Christmas | kimberly ah

Jan 04 2016

The First Post of 2016

Happy New Year! It always seems like December flies by without a chance to catch my breath. The first week always feels full of possibility and then I’m always rushing to finish projects and parties by the end. But in the end, the work is worth it, the parties are fun and full of laughter, and I know I have all of January to recover.

I am so looking forward to this month.

January is the introvert’s delight.

The parties are over. The shopping is over. The weather in Chicago makes going out difficult. I’m looking forward to hibernation and working on a couple of projects around the house and on my desk. I’m also looking forward to popping in here more often. I got out of the blogging habit at the end of last year…for many reasons that may deserve their own post someday. But I think I’m ready to come back…slowwwwly. Sitting here at my desk, I have a running list of things I want to share, including bits about the holidays, some great mail that’s been showing up in my mailbox, and well…more about Japan. Oh, and perhaps some resolutions?

Anyway, I hope you had a wonderful holiday season and are looking forward to what 2016 may bring.

It’s time to take down the Christmas tree…

(Have you taken yours down yet?)

Tagged celebrations, Christmas, decorating, holidays, home

Dec 05 2015

The LWA Holiday Letter Social

Tomorrow, I’ll be joining Kathy and Donovan for the LWA Holiday Virtual Letter Social. We’ll be writing out our holiday cards and chatting about postal and non-postal topics (the subject of cocktails usually comes up!) So get out your Christmas cards and a cup of tea and join in!

Have you gotten any cards yet? My Aunt Karen was the first this year, closely followed by Ryan, whose card came from the North Pole again!

Tagged adventures, Christmas, holidays, mail art, snail mail

Jan 07 2015

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Christmas, gardening, snail mail

Pretty Seed Packets

My pen pal Danielle sent me these fantastic seed packets for Christmas. They are from the Hudson Valley Seed Library as part of their special Art Packs series. Various artists’ works are used on the seed packet, making them perfect for gifts! (Danielle, you know me so well!) She sent Isis Candy Shop tomatoes, packet art done by Amy Ross. The other one, Tender Green Komatsuna, features a painting by Molly Rausch, famous for her postage stamp paintings. If you look closely, you can see that the base of the painting is a vintage Japanese postage stamp, and Molly, with her imagination and a teeny, tiny paintbrush, added the surroundings. You can see the entire painting here…isn’t it fantastic?

This gift blends all of my favorite things: mail, postage stamps and gardening! And, especially when windchills are hitting the -30°F mark, I’m really dreaming of gardening today.

Tagged Christmas, forest park, garden, gardening, holidays, Japan, snail mail

Jan 04 2015

Another Christmas Tea

Another book club holiday tea is in the books (hehe) and we’re onto a new year. December book club always falls around winter solstice, so it was rather dark all day at Peggy’s, but hopefully you can appreciate the beauty of the rooms and the table settings in spite of my dark pictures. We split into two tables, each seen above, and as always the place settings were festive and lovely. Peggy should seriously give lessons on how to set a table because I always feel like mine lack the layering that hers have. She has such a great mix of dishes to play around with, too. We started the morning with a cocktail–ginger sage prosecco. We found the recipe here and I made the syrup, which is easy and delicious and amazingly useful in other cocktails too. It’s warm and wintry, perfect for this time of the year. Bruising the sage leaf before you float it on top of your cocktail is also highly recommended.

Our menu was very similar to last year’s menu. I made ham salad tea sandwiches again, and they were served alongside pimento tea sandwiches and classic cucumber tea sandwiches. We had two kinds of scones, cherry almond and coconut, served with Devonshire cream, Meyer lemon curd, lime curd and lilikoi curd. And we had Christmas cookies and lemon squares and lots and lots of hot tea. For our book this month, we read Emma–our first dip into Jane Austen. Sadly, only a few finished the book (which is rare for us!) so the book discussion was not as long and as deep as usual. But lesson learned, choosing a lighter book in December may be the way to go. After the book discussion, we lingered on in Peggy’s comfortable home and chatted about our Christmas plans, families and other books. I’m looking forward to another year of book club, and more reading in general. I didn’t read as much as I should have in 2014, so it’s time for a fresh start. For January we are reading Ethan Frome. Edith Wharton is a favorite of mine, so I’m looking forward to it. We don’t have any other titles planned for the year, which is a preferred way to go. Last year we planned an entire year ahead and a few of us felt stuck with some of the titles. It’s nice to plan a little at a time, and leave some openings for interesting titles that pop up in the newspaper or recommendations from friends. If you’re in a book club, I’d love to hear how you choose your titles.

