A Gift Card Christmas!

This year I've decided to take the easy way out by choosing to give the plastic card no wrap option.  It's partial because things are a bit more financially tight this year and partially that I'm having a hard time deciding what to give some people on my list. 

For the last 7 years I've been giving out my Christmas booklets.  These booklets have had photos of my artwork combined with my poetry and recipes ( favorites that I've created or passed down from Mom, etc.).  The booklets have become too much for me both time wise and financially.  Lat year, I ended up making 100 + of them.  I had a great deal of people that just LOVED them but I just can't continue it.  It's getting to be TOO MUCH. 

So, this year I've had to budget myself and I decided not to put them in the budget.  Sorry Mom!  My list of retail locations this year are Walmart, Starbucks, Pizza Hut, Barnes & Noble, Target, Paradise Bakery, Wendy's, and McDonald's.
 
Here's 6 reasons I'm REALLY liking the gift card giving.....

1. No Wrapping paper involved.  No messing with scotch tape and the scissors to try to make the present look presentable.  I would highly recommend this for all of you that are all thumbs.

2. Time Saving!  You can go straight to the shortest line and the store and while waiting in line choose which plastic decorative card you want.  Most stores put them right up by the cashier.  Bonus!  No time spent wrapping presents, or picking up gift bags that are the right size.

3. Pawning off the decision making.  This is probably bad of me, but that way you are leaving the responsibility of the decision on to the giftee.  You can't choose the wrong size, color, or what not.  It's all on them.  I don't know how many times in the past I've gotten what I thought was the perfect gift and the giftee returned it.  It rather hurt my feelings.  (I guess I could add another reason in that it's emotionally more safe to do gift card too.)

4. A Guaranteed Perfect Gift.  By pasting the decision on, outside of making sure it's the favorite store of the person you JUST can't go wrong.  It's a given, and how many times in life does that happen?

5. It's easy to ship!  Put it in an envelope with their Christmas card and voila!  It's done!

6. It's easy to plan you budget.  Figure your total budget for Christmas and divide it among your Christmas list.  Put your prioritize at the top of the list and work your way down.  Increment it out by $5 rounding until you've budget has run out. 

Sorry if you've been down graded to a $5 gift card from McDonald's... please don't take offense, and do not think that it the valuation that I put on our relationship.  You just may have been at the near the bottom of my list? ;-)

Coming Down Off After Christmas...

It's a little like coming down off of a high of a drug, or I imagine it as such. I wake up the day after Christmas and look at my tree. A bit of a sadness enters my heart, as I realize that Christmas is done and over with. Now I need to see about taking down the Christmas tree; along with all the rest of my Christmas decorations. It's deflating, and I all ready miss Christmas.

I guess part of this "deflating" feeling is that the whole of Christmas season (that started barely the day after Halloween) is building in anticipation to one day. All of this worrying about selection of gifts, purchasing or making of gifts, then the worrying of delivering said gifts. It gets some of us rushing to the point of not knowing what end is up, then BOOM! The day is here and within under an hour, all of those presents are opened up, and the day seems over. Its unfair that all of this preparation goes into one day.

Another part of this sadness, is that after I take down all of those Christmas decorations my apartment is going to feel barren. I traditionally take down my Christmas decorations the first weekend of January. Though, one year I left it up until almost Valentine's Day. Some neighbors really thought I was strange that year. (They even thought they might have to have a Christmas decoration intervention for me.) It's strange how you can hooked on decorations in a month and half's time. ( I usually put them all up the day after Thanksgiving.) I'm unsure if I really want to take them down this next weekend. Though, I will feel like I have tons of room in my apartment now... BUT we shall see what happens. Who knows maybe I'll push it till at least February 1st??!?

Another part of Christmas that I will miss, is that it always seems as though some people are nicer than the rest of the year. It's like that grumpy neighbor down the hall... he actually smiled and waved at me just before Chirstmas! Then, there's those people that you may only see or talk to twice a year, unless there's a funeral. Either you've been too busy or they have and you actually get to do a little catching up with them. It feels good to do that, and you realize that you miss them. But life resumes, and everyone gets busy again after the holidays. It's sad but oh so true.

Christmas was wonderful. I received some very nice gifts, and got to visit with friends (and some relatives over the phone). The duet of "O Holy Night" went off well at the Mid-Night Christmas Mass at St. Joe's. Father Carley even managed to embarrass me a little by announcing about the Crucifix painting that is currently the acting as a Crucifix in the parish hall while the new church is being rebuilt. (I wanted to be 2 inches tall as everyone in the choir was pointing out who he was talking about.) I TRIED to sleep in the next morning, but no--- I was up by 7AM. I opened my two wrapped presents ( most of my presents I had received before or were gift cards) that were under my tree. Afterwards, I made my Christmas calls, went for a walk out in the winter land weather, then, went to my friend Diane's house for an amazing gourmet-like spread of a Christmas dinner. I finished the day, working on a new oil painting. A wonderful day!

But BOOM!! It's over with, and I'm feeling a little blah because Christmas is over with. Darn it!

Gift Card Day!!

Two friends and a year's collection of giftcards! What do you do?!!? Well, we made it into an interesting spending spee! The rules? Well, everything is SUPPOSED to be spent on giftcards. That was the original idea of it. Let's use them cards!

Well, we started off by buying some Diet Cokes for our journey downtown. Laura had not had a chance to check out my Halloween Bike Ride painting hanging down at the Salt Lake City Bike Company's bike shop downtown. So thus, we headed downtown Salt Lake City first.

Well, this is where we ran into our first snag! Unfortunately, the Salt Lake City's parking meters do not take Visa. Darn it!! So, we ended up breaking the rule and put a little change into the meter.

Then, after checking out my painting and the other art at the bike shop we were off to the true heart of the shopping spee! Shopko! Starbucks! Target! Sports Authority! From downtown we headed south and managed to hit all of these places within short distances of each other. It really worked out well.

The other giftcard day rule was to figure out to spend the whole amount of the giftcard without going over. Well, we managed to get pretty darn close but no right on the dollar amounts. I had to grab $.17 out at Sports Authority, and the cashier at Shopko got a $.35 tip. (We are such BIG spenders!)

We got some pretty good stuff and had fun with the challenges of spending all those giftcards. Lotions, cards, socks, t-shirts, cups of coffee & tea, pastries, a pair of shoes, a pair of pants, and a really nice sitdown dinner at an Italian restaurant in Sandy. When we were done, it was past Laura's bedtime and we were both felt like we just experienced a Christmas Day in May. It was fun and I look forward next year's giftcard day. Oh, and by the way, if you get me any presents this next year give me giftcards! Thanks!