Started Christmas shopping early this year. Ty and I have a conversation in the summertime about gifts for family members. We usually have one immediately after Christmas too, just to bookmark ideas.

The best gift we got last year were Minnetonka Moccasins. They are so cozy, and we wear them every day after the temperature dips below 50F at night. We weren’t even supposed to get slippers! Ty’s father got himself a new pair plus slipper socks, and we just happened to run across the store when we were in upstate NY.

I’m wearing the slippers right now. I’ve never been a fan of the slipper, and sorta despised getting them as a kid because my feet were never cold. I told my dad about the slippers and he had a blast from the past. He had a pair of the tanned leather ones, and he really really loved them, but he wore them out in the rain and they fell apart.

I called my mother a few weeks ago to get his shoe size, and she said she just bought him a new pair of slippers and he hates them.

Not Martha strikes first with an awesome list of online gift places at meta filter.

Here is my disclaimer - I’m not giving anything on this list, so I’m not ruining any surprises. This isn’t my wish list either if you know me personally. I just really like online shopping and crafts and like mostly ideas!
So here’s the gift list!

1. SLIPPERS - either Minnitonka Moccasins, slipper socks, crocheted, or knitted and felted.

2. Cookie Jars - Paint your own pottery stores may have them in stock, and they make great gifts! For the hipster kids, there are other kinds of cookie jars.

3. Bar Ware - Ty and I have a bar globe like this. It is a classy accessory for academic types. The jigger cube is great for measurement. The swivel cognac glasses are pretty classy too, but aren’t you supposed to warm it in your hand? Maybe it just makes it a feat of trust to put them down.

4. Green - You can improve your gas mileage by 4% by keeping your tires properly inflated. These caps help you stay inflated properly. You can even use recycled bike tires in your day to day, for her or for him.

5. Games - My brother got my sister this LED hula hoop kit last year. It makes for excellent photography. The only new video game I can endorse is Katamari Forever for the PlayStation 3.

6. Tech - I am really digging my new Flip video camera. It records 60 minutes of video, and then I just upload the video to my computer like pictures off of a camera. Last year my sister got us webcams to help keep in touch. She got me a Kermit the Frog colored green Clique webcam, and the sound and picture is better than I expected.

7. Sentimental - If I could choose one gift to give everyone, it would be an online gift certificate to get a photo book of your own pictures printed out. (Shutterfly option - flickr option) Along those lines, one of the best gifts I’ve ever given was to my brother and my father. At the end of a day of deer hunting, my brother drug my cousin Amy the photographer and my father out a clearing in the trees with great fall colors behind them. I sent the picture to shutterfly.com, blew it up to 20×30, and selected a custom frame of distressed wood (Portico Wide). My dad opened the package and almost teared up. In the background of the image, Dad could see the place where he shot his first deer. Maybe I compile these gift lists because I hope more people get to have experiences like this with the people they love.

The newest site that does this prints to a canvas. Canvas Pop does this for the best value I’ve seen.

8. Nifty - Whenever I think of gifts I would want, I always think about how I need more organization, and how most of my relatives do too. So many people have almost received Dart Coat Hooks from me. Ty likes making noodle soup often, and these Udon Noodle Bowls warm fingers like slippers warm toes.

9. Manly - A Well Dress Bullet speaks for itself. My father always said a flashlight makes a good gift, so this clamp light probably does one better.

10. Safety - My new job has a super focus on Health and Safety. These flower fire extinguishers fit the bill!

There are no books on this list, but you can choose the “book club” tag on the right side of this page, and I’d suggest any of those as a gift!

Many think the holiday season begins the day after Thanksgiving. I’ve always found this weird, because Thanksgiving is a holiday. I remember when I was a child and watch all of the Thanksgiving day parades. Santa Claus would always show up at the end, almost reflecting the European tradition of a Santa Claus visit on the first week of December.

Some people think it begins the day after Halloween when all of the stores throw out the orange candy, and bring in the green and red candy. I think this is a little too early to decorate. Being away from family, I have to start my gift buying early! Last year we went to Nebraska for Thanksgiving, and I brought up all of our gifts then to save on shipping.

If I had to set a floating date for the holiday season, I would say the first weekend of the deer hunting season. Coming from a farming community, that was the first point in time that the community seemed really relaxed. The holiday concert prep began, and there was a shift in sports season.

If I had to pick an exact date, it would be tomorrow, November 14. That’s my sister’s birthday. Buying her a gift, or sometimes just thinking about buying her a gift gets my gears going on my other gifting. It gets my gears going on what to bake. It gets me excited to see family members again, and just take a break from everyday life. It is also the time when my body realizes the effects of eating perhaps too much Halloween candy.

This year we’re spending Thanksgiving with two different groups of friends. We’re going to an early potluck, and I’m still not sure what to make. There will be many vegetarians there, so for that crowd I like making some turkey that they can actually eat.

My Aunt Carol makes these chocolate turkeys every year. I can’t find a recipe for them anywhere, so I’m going to take my best guess at the recipe, as ready-made as I can make it:

1 bag of BRACH’s Chocolate Stars
1 box of malted milk balls
1 can of chocolate frosting
1 tube of red frosting and an extra fine tip.

Place one star on the counter, point-side up. Place a 1/4 tsp size dollop of frosting on the point (or less!). Stick the malted milk ball on the frosted point. It should stick. Place another star on the counter and add frosting to it. Stick the ball/star combo on top of the counter frosted star at a 90 degree angle from the first one. The first star is the turkey fantail. The second is the feet/pedestal. Let these dry a little bit and set up. Whip out the red frosting with an extra fine tip, and start mid-way down the front. Make an extra elongated “S” down the front where the bottom of the “S” is the turkey waddle, and the top of the “S” is the beak.

I’m not sure what else to make. The next week I think we may be going down to Texas to see some friends and football there.

So this weekend it begins: looking for recipes, looking for gifts, trying to get the first clue about what I could use. Send me your suggestions! My mother already sent me a “what do you want this year email”. If only she had an amazon account!

…AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY JEN!

(don’t read this if you haven’t received your gift yet!) I got here a really cool felted coin purse from The Red Sari at the Box Turtle in Little Rock.