Table Woes Ended

I am lounging by a fire, eating the last of my Christmas Chocolate Toffee Bites from Moonstruck Chocolate Co. (thanks, Chip and Jennifer!! They were fabulous!), drinking wine, and keeping M. company while the Packers kick the Vikings' collective hiney. It's a nice Saturday night.

It was also a pretty awesome day because... I got a new dining room table!! Yay for me! Some of my long-time readers may remember that more than a year ago, M. and I held a yard sale and sold off a bunch of house-cluttering objects, including our dining room table set (not cluttering objects, per se, but old, not the right look for us, and woefully small for our expanded family). At that point, we were left without a dining room table entirely, and we were reduced to eating all meals at the kids' small table. Shortly thereafter, I ordered a dining set (table and 4 chairs), a server (for my wedding china!), and two additional matching chairs from Target. After a couple of weeks, we saw relief from cramped dinners in sight when we came home to several large boxes deposited on our walkway.

UNFORTUNATELY, after lots of heavy lifting (and what M. swears is the start of all his recent back problems) and assembly, we discovered that the table was actually broken. The kind of broken that cannot be fixed or overlooked (aka a crack through the entire middle panel of the table). I spent about an hour on the phone with Target, FINALLY arranged for someone to come pick the table and 4 chairs up (since they were sold as a set), cried a little, and went to bed. In the morning, we dragged out the old, spare dining table we had hanging around (only possible because it was drop-leaf and folded down to a furniture item that was only 6-inches wide and could be placed against any wall) and put it to use. I'm so glad we had it, but it was a) rickety, b) waterstained, c) not an extension table (what we wanted), and d) rickety. Did I mention it was rickety? We kept the two extra dining chairs from Target (upholstered), and bought 4 dark wood chairs (cheaper and more kid friendly) to use with our back-up table. This post has some photos of our original dining room table, the "extra/spare" table we ended up using, and the server from the Target set that we kept.

Since then, we have faithfully used tablecloths (to cover the watermark) and accompanied every meal with hushed yells to the kids to "Stop jiggling the table! I mean it!" We've also suffered through lots of spilled drinks, and the awkwardness of trying to fit two more people at the table when we (oh so rarely) have guests.

BUT NO LONGER. Salvation has come, in the form of the World Market Mahogany Verona Trestle Table. My parents actually gifted us with a rather sizable Target gift card to encourage us to buy a new dining room table (perhaps because they are pretty much our only guests, and are usually the people we are awkwardly trying to fit around the table with us). Gun shy about ordering another table to be delivered to the house, and not able to find anything remotely close to the kind of table we wanted at Target, I stumbled on this table at the World Market after spotting a Pinterest link for a coffee table. People, if you're not on Pinterest, you should be. It's a wealth of serendipitious links and good ideas (though you do need to be able to spot them/sift through to find them). Anywho, found the table, which was on sale, and also had 126 customer reviews that were all unanimously positive. Said table was on backorder, but I (as the old commercial used to say) "let my fingers do the walking" and called around to some local stores to see if any of them had it in stock. As luck would have it, the Chevy Chase store did, and M. and I caravanned it down with the kids to pick it up today (saving us $100 in shipping costs to boot).

Now it is here, and set up, and I am in love. So is M. Is it wrong to love a table? Probably, but I do. It matches perfectly with our cheap Target wood chairs, and the beautiful Target server (that matched our original ordered-but-broken Target table). It is BIG (to us), fitting at least 8 when the extension is in place. And it is sturdy - I predict NO WOBBLES in our future. Maybe less spilled milk (but eh, maybe not. Kids are messy). And best of all, we still have that wonderful Target gift card from my parents to buy lots of wonderful Target things, like new (BIGGER!) tablecloths, and clothes!

Here is the table, tell me you love it:

Now we just have to get someone to take the old "spare" table off our hands...

Gift List - Grown Ups

The excitement of the holidays is over  for another 11 months - so sad! But before *I* move on, I thought I would share some of the details of our holiday preparations, in the event they help you (and me) next time around. I'll start by sharing the gifts we (me and M., since I made him do some of the shopping) got the adults in our lives, which might seem like a very "stuff" centric/materialistic post, but I've never been one to shy away from the reality that our Christmas is very heavy on the "stuff" aspect of things. Family, food, and a smidge of religion, too, but clearly STUFF. Hopefully I'll follow up with additional posts on what we gifted to the kid crowd and the gads of Pinterest-inspired cookies I made. No promises, of course (you should know that by now!).

The Siblings

First up is the under-30 crowd, otherwise known as my brother and his girlfriend. My siblings and I don't normally exchange gifts, but this year I decided to do small gifts "from Finn and Lucy" for each of them anyway (AND my brother also decided to get gifts for my sisters and I, which led to one of my favorite gifts of the season - my very first, but probably not last, infinity scarf that I heart with a passion. I call this Christmas "the year of the infinity scarf," subtitle "and also beermaking"). I didn't get gifts for my brothers-in-law (sorry, guys!), but since this was our first Christmas with my brother's girlfriend, and she was very far from her own family (they live in Columbia, as in the country, and not one of the many US cities), I got her a small gift, too.

