Mark Twain

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do ...
Explore. Dream. Discover." Mark Twain

Sunday, January 1, 2012

Christmas Eve and Gifts I Love


We took mom out to a restaurant for Christmas Eve lunch. It was a lot of fun. Not as good as having her at our house for dinner, but the next best thing.

This year I got several Christmas gifts that I just loved and wanted to share with you.

My son has started doing leather working and has made some beautiful things. It is a new hobby for him and his work can be found at his new Etsy Store Marrotte Leather.

But his gift to me was a total surprise.

I have had an iPad for about 2 years and the case I have used for it was pretty generic: black, plastic and ugly.

He made me my own iPad case (actually an iPaws case). It is pretty amazing. The pictures tell the story better than I can.


He found these cute magnets on Etsy. Recognize the dogs? If you don't, you need to spend a little more time reading my blog!!


Also got a bottle of nice wine and a gift certificate to a local restaurant. Always welcome stuff.

And my daughter checked out my Amazon Wish list. Thank God for Amazon Wish lists.
I recently discovered the Mark Bittman cook books (How to Cook Everything and How to Cook Everything Vegetarian) and I am now a total fan now. I bought the Vegetarian one before Christmas and my daughter got me the original book.

Now I know you are thinking - I thought you hate to cook! I do, but I have to cook and I am always looking for cook books that are good references. These two books are phenomenal.


They are the kind of books that you could almost sit down and read, except that they are hugely thick - over a thousand pages each. But I have read full sections of them and found them very helpful.

Also the focus of his cook books patterns my approach to cooking - keep it simple! I totally love that.

And I know that these kinds of books might not work for everyone. They a absent of the typical color photography - the illustrations are line drawings. But I can assure you that my own cooking seldom looks like the color photo. If you really need a glossy color picture, the bookstores are filled with books like that. In fact I have quite a few myself. But when I have a question I always turn to books like The Joy of Cooking or the Betty Crocker Cookbook - and now the Mark Bittman's books.

The books are really exceptionally well done, well presented and entirely useful for the novice and the expert cook. You have a question about something and it is covered (even popping pop corn - he isn't a fan of microwave popcorn!).

She also got me some fun books to read - books with a knitting theme.

It was a fun Christmas ... everyone spent the night in a big sleep over! It was a wonderful way to spend Christmas Eve.









6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Your son is very talented. What a lovely case and so much detail.

Carolyn said...

Aren't you lucky to have a beautiful custom made ipod case. I think that books are a lot like yarn...you can never really have too many. It does sound like you had a wonderful Christmas Eve with your family!

Laura said...

What a talented son! Beautiful case. A bottle of wine is always good! I'm going to have to check out that Bittman book just by the little excerpt that you shared. I'm also one to try to keep it simple. Two reasons: my husband prefers it that way and if I want something different I'd rather have someone else make it for me (in a restaurant setting ☺).
All great gifts!

happyone said...

You did quite well!! : )

Wicked Stepmother said...

LOVE LOVE LOVE your sons leather work!1 What a creative and meaningful gift...if I only had an iPad!! :) I also made my mothers gifts this year a necklace of amethyst and abalone. Happy Late Holidays! :)

Linda said...

I obviously need to do a better job at keeping up with my favorite bloggers! What thoughtful, creative children you have!