Holi-Daze: New Year's Eve!

Everybody has been doing big recaps of the year/decade. Like, everybody--including my place of employment. And I'm a little over it. As with every other holiday, I feel like New Year's is creeping along the calendar and taking up more time. I've been seeing recaps since Christmas, and really, once you've seen one, you've seen them all.

So let's not even go down that road! Instead, let's talk about pretty things you can wear tonight.

You might not want to do them all together unless you're going to a Cher-themed party (which would be awesome), because I don't think anybody except the Bejeweled One would ever wear that many black sequins at once.

Everything is from Etsy: the shoes are $25, the clutch is $20, as are the hairpins, and the dress comes in at $45. Considering the equation that "sparkly" always equals "more money," these are pretty cheap.

We're hosting a small party tonight, but since we'll be sitting around playing board games and Guitar Hero, I don't get to put my sparkle on this year. (I will also be forcing chocolate upon my guests, since my husband lost his mind this week and brought home a 10-pound bar of the good stuff. Seriously, WHAT am I supposed to do with that?)

What are your New Year's plans? Do you get to dress up? Did you also get stuck with too much chocolate and a crazy husband? Comment away.

Web Gem: High Rollers

Greetings!

I know I said the holiday hiatus would end yesterday, but I received an after-Christmas miracle. Last minute, it was decided that I wasn't needed at work, so I used the unexpected freebie to run errands and watch the most bizarre football turnaround in the history of the universe. (I also learned that I HATE IT when people touch their faces while speaking, but I digress.)

How was your holiday weekend? Did you get everything you asked for?

If your haul wasn't so good this year, I have something that might make you feel a little better. It's called Gilt Groupe, a service that sells luxury brands at super-discounted rates. They claim up to 70% off, but items in the Final Sale area go for even less. (An Alexander McQueen jacket is 86% off, for example. [Also, my apologies for the lack of link--you do have to sign up to see anything. But it's free!])

Gilt has stuff for women, men, kids, and the occasional item for the home. You can searach by either size or brand, so there's no weeding through 9,275 items to see what will fit. They're also kind enough to tell you when something is in danger of selling out, so you can make a game-time decision if need be. More deets can be found here. Clickity-click!

Miscellaneous: Merry Christmas!

I usually blog "for real" on Thursdays, but since that's Christmas Eve and I'll be in the car and then at my in-laws, I need to do it now.

If you celebrate Christmas, have an excellent day! And even if you don't, enjoy the three-day weekend. I'll be back on Monday. (Unless we get snowed into our house, in which case I might be back sooner. But let's hope for Monday.)

Holi-Daze: Gift Guide #4 (Your Mother!)

Riddle me this: why do guys wait so long to start Christmas shopping? As of today, December 21st, I know of two who haven't even STARTED yet. Well, let me correct that. One of them, a bro-in-law, plans to get everything done today. Before he and my husband left for the mall, they were grilling me about what he should buy for his mother. So if you're in the same boat, needing something lovely for the woman who gave you life, look no further.

If you've been to a mall in the past six months, you've probably seen the 900 key necklaces in every jewelry store. I don't often encourage people to go out and buy something everyone else has (like those journey pendants), but I find this necklace to be especially cute. It's from Overstock, is on sale for $22.49, and if you order today it's guarunteed to be delivered by Christmas Eve.

A lovely and versatile purse! I know it looks black, but it's actually navy with a rich purple interior. From Target, it's a very reasonable $39.99, and like the stuff from Overstock, if you order today, you'll get it by the 24th.

Moms work hard. They wiped the snot off our faces when we were little, for cryin' out loud! Isn't that worthy of cozy slippers? These are indeed cozy; I can say that because I own them. From Land's End (which is apparently part of Sears now?), they're $25.50 and fall into the same category of ordering today for delivery by Christmas. Although, if you totally drop the ball and forget to purchase tonight, you can still get them in time for an extra $12.

Hopefully these will help. Now hurry up and buy something, dudes.

Ma, Look What I Got: Suit up!

I hate it when I buy something in a store and then need/want to look it up online for whatever reason and it's not on the website. GAAH. That's happening to me right now, as you might've guessed. It's likely that the items I just bought are ancient relics that were removed from the interwebs long ago, but STILL. I didn't take a picture of myself before I ran out the door today, and now I'm out of luck.

So this post is only about half of the goods I got at Macy's this week. They just had their last One Day Sale of '09 Tuesday and Wednesday, and it was EPIC. It was even better if you got a coupon in the mail (I did!) or found one in the newspaper. I picked up some Christmas presents, which I won't feature on here for obvious reasons, and this for myself:

The blazer, not the speed skating pants she's wearing under it. It was originally $99, and was reduced to $29.99. Then, it was 20% off that price because I paid with my Macy's card, so I ended up with a $100 jacket for $23.99. (And THAT is why I don't pay full price, my friends.) It's still marked down, but now the price is back at $49.99, which is not as amazing, but still better than the whole shebang.

Gotten any good deals this year? And where are you in your shopping? Done? Panicking? Please tell me you've started, unlike my boss...

Wedding$: Do yourself a favor...