For Andrew (my brother): This T-shirt from Skreened that I found hilarious and irresistible

Am I the only one who finds the teeny arms of the T Rex to be absurdly mockable? No, I'm sure I'm not.

He also received a set of mustache bottle clings/reusable labels that you can use to mark beer bottles and whatnot, capitalizing on the recent mustache craze. I cannot for the life of me find a link to an image online, but I bought them from the dollar section at Target.

For Christel (his girlfriend): I picked out an infinity scarf from Kohls with a colorful chevron pattern that is apparently no longer available, though I did manage to track down an inactive link with a photo of it here.  A little birdie (my brother) told me that she is a fan of watches, so I also got a cute (*I* think) fashion watch that picks up one of the colors in the scarf (the watch is also no longer available, but I managed to find yet another dud of a link):

Onto the over 30 crowd. I couldn't resist giving my sister Stacey this adorable bracelet from Banana Republic (you should note that pretty much all the gifts I gave the women in our families I either already owned, or secretly wanted for myself. Including this bracelet):

At the time it was available in black, red, or camel, and I got it in red. Seems only the camel color is available now, but still VERY cute.

Kristin was gifted... An Infinity Scarf!! See? The Christmas of the Infinity Scarf. I got hers at Kohls, and the internet is unable to yield me any photos or links to this item. SO while I cannot show you what it looks like, I can tell you that it was a somewhat gauzy/crinkly dark green scarf with threads of gold running through it. Which may not make it sound lovely, but it is (and work appropriate in all but the most formal of environments).

My sister-in-law received the same red bow bracelet I gave Stacey, along with a "Cozy Colorblock Scarf" from the Gap:

This scarf is, of course, no longer available - seems to be a theme here. But whether or not you can actually purchase the same exact scarves I have, the take home message should be clear. Scarf = Great Gift. Infinity, regular, doesn't matter. Buy scarves, people.

Finally, rounding out our siblings, M. picked out a fleece-lined flannel from L.L. Bean for his brother - the perfect layering shirt for ass-cold Wisconsin (spoiler alert: he got one for his dad, too. And I bought him one, since he so clearly pined for it):

This is the one M. bought his brother, and that I unknowingly also bought him. His dad received a red/navy one that is, of course, no longer available. But red is an important color in Wisconsin (go Badgers!), so good thing it was available at the time - my father-in-law's wardrobe is about 96% red, so this way he can coordinate the shirt with other items he already owns :-). Clearly we will need a flannel photo shoot the next time these three get together.

The (Rest of the) Parents

My siblings and I always go in together on group gifts for our parents, because they literally are "the people who already own everything." Seriously - they don't know how to deny themselves anything, so any time we come up with a great gift idea, it usually turns out that they already own it. Since we struggle so much, we've stuck to coming up with just one gift that works from all four of us. So far, no complaints....

My mom hinted (OK, we asked) that she'd like some hand hooked pillows made by a very specific artist to complement the rustic decor of the lakehouse my parents have up in Maine. A lakehouse that heavily features, among other Maine/wilderness themes, moose. These pillows are NOT cheap. $80+ bucks a pop, which I would never spend on throw pillows for myself. But these were not for me, they were for my mom, and they were a Christmas gift, and they are incredibly cute and fun, and really, that's what Christmas gifts should be. Fun things we would never think of getting ourselves. We got her two, one with an image of a moose (of course), and one with an Adirondack chair. These pillows are so wonderful that we had a really hard time just picking two, and would have loved to buy the whole lot. Eh, maybe next year, right?:

My dad received the new Amazon Paperwhite Kindle - the man who has every device imaginable (TWO iPads! TWO!) had managed to kill his Kindle, and had nothing to take with him into the hot tub to read (talk about first world problems, I suppose... but definitely wouldn't want to accidentally drop the iPad in there!).:

You already know about the fleecy flannel shirt my father-in-law was gifted, which just leaves my mother-in-law. I waffled back and forth a lot about what we should get her - clothing? kitchen stuff? A scarf?? In the end, I decided to go with an immersion blender, since I'm so in love with the one M. got me for our anniversary:

To go with it, we got some handled soup bowls from Sur La Table (in red, of course),:

and I scoured Pinterest to copy out a few recipes that we enclosed in a Christmas card (um, not pictured, because I don't remember EXACTLY which recipes I sent. But they all sounded fabulous) that heavily featured use of an immersion blender.

Finally, we sent a gift basket to my maternal grandparents who live down in Florida. Christmas isn't the same without them, but the trip from Florida to Massachusetts is just not practical for them anymore. So we Skyped and called and sighed and felt more than a little sad they weren't with us, and we gave them a Dean and Deluca gift basket to help make their own holiday feasts and entertaining a bit easier. The exact basket is no longer available (it was called "Fresh from the Country"), but it featured things like their babka bread, jams, some cured meat, etc. Nothing they had to bake or mix themselves, and I'm told the bread was very, very tasty! So no link or picture for you, but all the other gift baskets they still have look just as lovely.

