What the Elf? Oh Go Elf Yourself This Holiday Season

My sister-in-law, Alison's, friend created this funny Office Max program to make your family into disco dancing elves! I made my family into dancing crazy elves.

Hey, I just made a total elf of myself. Check it out by clicking the link below.
http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1627563941
This elfin' greeting brought to you by OfficeMax®.

For the sake of good reseach

There is a WONDERFUL blog devoted to the movie, book and topic of Becoming Jane. There is this excellent booklet/paper written by this very knowledgeable and great researcher Nadia Radovici about the topic of Jane Austen and her real life love Tom Lefroy. It is out of print and there is a petition out to get it to be reprinted and available to the public. I was lucky enough to grab a hold of a copy of it via interlibrary loan, but there was only one library in the whole state of NJ that had it. Anyways... for the sake of great research and classical literature please read and sign this petition to get this booklet republished. Thanks!:)

http://www.petitiononline.com/JATL1795/petition.html

The tone of the movie was crying...

I cry at every love story movie. It is a given. Some of my friends have a saying "I was like Jaimie crying at the movie" . Unfort. the past year I have been to way to many movies in which in the end the lovers can not be together - either they died or was separated. Those really break my heart and frankly the past two times I have been depressed for a day afterwards. I get so into the movies that I feel I am apart of the movie (I know, sucker!). I however, think it is because of these movies star my Hollywood crush James McAvoy (hands off ladies! I got first dibs). Becoming Jane and now his latest. So I end up drooling over him and in the end he can't be with the leading lady (aka: me), so it depresses me and yes, J. finds is silly.

So what did I do this past Sunday night? Go out with my BFF to see Atonement... staring Keira Knightley and James McAvoy. I bought the paperback (for all you librarians I almost typed just PB) to read it before hand but I didn't get a chance. Yea, I sobbed like a baby... but I did fall in love with Keira's emerald dress so much that I am looking for a similar style to wear to my sisters wedding. Here are some photos for you to droll over and yes, I recommend the movie. It is true, it is the best love story to come since Titanic.

The carrot topper of the holiday parties

They say that being married lowers your social life, but in our case it has increased it. We went from zero holiday party invites last year to almost a half of dozen - one or two each weekend the past month. As many of you know I am a social butterfly and get so excited meeting new people. Its great that I have met some really wonderful new friends this past year who have in turn introduced me to other great folks.

Since I am big on never coming to someone's home empty handed I decided to show up to most of the parties with my home made dessert - carrot cake cupcakes (say that 3 times!). I really got into them - with the old fashion cream chesse frosting to trying to find a fancy way to wrap it all up.

It seemed to be a big hit at most of the parties. So much that one party we went to some stranger took them all home, still wrapped, 15 mins after we arrived (yeah, I was a bit shocked and pissed at that one). Like Emily stated "It wasn't a holiday bake sale!" Haaa.

I saved one for myself to enjoy on my beloved Hello Kitty dish.

I am a business owner

I love Etsy.com. It is a cool online craft/flee market full of beautiful handmade and vintage crafts. So for the past year I have been brewing of opening up my own etsy shop. I tried to open two different ones, but I didn't go past creating a name and then erasing it because the names didn't sound like me. 1st one was I2INE and the 2nd one was Limone - which J. told me calling a business "lemon" doesn't sound like it provides lasting, quality items. So I decided to call it after me - the dodoist since I am an amateur historian on the dodo bird.

Here is my own homemade jewelry and other stuff:
http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5463212

Up, up and away to the 86th floor

Last week my family did the annual holiday trip to Manhattan, NY. It is a wonderful trip that every year my dad graciously pays for and after this emotional year it was well needed. However, the past two years I have been ill and still push myself to go. Last year I actually OD on over the counter cold medicine - not knowing that my cough drop and throat numbing spray had TRIPLE the amount of the same drugs in my system. I survived and saw Annie the musical last year. This year I had a sinus cold infection, but the love of this day is all worth the pain. Its a mixture of Christmas in NYC, my moms 1987 puffy coat and hot chocolate that bring it all together.

This annual trip consists of taking the train into Penn Station, going to see a show usually at Madison Square Garden or Radio City Music Hall (This year, it was the Radio City 75th Christmas Show - LOVED IT), visiting Rockefeller tree, passing through St. Patricks (my favorite part of the day), getting hot coco at a cafe and then ending the day with a yummy lunch/dinner at Carmines near Time Squares.

This year Dad added an addition excitement - visiting the top of The Empire State Building. I have never been there and after 9/11 was not a fan of going. I met my fear and stood on top of one of the American Society of Civil Engineers Seven Wonders of The Modern World (I see why you wanted to go now Dad). It was amazing, I wasn't scared at all and it was so cool to see the snow go up and not down. My sister Jade took a cool photo of me with NYC in the background, but she has yet to send it to me. So this photo with my hat off for the 1st time that day will have to do for now.

NJ Largest Candy Cane? Nope, thats my Xmas tree. THATS HOT

Growing up I was always loved white Christmas trees. I just find it more winter like than a bright green tree. So last year I got my 1st Christmas tree and you bet it was white! I find having white makes it more fun to have a themed tree. Last year was silver and ice. This year I saw a white tree online with red balls (I think it was an ad for Ebay in fact) and fell in love with the color combo. All it took was two boxes of red shiny and matte colored red balls to make my 2007 tree look like a gigantic candy cane! So in the season of giving I am sharing with you photos of our beloved red and white holiday tree. Check out our cheesy stockings (yes, Cookie Monster is mine) and mini nativity and nutcrackers. I have already decided next year theme will be white and yellow gold - to match my white and gaudy gold china with GOLD (yes gold) flatware. Still undecided if I will cover the tree with plastic for extra effect.

Don't forget to notice our little black gift under the tree and the actual first gift under the tree for my sister's fiance, Joey, who is in Iraq this year. I put it under the tree until it is sent to make sure his gifts got a under-the-tree experience before going to him.