enjoyed with the other cousins. Keeps everyone happy and occupied. Good Luck!
October 17, 2009 at 8:22 am
We have two different ways we do gifts for extended family. For my side, we just do each other’s children, but no adults. Since I have far more children than my brother, I always encourage them to do a gift to the family instead of individual gifts. For dh’s side, we have a revolving 4 year plan. There are four families and we have it scheduled out so we know who has who, making it easier to shop during the year. Often the families buy for each individual person, but, once again, I encourage group or family gifts to be given to us because, really, who wants to buy gifts for nine different children? I’m not even sure I do!
October 17, 2009 at 9:51 am
We used to draw names among the adults, but got all the kids something. But we did stocking gifts on the side, and it was the most fun. For some family members this plan was okay, but it was really hard on us financially A few years ago, we dropped everything but the stocking gifts for everybody. I tried to be creative (cheap–$5 per gift), but looked for things the individuals would really enjoy. For example, a copy of a skateboarding magazine for the teenager who was really into that. It was a lot of fun–both the shopping and the gifts. However, we ended up having to add paper sacks because the stockings were not big enough. Nobody seems to have missed the big presents.
October 17, 2009 at 10:36 am
I think that the real gift giving is for parents to do, not aunties and uncles. I’m with giving each kid one special gift.
In our house, we have many nieces and nephews ranging in age from 20′s down to my littles ones. We found that it becomes very difficult to buy for kids once they’re tweens/teens. We didn’t like to buy things they wouldn’t really use or like, just too much of a waste of money. So, we decided to draw names and kids “age out” of the draw at 16.
October 17, 2009 at 1:49 pm
If you figure out that family thing, let me know. I only have two nephews and a niece and do not mind buying for them and their parents do not mind them receiving a small gift from us…it is small on that side of the family. We have a huge extended family on my side, though, and a gift here or there adds up. They each get a gift from my mom’s parents, then two or three from husband’s mom. My parents give them each 3 or so gifts. From my dad’s side of the family we end up with 4 or 5 additional gifts per child which adds up to a grand total of 11-12 gifts without adding in what we give them (about 3.) In the end we add 60 new items to our home and a very small home it is for 6 people. I do not want to be ungreatful, but I am tired of trying to sift through what goes where when we already have a hard time housing what we have.
October 18, 2009 at 10:03 am
I tried to rate your poster, but it asked for a login and password.
I am getting some good ideas for the Christmas exchange from your readers! We have lots of cousins and we’ve tried various things. Recently we’ve just resorted to everyone giving gifts within whatever price range they’re comfortable with and not really structuring it. But we only exchange kid gifts with the extended family, not adults. In the past we have also done great big stockings for each kid and everyone contributes something to the stocking. It does keep the cost down. The thing I’d really like to do if I could think of a good way to do so, would be to get the kids involved in a Christmas charity in lieu of some of the gift extravagance. If anyone has any great ideas on this, I’d welcome them!
And lastly, I must ask: where did the Mrs. Broccoli Guy name come from? I’ve been reading your blog for a long time, but I guess not long enough to know that.
October 19, 2009 at 8:47 pm
Hmm . . . Christmas . . . well, on my side of the family, sometimes we do the name swap thing and sometimes we just do nothing. Well, except for my parents. They always get the kids and grandkids gifts, and we always get them gifts. Then there is McH’s side of the family where, traditionally, we all rotate through a schedule of which family buys for which family and then we just send a bunch of $25 gift cards around the country to each other. So thoughful. But now, of course, since I dared suggest something different last year, my mother-in-law thinks my husband should divorce me and half my in-law siblings hate me, and the other half think the whole thing is soooooo very, very funny, and I have no idea what is going to happen this year. But I’m sure it will all be my fault. Umm . . . I’m sorry. Was this supposed to be about you?
October 25, 2009 at 3:57 pm
We still do gifts for everyone, on both my family’s side and my husband’s. It’s a bit much — I’d just as soon not exchange with the adults and just buy for the kids (and seeing as we don’t have kids, I’d be buying but not receiving, but I don’t mind!). But both families seems to prefer buying for everyone even now. So I try to keep an eye out all year long for good presents, and spread the cost over the year a bit. We also have to ship a lot to Canada, and boy, does that ever add to the cost!