MagicallyDelicious

We recently discussed the best kitchen gadgets for 2011 and developed a handy list of kitchen essentials.  We included items from tried and true mixers to fabulous designer corkscrews.  Today we are going to discuss the everything in between.  Recently, one of our expert contributors provided us with a kitchen essential that was less about helping her cook in the kitchen and more about saving her sanity and cash!

We couldn’t resist sharing this unique and helpful gadget with all of you Mother’s out there who can relate to the following scenario:

Read More Magic “Sanity Essentials for Mothers Worldwide” »

First batch - Toll House Dark Chocolate Chip Cookies

Anyone who knows me knows how much I love to bake, which makes this MY time of year.  The oven runs almost nonstop before Christmas.  This year, while much of it will head off to friends and family as usual, more of that baking will make its way to people who need a real boost in spirit.

Ronald McDonald House Charities of Baltimore provides a home away from home for seriously ill children and their families, and helps to fund programs in the local area that directly improve the well being of children.  When I think about the fact that there are 36 families staying there over this holiday season with seriously ill children, it makes me want to do something to deliver some holiday spirit.  I can’t imagine how discouraging it can be to spend the holidays away from home with such an uncertain future.

So I’m participating in Cookies Across America, a grass-roots program powered by AllRecipes.com and Nestle Toll House,  designed to harness its online community for good.  Home bakers across the country will bake and donate an estimated 1 billion cookies to those in need this holiday season.  That’s enough cookies to circle the globe twice if lined up end to end!  Twelve dozen of those cookies will be mine, delivered to the families at Ronald McDonald House in Baltimore.

For me this is a complete no brainer.  I’m adding a few dozen cookies to my list of baking this holiday season.  And I get to host a little get together to help get them decorated and packaged up.  In the area?  Come by and help on December 10 from 1-4:  just RSVP here.

So, I get to do something I enjoy, have a nice day with friends to get everything ready, and I get the satisfaction of knowing I did something to help this holiday season.  What could be better?

I’m making a batch of cookies every day this week to get ready for my event next Saturday, so check back as I post pictures of the cookies as I bake them.  Two batches down…several to go!

If you want to participate in Cookies Across America there are many ways you can help.

1. Take the pledge!  Click the banner on the right and pledge the cookies you’ll donate this year.
2. Host your own gathering!  Set up a group at Meetup.com and get together with friends to bake and decorate some cookies to donate.
3. Bake some cookies and donate them on your own.  Find a local organization you believe in and deliver some cheer.
4. Don’t like to bake?  Donate to those who do.  Give ingredients to your local food pantry so that families who couldn’t otherwise afford to can bake their own recipes this year.

This Thanksgiving season, as I think about what our menu will be for the first Thanksgiving I’ll be hosting, I’m also thinking about what I’m thankful for this year.

I’m always grateful for my family and friends.  Amazing, supportive people who make life what it is.  But there’s something new to add to this year’s list.  I’m grateful for the chaos of not having a “job.”  I could be scouring the want ads, and stewing about the fact that this year I’ve had not one, but two full-time jobs end quite abruptly because the companies were forced to downsize.  It would be easy to be bitter and panicked.  I could be worrying about money, and stability and the possible complete lack of both.  But, it’s an opportunity.

I have spent my career floating from one job to the next taking new skills and relationships from each.  Usually the skills I picked up had little to do with the job for which I was hired.  As an affiliate manager, I taught myself Photoshop, HTML, CSS and enough PHP to hack around in WordPress sites.  Not to mention, I learned what affiliate marketing was (I had to look it up when they called me for an interview – I had not clue one what it meant, even as I was being interviewed).  I made banners, wrote sales copy, and reluctantly became a team leader.  As a product manager and marketing VP, I taught myself to edit video, build landing pages, how to work on almost non-existent deadlines, and some pretty decent mind-reading skills.  And from everything I’ve ever done, I’ve learned how to work with clients, be self-managed and motivated by deadlines.

I’m Jobless & I’m Grateful?