Tagged books, celebrations, Christmas, cocktails, decorating, food, holidays

Jan 03 2015

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Christmas, holidays, Office Supplies, snail mail, Zines

Merry Zinemas

I think out of all of my gifts, I liked my stocking gifts the best. (Well, that’s hard to say…but they are awesome!) I mentioned here that I like to ask for zines for Christmas. My stocking was stuffed with zines, socks, postcards and a stamp. Here’s what I got:

Cats in My Neighborhood zine

Collage & Art Journal IDEAS zine

Parcel Ghost Super-Supernatural zine pack

(I’ll talk more about zines in an upcoming post, but until then, I highly recommend all of these zines!)

Donuts socks: These socks are so cozy! I gave Naoto the Beer ones a few years ago. The sock bottoms are lined with terry, giving a little extra cushion. I’ve been padding around the house in these for a few days now. I may never take them off.

Letter Writers Alliance Official Seal Stamp: I love all of my LWA stamps and I’m so excited to have one with my member number on it. I’m ready to send more mail in 2015!

Victory Garden postcards: I’m excited to NOT hoard these!

So that was my stocking. Santa Naoto did a great job, as usual. One more Christmas post…and then we can put the holidays behind us!

P.S. Though some of the makers (of the zines & stamp) are friends and acquaintances, this post wasn’t sponsored by anyone but me. 🙂

Tagged Christmas, gardening, holidays, mail art, office supplies, rubber stamp, shopping, snail mail, zines

Jan 02 2015

2 Comments

Christmas, holidays, vintage

The Christmas Gifts 2014

I wish I could promise you this is the last Christmas post…almost!

For Christmas, Naoto surprised me with an Instax printer. If you don’t know, Instax are similar to Polaroids. You can buy an Instax camera, but I wanted the convenience of printing pictures from my phone so Naoto picked the printer for me. (As much fun as it sounds to have an Instax camera, I know I would never carry around an extra camera.) The printer links wirelessly with my iPhone and I can print tiny instant pictures wherever I want. The pictures are about the size of a credit card, perfect for memory keeping (ahem, scrapbooking) and mailing to friends. My first picture is of our Christmas Eve cocktails and I can’t wait to print some more. The printer is small, so it will be perfect to take on vacation so I can have some instant access to pictures of my food and drinks (heehee) to accent my travel journals. Naoto also got me this vintage table runner. I am in love with the one from our anniversary, and I imagine this one will be great to use in the spring. It coordinates nicely with my vintage dishes in the china cabinet. He also got us another pair of Blackhawks tickets…this year we are going on January 16! I can’t wait! I gave Naoto some practical gifts–snow boots and new jeans. (Un-pictured because snooooze!) I also gave him the shirt pictured above (which for the record, is less about the Chicago Bears than it is about Mike Ditka and the Superfans from the old SNL days. If you’d like to watch a Superfan clip, here it is…maybe it’s only funny if you’re from Illinois though?)I also got him a Resketch notebook and a ninja sticker for work. The Resketch notebook is really neat–it’s made from recycled papers like building plans and Braille sheets. There are also a few creative prompts mixed throughout the book. Naoto takes notes at work, so I thought it might be a fun gift. (Also, Shawn, the seller, was really super and I like to support super people with super ideas.) I bought both the t-shirt and the notebook at Show of Hands this fall. I found this rice cooker key chain at Renegade this summer. It’s from Mehoi, who has so many cute designs. I’m kind of regretting not getting him a pin instead because he’s already said the key chain is too nice to use.

I feel good about our gifts this year. Other than the snow boots, jeans and Instax, all of our gifts came from independent makers and sellers. Tomorrow I’ll share the stocking stuffers. Santa outdid himself with tiny treasures this year!

