Christmas Maddness

Sewing, I really enjoy it, especially when there is really no pattern and I can sew scraps of whatever together to create gifts that people say they love but then stuff at the back of a closet. No matter to me, I believe it is the thought that counts. What I’m getting at is the fact that for Christmas some of the lucky people in my life are getting special gifts, right from my heart. So they should not get their hopes up for beautiful gifts; like diamond earrings or Himalayan cat fur lined mittens or that latest doodad that guarantees you will loose weight by the time you manage to figure out where the belts go and get your head out of the hole that is actually for your left leg, and by then you should have a pretty good sweat on and lost all interest in the contraption that your sister saw on the shopping network and just knew you had to have. Instead they will get pretty pillows and quaint quilts, so long as I don’t run out of fabric. I disappear to my “sewing room” every night when I get home from work to do a little bit more to each project. I am proud of myself that I am slowly chipping away at it instead of staying awake for a marathon sewing weekend like I have been known to do. However it is the weekend so I can’t promise anything. Next on my list of things I love to do to myself around this time of year is bake cookies, and I mean bake cookies my friends. I bake until I can’t bake anymore, and until I want to puke because I have sampled all of the dough and then all of the cookies as they come out of the oven. I am not one of the people who put on the holiday weight at Christmas; I put on my winter insulation at the end of November. Why do I bake so many cookies you ask? Because I have come to learn that grandparents prefer good old home baking for gifts rather than some shiny thinger majig that they have no idea what it is or what it is for. Instead they like cookies that they can eat at coffee time two times a day. I have 4 sets of grandparents to make cookies for, and then some of them I have to stick in the mail. I cant even up and just decide to quit the baking, because I am pretty darned sure that the grandparents will revolt against me. I am ok with it though I would rather bake cookies than try to find something to buy them. I am what you would call a “Suzy home maker” but I don’t exactly like to clean the mess….. So I have a few people on the Christmas shopping list that I am completely and utterly stumped about what to get them for Christmas. One is Oscar’s sister, she is very pregnant at this point and I don’t really want to get her clothes; usually she is so easy to shop for, her and I like the same things and see an item and just know that we will like it. I guess I just need to think really hard, I want to make it a good gift. The other person on the list is her husband, he is always rather hard to shop for and I am completely at a loss right now. Maybe I will have to crochet him a nice toque; however crocheting is not something I am very good at. Oh, I just thought of what I would love to get Rach for her Christmas present, but I cant tell, I would have to kill you.