On Christmas, it'll be 5 months since my wedding day, which is WEIRD. Not weird bad, but weird like, did I fall into a worm hole and skip a few months? Because I still feel like it all happened yesterday. In fact, it feels so recent that I keep forgetting to work on the thank you notes, and have only written 20 to date. My bad.

Incomplete projects aside, today I found a good deal future brides can use. I'm bummed I didn't see these before my nuptials, because we used a similar motif on our paper goods:

They're matchbooks with mints inside (although, are they really matchbooks if there are no matches?). I've seen people do stuff with these mints before, like making little tags that say "Mint to Be," but this is the cutest idea. They're also amazingly inexpensive, $15.50 for 50 of them. That's 31 cents apiece, which is really about as low as wedding favors go. So if you're getting married, I'd snap these up before they're gone.

U.G.L.Y.: Fancy Footwear

This post was originally going to be about the great sale Macy's has coming on Tuesday and Wednesday, but then my eyeballs were ASSAULTED and I couldn't ignore the problem.


Futuristic stripper shoes. I mean, is this what the ladies show up wearing when Captain Kirk orders entertainment for the Starship Enterprise?

In an unusually bad move, Macy's has decided to sell these. They were $79, but have been marked down to $55.30, which isn't just a sale price--it's a clearance price. Clearance, you say? How STRANGE! It's almost like nobody wants to buy them...

Holi-Daze: Gift Guide #3 (Geekery)

On my walk to work everyday, I pass what I call the Hipster Corral. There are a lot of colleges nearby, and this area of sidewalk is, for some reason, where all of the "cool kids" decide to stand and smoke and drink their Starbucks. Hipsters follow a variety of henious trends, like acid wash jeans and ironic moustaches, but I've noticed that all of them--ALL of them!--try to be nerdy. If they're not wearing glasses, they're rocking a sweater vest. Or a cardigan. Or their pants look like something Steve Urkel would wear.

My friends, don't be fooled. Those are hipsters pretending to be dorky because they think it's cool. We all know an actual geek. Heck, you probably know more than one. So with the gift-giving holidays fast approaching, you might be stumped about what to buy for them. I'm here with some ideas.

POP QUIZ! Solve for x! What's the square root of 64? You can solve the problems if you really want to, but I think most of us will just remember where the numbers are. The Pop Quiz Math Clock from Think Geek is $26.99.

This is clever. An eraser shaped like a delete key. Also from Think Geek, it's gigantic (3.5" x 1.75" x 1") and $12.99.

No, he's not just miming his solo--he's actually playing it. The Electronic Rock Guitar Shirt is fully interactive, complete with a mini amp at the left hip, a magnetic pick, and the ability to play all major chords. There's another version with a drum kit, and since each is only $29.99, you could have the cheapest band start-up ever.

On the Cheap: Forget Me Not

I still have that pesky cold from last week, only now my husband is sick, too, so there's a lot of coughing and snot-dripping going on. There have also been a lot of weird, NyQuil-induced dreams on my part (including one about a turtle/spider hybrid monster that was strong enough to carry a giant, early 90s camcorder on its back to record my terror). So that's been great.

My husband doesn't have the trippy dreams, but he does forget things. He actually forgot to buy more cold medicine yesterday and I'm really hoping he remembers today, or I'll have to spend the night curled up with the kleenex.

Maybe it would help if he tied a ribbon, so to speak, around his finger.

Or not, since those are a little girly. Perhaps I'll invest in one for myself, as I'm not exactly known far and wide for my memory skills. I stumbled upon these at Delight.com, and either color is $49.50.

That's not a bad price, but I did see them for less on Etsy.

Silver or gold for $31.50.

Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go track down another box of kleenex.

Go Retro: Baby, It's Cold Outside

We're getting our first snow today. Big, fat flakes that, unfortunately, aren't sticking because it was in the 50s on Monday and the ground is too warm, but it's nice to finally have some seasonal weather. It would also be nice to have a coat like this:


I don't normally like real fur, but this is just adorable. (I'm taking cold medicine, so when I first saw it I thought it looked like polar bear, but it's just mink. Do people even wear polar bears? I bet not. Good thing I don't have to use my brain today.) Anyhoodle, as much as I like this, I'd be too afraid to wear it in the city, lest some manic PETA member decided to go all Carrie on me.

When I got the link from Ebay the price was only $31, so if you're a fur fan, this is a steal.

While we're on the topic, how do you feel about fur? Does it weird you out? Are are you lounging on your bearskin rug right now? Comments!

Miscellaneous: Workload

I've mentioned before that I do a lot of my blogging while I'm at work. That'll still be happening, but somebody from the Powers That Be has decided to up my workload--so starting now I can't bring you the deals quite as often.

I'll still be here with big posts on Mondays and Thursdays, since those will be my "boring" days, but I'm not sure how much I'll be able to do in between. Luckily, I have some free time right now, so I thought I'd direct you to Target's adorable selection of holiday dresses:

All of them are considered limited editions, and all are $39.99. My only complaint is that 95% of the dresses were this pencil silhouette. I mean, that works for me since it's pretty much the only silhouette I wear, but some people REFUSE to go down that road. My sister, for example, would probably dress up like Laura Ingalls Wilder before she'd put on any of those.

How do you feel about pencil skirts? Are you a little tired of seeing them EVERYWHERE?