My Favorite Christmas Gifts 2014.

Christmas gifts!

I don't do well with picking out good ones. I am more of the type who does better just doing things for people and giving things to people I care for year round. My sister Kentucky is the best at listening intently and remembering to get something the person really wanted or needed. I want to be that way. I am not right now. I better hear you talk about it plenty of times before I remember to make sure to get it as a gift for you.

One of the security guards at work, Ms. Nora, gave me miniature shopping cart. I filled it with candy.

I'm going to be rolling that around on my desk and crashing it into stuff. My coworkers on the other side of the cubicle will be wondering... What the world?

My bestie LadyTee gave me a really nice soft blanket. Really nice... and a bottle of sparkling pomegrante cider.

"The cats gonna love that blanket," she said.

Well after I opened and felt it... uh no. They will NOT be getting on this blanket. This one is great. Great enough only for me.

I saw that bottle and I thought it was wine. Or some Cristal. LadyTee said "Uh, no."

So I will be popping a bottle of sparkling cider! Pretending it's champagne!

My friend and cubicle mate Cowgirl Cre gave me some of my favorite water... and a slice of cornbread.

Water in Glass! I LOVE WATER IN GLASS! No plastic aftertaste. And this is Voss, a Norwegian brand. It's from the top of the world. Very clean taste. Best water in glass of all.

And my piece of cornbread. Whole foods has some good cornbread. That is all.

I'm making some green beans for New Years Day. That cornbread will go with them just fine. GLORY!

Finally, my sister Kentucky gave me an AWESOME wok.

It is huge. It's sitting there on the trunk of my car, so you can tell how big it is. She bought it at a flea market for $20. But online, it retails for $100. The thing about it is it is HEAVY. I know it has to be a good 20-30 pounds. It's out in the garage for now. I'm gonna have to get rid of a couple of my big pieces of cookware before I can even bring it in the house.

I don't know what kind of steel it's made of. Maybe some space rocket bullet proofed compressed steel.

I can't wait to make a stir-fry! It's gonna be kickin'!

Now the best gift I gave this year was to our custodial staff at work.  I bought each a gift card to one of the nice eateries near our workplace. It wasn't the gift card that made it a good gift. It was that I sat down and wrote a short note in each card holder, telling them how much I appreciated them, and thanking them for a job well done. A couple of them have been there since I started the job, some 13 years ago. I even included some funny story where I could.

That was my favorite gift to give. I wasn't the creative handmade thing I like to do, but I REALLY enjoyed writing those notes. I must do that more often.

I picked that up from Serenity23's new blog, Living My Faith. She did a whole month of posts on thanksgiving and gratefulness. And there was journalling, and exercises for us to do all month. She has increased my awareness of being thankful for people in my life. Thanks gal! You don't know it, but that was your gift to me!

So that's my gifts post in a nutshell!