Now here I sit, no longer technically unemployed, but jobless nonetheless.  And excited about it.  I’m self employed.  While the lack of structure, routine, and predictability of a paycheck every two weeks is gone, I’m grateful for the chance to figure out what it is I really want to do when I grow up, and just do that.  Maybe I’ll succeed.  Maybe I’ll fail.  But I’ll know either way it was because of what I do, not what someone else does not.  And for that, I’m really grateful.

So as I drive my friends crazy taking pictures and video of both the making of this year’s Thanksgiving meal and the devouring of the same, I’ll be thinking about how different this year is from most.  And I’ll be looking very much forward to what the next year brings and who I’ll be working with.  From my living room.

Gratitude is a really freeing thing.  What are you grateful for this holiday season?

Oh PS – I’m available for projects in all of the above things and more.  You can find more about what I do at http://creativeduckies.com and http://localduckies.com

What happened to Thanksgiving?

Thanksgiving is getting engulfed in a wave of displaced Christmas spirit.  Now I’m all for decking the halls, don’t get me wrong, but how can you get in the Christmas spirit in…October??  But I have two problems with this.

This year as I looked for Thanksgiving and Halloween items, I noticed that Christmas crept onto the shelves even earlier this year.  And it seems to get earlier ever year.  That is bad enough.  I understand retailers’ competition for holiday spending dollars, and I understand that they think whoever is first to the party is going to get the money.  I also get that in this economy, they’re all worried that we’re not going to spend as much, so the sooner they can get us in the spirit, the better.

Give Thanks & Wait to Give Stuff

But what about Thanksgiving?  That day where we sit around a table as a family (which happens less frequently for everyone in this fast-paced world) and we give thanks for what we have.  A nice, non-commercial day about family, good food and gratitude for all the good things in our lives.  Not for what we want to get under the tree in December.  Thanksgiving has started to become that day before the big sales.  Or worse, the day you can start shopping early.

Which brings me to my second issue.  What about those retail clerks and managers.  If we shop on Thanksgiving, retail workers have to be in the stores, away from their family on the holiday.  I worked retail for many years, and I did work at a couple of places that were open on Thanksgiving.  I grated my teeth every time someone said at the checkout (and it happened frequently), “I can’t believe you’re open on Thanksgiving!”

Retailers Only Do What We Pay Them to Do

I bit my tongue to keep from replying, “We’re open because you’re here.  If you didn’t shop on the holiday, we wouldn’t be open because they wouldn’t make any money.  And I could enjoy my holiday.”  If it cost more to keep the doors open than they brought in, retailers would not be open on holidays.  And if we choose to wait until after Thanksgiving to start spending our holiday money, retailers won’t push the season.  Let the retail workers take a collective breath on Thanksgiving with a well-deserved break before we bombard them on Black Friday.

Vote with Your Dollars

It’s up to us to vote with our dollars.  Wait to buy your presents until “Black Friday,” or be a rebel and wait until after the Thanksgiving weekend is over.  The stores will still be stocked with great gifts, and you can take time out of your busy holiday season to give thanks for the family sitting around your table without being distracted by visions of consumer electronics dancing in your head.

Respect the Bird!

As an All-Recipes AllStar, I’m in on the Respect the Bird campaign.  I support it 100% because it’s something I believe in.  You can get in on the act, and tell retailers to just wait until after Thanksgiving to start all the holiday madness.  Visit RespectTheBird.com, or just click the pledge on the right.

So it’s Spring, and I’m 40.  I haven’t even thought about Weight Watchers for months, though I do keep paying them because I keep thinking somehow it’ll work without me doing anything.  Sadly for my waist, this isn’t the case.

Last month, my mom had a heart attack.  I’ve often repeated the axiom that first God whispers in your ear, then he taps you on the shoulder, then he hits you with a brick; don’t wait for a brick.  Well, for my mom this was a brick and for me it was a hard tap on the shoulder.  Time to get my act together. Read More Magic “Spring Cleaning” »