Tagged Christmas, holidays, office supplies, photography, shopping, vintage

Dec 31 2014

Christmas Food at Karen’s

We spent Christmas morning at Karen’s for a little brunch before we came home and hibernated with gifts for the rest of the day. We had to journey alllll the way across the hall, but it was totally worth it because Karen is always good company and her brunch food was delectable. I was in charge of cocktails. Since it was morning and it’s been so gloomy lately, I chose to make this Winter Sun cocktail. A nice burst of citrus was just what we needed. If you are looking for a breakfast cocktail (because who doesn’t like day-drinking?), I highly recommend this one. It’s kind of a fancy screwdriver…but a thousand times better. (Do people still drink screwdrivers? I haven’t had one since college.) Freshly-squeezed clementine juice, lemon, triple sec…and the citrusy sugared rim on the glass…we might have to make these again for New Year’s Day! Karen made an egg casserole (which was delicious) but the highlight of the meal was the “Japanese Pancake”. It’s a long-standing Karen’s family tradition to eat these “Japanese pancakes” on Christmas morning. It’s not Japanese, and the closest thing I could come up with that’s similar is a Dutch Baby Pancake…but oh, is it heavenly! It’s a thin, simple batter poured into a hot cast iron skillet and baked in the oven. It puffs up as it cooks and when it’s done, it’s the perfect blend of light and airy and crispy. It already is flavored by the butter in the skillet, but you can add jam, syrup, powdered sugar, and fruit, too. I just added a dusting of powdered sugar to mine. It was perfect.After breakfast we came back home and gave Presley her gift from Karen. It’s a catnip fish that makes water sounds when you swat it. She’s in love. More on the rest of the gifts Friday…

In the meantime, have a wonderful & safe New Year’s Eve! Thanks for spending a bit of your 2014 with me! We are heading back to Golden Steer (for the third year in a row!) with some friends and then coming back home for snacks and cocktails and the countdown to midnight. Happy New Year!

Tagged Christmas, cocktails, food, forest park, holidays

Dec 30 2014

3 Comments

Christmas, holidays, Merry & Bright, snail mail

Holiday Cards 2014

Siiiiigh…our holiday cards are out…most made it by Christmas. Others didn’t. And that’s okay (she says, begrudgingly.) I worked on my cards over two days–one with my friend Jackie and her cats (Eskimo is shown above…she finally warmed up to me on this visit and now that she’s rested on my cards, I’m for sure we are best friends), and the other at home with Presley overseeing my progress (top picture). I took some people off of my list this year, and added some new friends, totaling forty-four cards for the season. I found these Hasui Kawase cards at the Book Table in Oak Park. I love that they are peaceful and snowy. Some people may say they lack “Christmas” but with their “Season’s Greetings” message inside, they worked for a variety of people. I also had a few 16 Sparrows Chicago Snowflake cards that I sent to a few former and current Chicagoans on my list. (It’s their interpretation of the Chicago flag.) And since twenty-eight cards were not enough, I mixed in some of last year’s leftover cards and some from a Cavallini kit that I’ve had for a few years. Not a single piece of washi tape was used for this year’s cards, but I did put a Trader Joe’s sticker on each one. (I often ask for a few stickers when I’m checking out at the store. I like to use them on my mail and my calendar. On a recent visit, the manager gave me the whole roll. Trader Joe stickers forever!!)

So, they weren’t perfect, but I wrote a personal message in each one, so hopefully that part was appreciated, even though the envelopes were a little plain. And now…onto New Year’s cards…I only have a few but the clock -again- ticks…

Tagged Christmas, holidays, Japan, letterpress, snail mail

Dec 29 2014

1 Comment

Christmas, holidays, Merry & Bright, Oh Tannenbaum

Oh Tannenbaum 8: Inge-Glas Ornaments

(Oops, I fell off the blogging wagon last week. It’s still okay to post about Christmas stuff, right?)After the pickle, I chose to buy an orange slice and an apple slice for my next ornament purchases. They both really pop on the tree with their glittery edges and bright colors. The apple came with a little story card that explains how the apple is a symbol of temptation in Christianity. The orange didn’t come with a story, but it always reminds me of getting the tiny oranges in our stockings as kids. And a cigar–its burning end is my favorite detail, black and glittery. I purchased this ornament before I met Naoto but oddly enough one of our first dates involved a cigar bar in Greektown. We were the only non-old men in the place and it was a lot of fun. My parents added to my collection with a teapot and a ruby slipper. I love the delicate little teapot and the bright red glittered shoe. The last Inge-Glas ornament I received was the champagne bottle–an engagement gift from my parents. Naoto and I have a lot of “First Christmas” ornaments, but this engagement ornament is my favorite. This year it’s front and center (along with Charlie Brown) on the tree.

Naoto is already asking when we are taking down the tree…but I’m not quite ready yet. I’m still enjoying the Christmas lights…it’s been so gloomy and cloudy here that it’s nice to have a little brightness and sparkle inside for a little bit longer.

For the other Oh Tannenbaum ornament posts, go here.

Tagged Christmas, decorating, holidays, memories, parents

Dec 25 2014

4 Comments

celebrations, Christmas, cocktails, holidays