So that's the rundown of the adult shopping we did for Christmas (aside from the gifts we got each other). I think we did pretty well (and best of all, the last gift was purchased by mid-December!). Maybe they'll help you next year when you are trying to come up with gifts for everyone on YOUR list.

HNY

Here's to noisemakers, shiny hats, shinier faces, sparkling cider, a crackling fire, midnight champagne toasts, and the promise of things to come.

Happy New Year, from our family to yours!

Holly Jolly

Christmas, In Brief:

We had two - one with just the four of us, and another extended one that involved my entire family, separated by a rather lengthy car trip. Fun was had all around, and we even got sleep! Except that night in the hotel when all four of us shared one room, and Lucy coughed a lot. But all the other nights, sleep! And fun! And presents, oh so many presents. M. and I did exceptionally well with the gifting, I think. I got him a new hobby (beer making!), and he got me, among other things, a fabulous new winter puffy coat that magically doesn't make me look puffy, and a tripod. There was a little snow, there were a lot of cousins, there was even some church time (ack! we survived, but barely! Note to self, next time, don't sit in the balcony!). We drove home on Thursday (a very long, long drive), and we're now faced with the prospect of reintegrating into real life again tomorrow.

Christmas, In Photo:

I could go on and on, but instead, I shall overwhelm you with photos and go to bed, because it is late. I have no photos from our little Christmas at home on Saturday morning, these start with Sunday afternoon in Massachusetts:

 

My mom dug out my wedding dress and veil for Lucy. The dress is sadly pretty stained, but the veil looked as beautiful as ever. Doesn't she look saintly?

 

Since it came down to her ankles, I wouldn't let her wear it for very long.

 

Tried to capture an "artistic" photo on the sly.

 

Looks much better without flash. Would prefer it if Finn was in focus instead, though. Too bad he moves so damn fast all the time.

 

This is my two-year-old niece Josephine. Isn't she cute?

 

This is what the kids wore on Christmas Eve. Lucy is wearing an old dress of mine, a velvet jumper. Finn wore this sweater for exactly 5 seconds after we walked in the door from church, then whipped it off in favor of the Angry Birds T-shirt he had on underneath it.

 

Needless to say, I didn't have much luck getting them to pose prettily for me.

 

My mom and brother somehow managed to color coordinate on Christmas Eve.

 

After a big dinner, stockings were hung (by the chimney, with utmost care, of course). Finn is the only grandkid to have a stocking knitted for him (by one of my dad's co-workers) - such privileges are often afforded to first grandkids. Everyone else had to pick a generic stocking from a pile.

 

Lucy picked the one with Rudolph (or "Redolph," as she likes to call him).

 

Then my brother read all the kids "The Night Before Christmas."

 

They MOSTLY listened intently, and there were only a couple of potty breaks and other random interruptions.

 

The kids fell asleep, stockings were stuffed, and morning came. Surprisingly, not as early as I thought it would. We actually had to go into Finn and Lucy's bedroom to rouse them. Here are the kids waiting to bust into the closed family room to see if Santa came. Santa had zip-tied the door shut just in case there were any midnight wanderings...

 

Once the stockings were emptied and the Santa gifts were properly played with, we all got out of our jammies and moved down to the living room to open family gifts.

 

The display of gifts was a tad overwhelming in an "embarrassment of riches" kind of way.

 

Lucy waited patiently to open her gifts, and helped Bumpa with his.

 

Finn got a little antsy that he had nothing to open (since we had already exchanged gifts, he had fewer than his cousins), but finally scored with a new Angry Birds backpack and the Lego Star Wars game for his Nintendo DS.

 

My dad got a new hat.

 

Some of you may have seen a similar photo on Facebook - me snuggling with a happy Lucy.

 

All the girls received a sack of girly princess things (nailpolish, tiaras, rings, wands, necklaces) from my brother and his girlfriend. Here is Penny modeling the tiara and wand.

 

My siblings and I gifted Mom with a couple of rustic looking hand-hooked pillows for the Maine lake house - the moose was a must.

 

Me and my oldest cutie.

 

The night before we left Massachusetts, I headed over to my wonderful friend Natalie's house for a little kid-free get-together. Here is a photo of my two sisters (Stacey on the left, Kristin on the right).

 

And one of the group of us - me, Amy, Stacey, Natalie, Kristin, and Helen in the front. It's hard to believe that we've known each other for almost 30 years (since first grade!!).

 

Back in Maryland, I unpacked one of my gifts from my mom - a real, honest-to-goodness, Le Creuset dutch oven - and made a pretty kick-ass vegetable soup. I love, love, love this pot!!

 

And M. started his first batch of beer.

 

In just a few weeks, he won't be holding a Sam Adams, he'll be holding a... hmm, a what? Clearly, we need to come up with a name for this brewery. Anyway, soon he'll be holding and drinking his own homemade beer (and so will I! I get extra bonus points for helping M. start a new hobby that ALSO benefits me!).

Hope you all had wonderful holidays, too. See you next year!