Obviously, the season looks nothing like this at the moment. But I would much rather think about this car, than our own poor wrecked one. Image via here.

Sometimes I end up having 20 tabs open on my computer because I just can’t bring myself to close them, lest I never find the article/item/recipe/picture again. Eventually, I usually just end up slapping them in a blog post because a) I have a desperate need to share everything I like and b) it makes it easy to find them again for myself!

This weekend we are off to all sorts of Christmassy things. The Nutcracker! Messiah! Christmas parties! Car shopping! Dissertation proposal writing! Ok, so some of these things are definitely worse than the others. But, if you have some minutes in the midst of your own busy holiday weekends, here are some things you should know about. (Note: I hate leaving that sentence and title with the dangling about…. but “Things about which you should know” just sounds so pretentious so I am keeping it.)

This article about the final Hunger Games movie. Our house is squarely divided between those who love the movies (me!) and those who think that we are no better than the residents of the Capitol watching children die for our own pleasure (James!). This article was an interesting response.

A literary advent calendar with stories or poems for every day. Go ahead and just go back and read them from the beginning because they are some of my favorite readings these days. (Dec. 2nd is quoted at the end of this post.)

Our favorite Christmas things in DC. And if you happen to be in the district, our church does a great performance of the Messiah that is free and open to all this Sunday morning at 9. They hire soloists and all, so it is pretty awesome. We also love going to the Lessons and Carols service at CHBC because they hit allllll those good carols.

I ordered Christmas prints from here and I am obsessed. And since the rest of our Christmas decor theme accidentally became “animals Hannah wants to domesticate,” it’s good to mix it up.

Might I suggest these for your Christmas cookie exchange needs? Perfect blend of tart and sweet.

If you haven’t finished all those lofty 2015 goals -take heart!

I’ve been thinking a lot about gift-giving recently. The Internet, magazines, stores, etc, are overflowing with Holiday Gift Guides. Honestly, a lot of them seem really impersonal, more lovely things that are in the end just stuff. I kind of like the intentional gifts, the ones that just scream the name of the person they are for. Christmas can be hard because we get SO excited about gift giving — a really wonderful thing — that we get swept up in a materialism that is the antithesis of Christmas’ simple story. So in that vein:

I liked this article about letting your kids select gifts for others.

Yet before we start exclusively praising minimalism, let’s remember that it too is an often elite luxury.

And to close, I have been thinking about this great quote from “Gift of the Magi” all week.

“The magi, as you know, were wise men–wonderfully wise men–who brought gifts to the Babe in the manger. They invented the art of giving Christmas presents. Being wise, their gifts were no doubt wise ones, possibly bearing the privilege of exchange in case of duplication. And here I have lamely related to you the uneventful chronicle of two foolish children in a flat who most unwisely sacrificed for each other the greatest treasures of their house. But in a last word to the wise of these days let it be said that of all who give gifts these two were the wisest. O all who give and receive gifts, such as they are wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the magi.”  -O Henry

Merry weekend to all.