Geri and I love to go Black Friday and After-Christmas shopping to get the best deals on holiday gifts. Sometimes we give them right away, sometimes we stash it away for next year’s giving.  We’ve all done it, buy the perfect gift on sale to give following year, then buy something else during the year, and something else, until we have a collection of these perfect gifts in our basement.  And there they sit.

I received a gift from a friend a few days ago that truly touched me.  Through this website, she purchased and had shipped a beautiful “Best Friend” cup.  In the box was information on a company called Children of the Inner Light.  I fell in love with this website so much that I put it on my list to purchase gifts for family and friends.

This website is full of gift ideas such as:

• Cups
• Cake plates
• Piggybanks
• Candles
• Bookmarks
• Calendar
• Coasters
• Dog tag necklaces

The list goes on…please visit www.MARCIonline.com and spend some time in this wonderful website.

Christmas is my favorite holiday. It is magical with the decorations, the hustle and bustle in the malls, special time with family and friends. But I have to admit that once that special day is over, I look forward to packing away the memories for another year. Christmas can be a huge expense, with travel, gifts, the food, etc. So I start planning in January.

This is my first Christmas as a Gluten Free individual. For those of you that don’t know what being gluten-free really means, it means no wheat, no flour, and many other grains are out of the question. It’s not easy, let me tell you, especially around the holidays. The parties, the snacks at work, and the Christmas cookies all get adoring glances but no nibbles. Not only is it hard on me, it’s hard for my friends who try to figure out food that I can eat.

Many of us have family and friends that live in another state. Mailing a package becomes another consideration when gift giving. You have spent your time and money on a nice gift, but now you have to ship it. We all know just how expensive that can be, and if your loved one is out of the country, well that can be even worse. In some cases, you could spend as much or more mailing the package than you spent on the gift.