Christmas is UP! So let’s take a look. In order to save us all time and effort, let’s just assume that if I don’t state where something is from, you can know that it is from TJ Maxx/HomeGoods. It’s either that or we turn this into some kind of “Hi Bob” type drinking game.
The Sparkly Trees
Many years ago, a former colleague at Merrill Lynch and I took an epic lunch trip to the Tag outlet store called the 1730 Outlet on the north side of Chicago which had no sign, no parking, was in the back of a warehouse and was only open for about 3.2 hours a day. But in this glorious space were items you normally see from Tag at Crate & Barrel, Macy’s or the Container Store at ¼ of the price. Now, this was before the Internet allowed Tag to sell to just anyone, not just to those with the stamina to forego lunch and race up the Kennedy to save a bunch on housewares, and then lug them, piece by piece, home on the train over the course of the next two weeks. But it does explain why I have Easter napkins, Halloween appetizer plates, Thanksgiving napkins, 67 napkin rings, seasonal doormats, and these:
I put Starry String Lights from Restoration Hardware inside them on timers. They are tiny little lights on copper wires so you can bend them. Looks cute in mercury glass too.
The Santas
Once again, I find myself with a collection of things that I don’t actually collect. It started with one wooden Santa that Marge and Dad gave me, then I found another in an existing Christmas bin, then someone else gave me one as a hostess gift, then I saw another at *do a shot*. And so on, and so on,
In honor of this non-collection, we also decided to do the family room tree as a Santa theme:
The Christmas Art
I love this Christmas Motawi tile that we purchased at The Art Stop here in town.
Favorite Christmas pictures of Baby Guitar Boy:
And Baby Drummer Boy. Frames from Exposures.
As an aside, here is Guitar Boy performing at his first gig at a bar yesterday with the Hinsdale School of Rock band. They played Tom Petty songs:
Ok, so it was at 3:00 p.m. on a Saturday, but still, pretty cool. Drummer Boy has just been promoted up to the performance group as well, so he’ll join his brother on stage later in the year.
Back to this business of Christmas.
Other Stuff
Front Room Tree
Went with a turquoise and red theme on this one. Turned out cute, huh?
The White Elephant Party
This is a great group and we always have a blast. The gifts are always ridiculous and we each collect stuff throughout the year/run to Walgreens 5 minutes before the party to come up with the most irrelevant items you never wanted to own, but yet somehow were mass produced anyway.
Here is what we gifted:
The Date Night In Package consisting of a Big Bang Theory fleece blanket, a White Castle scented candle, (Yep, scented like a slider. Yep, it smells as disgusting as it sounds), bacon lip balm and a yodeling pickle.
The Dessert Package consisting of a set of Presidential Pez, blue rock candy that looks like meth from Breaking Bad (was supposed to go with Kevin’s Halloween costume but we forgot) a chocolate zombie Santa and a unicorn shaker where sprinkles come out of its butt. Happy birthday baby Jesus.
About 10 years ago, the white elephant gifts would lean towards inappropriate adult gifts. This year, 5 of them were toilet related. We received two humorous toilet paper roll holders, including one that looks like a Polaroid camera with toilet paper that looks like Polaroid pictures. We are old.
To close, we present one of many awful pictures that Drummer Boy took with Santa at the mall over the years. Even the presence of Fake Sister could not cheer him up.
This has a “let’s re-create this picture when we’re in our 30s” written all over it.
Happy pre-Christmas everyone!
