It's beginning to look at lot like Christmas - part 3

Finally. Part the Third.

For the dudes (and specifically the dads):

This is where it gets tricky. My father is not the easiest to shop for. One Christmas he specifically requested CD cleaning wipes and refused to countenance the idea that I might want to buy him something less, well, cleaning product-y.*

So, with a distinct lack of originality, I've bought my dad the latest Terry Pratchett novel most years. I'd buy it in December, he'd usually read it some time around August, and that would be that.

After 20 years that idea has staled a little. But my dad is a busy man, hence only managing to finish his Christmas reading on his summer holidays - he doesn't have the time for books.

So what does he like? Well, beer, for starters. Good beer. Fancypants beer.

Image from here

I can't recommend St Peter's Brewery enough. It has every kind of beer a discerning ale drinker could ever want, from grapefruit to Christmas to Suffolk Gold. Sadly, my dad already knows this. He knows it so well that after knocking off work on Christmas Eve he usually drives over to their (beautiful, medieval) brewery and buys a case for himself, to enjoy at leisure over the festive season. So that's out.

So my brain runs thus: My dad likes music. I can buy concert/theatre tickets. I'll get him an experience, rather than a thing! Genius!

Except. The last cultural events of this type my parents attended were, in no particular order: Mumford & Sons, the Glyndebourne Touring Opera, the Foo Fighters and The Imagined Village. Their tastes are nothing if not diverse.

If you happen to have a parent with operatic leanings, Glyndebourne will be performing The Marriage of Figaro (which my parents declared excellent) again next summer at the 2013 Festival. 

Ooh - I know! Scandi-crime! All middle-aged, middle-class Brits like a bit of gloomy Scandinavian noir, right?

Image via the BBC

Season 1 of The Bridge is on dvd now, as is the film adaptation of Jo Nesbo's Headhunters. I can't comment on either of these, because I haven't actually seen them. I haven't even watched the Danish version of The Killing. *Hangs head in shame*. But judging by my parents' reluctance to speak to me on Skype when The Bridge was on, I think they liked it.

Which means they've seen it. Which means they do not strictly need a box-set.

Which means I GIVE UP. Guys, what are you buying your dad for Christmas?

*In case you get really, really, really desperate. You're welcome!

Happy thanksgiving!

May your day be full of pie...

All I want for Christmas is...

... this:

Image from here

A super wide-angle lens for my beautiful camera, to be exact, so that I can take uber-awesome photos of Bolivian salt flats and Chilean deserts. Sadly they're a leeeetle out of my price range to buy new. And also to buy second-hand.

So I'm saving my pennies, scouring t'interwebz for bargains and spending far too much time looking at incredible photos of the Salar de Uyuni.

In the meantime, I'd settle for a cute journal like one of these.

Both images from Paper Source

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas - part 2

Now on to my favourite (and most researched) section of the Christmas list:

Little people:

One amazing additional bonus to my friends starting to become parents? I get to buy kids stuff! Right now they're all pretty much babies, still, so a few of my favourite children's purchases might have to wait a few years.

But I can't say that's limited me too much - there are so many cool things out there! Starting with books. I'm pretty old school when it comes to children's stories, I tend to stick to the classics, and to the authors that my brother and sister and I loved...

Like Janet and Alan Ahlberg.

All of these images from Penguin

Or Meg, Mog and Owl.

Although I'm also a sucker for any kind of stories about feminist princesses...

And when it comes to toys, I get paranoid about plastic bits breaking off and getting swallowed, or just generally not being very durable - so I'm leaning towards wooden toys that the babies of my acquaintance can play with, smash around, suck on and generally use as weapons to their heart's content.

Cute helicopter from John Lewis

How cute? From here

For the nesters:

This would totally include me, if I didn't keep on moving and clogging up my parents' garage with all my possessions.

Current contenders include these beautiful Roald Dahl mugs - you can get everything from James and the Giant Peach to the BFG, to my personal favourite, Matilda.

Matilda!

Or how about some Anthropologie offerings? A seriously fancypants rolling pin?

Both images from Anthropologie

Or some rather gorgeous measuring cups?

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas - part 1

Yeah, yeah. It's still November. Thanksgiving hasn't even happened yet. Whatever.

It's raining here. I am wrapped in a blanket, listening to Sufjan Stevens singing festive songs, and eating dark chocolate-covered almonds. If that isn't Christmassy, I don't know what is.

So I thought I might show you a few highlights I unearthed while browsing for potential gifts. That's ok, right? Blatant hypothetical consumerism? They are really pretty presents, I promise!

For the bookworm:

Image from Penguin

Let's face it, if you're going to buy someone you love a book, you might as well make it the most beautiful book you can find. And it probably doesn't hurt if it's generally considered a masterpiece. I think Penguin Clothbound Classics fulfil that brief. Personally, if someone was to buy me that gorgeous copy of Northanger Abbey, I wouldn't be devastated. And I'm eyeing up The Hound of the Baskervilles for a certain someone else...

Read all of those already? Don't feel the need to update your old copy of A Tale of Two Cities with something a little jazzier? Similarly ornamental to the Penguin Classics, but rather more obscure, are Persephone Books. 100 neglected books from the early and mid-20th century, mainly by women writers. Each with a gorgeous endpaper chosen from a vintage fabric design.

I already own The Making of a Marchioness by Frances Hodgson Burnett (which is being adapted for TV), Saplings, by Noel Streatfield, and Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day.

I know a certain horror fan who I think would love ghost story The Victorian Chaise-longue, and for newlyweds (of whom I know many) Persephone recommends 'homage to married life' Greenery Street.

For the beauty junkie

You know who I mean (hello sister mine! And mother mine! Oh. And hi me!). People who like nothing more than opening a Christmas stocking to find a perfume they've been spritzing themselves with at every airport duty-free and beauty counter for the past year.

For years now I've worn the same perfume, and finally, this summer, I decided it was time for a slight revamp. So I ambled over to Sephora, told the scary overly made-up lady I liked fresh, citrussy but a tiny bit sophisticated scents (I have a way with words, right?) and lo and behold:

Image from here

The catchily titled Guerlain Aqua Allegoria Mandarine-Basilic. I love it. And when I mentioned it to my mother the other day, she got quite over-excited about its sister perfume, Aqua Allegoria Pamplelune - which apparently smells of grapefruit, blackcurrant, patchouli and vanilla.

As for my little sister, there are few things that make her as happy as unwrapping a ton of Benefit goodies.

You can never go wrong with Benetint

I'm canvassing opinions on this highlighter and this cute little travel set.

And in the meantime, I'm lusting after a few more shades of Essie nail polish. Because. Hello. Navy nails for winter? Navy nails in a shade called Bobbing for Baubles?

Or, indeed, Midnight Cami?

Images from Essie

That's what I call festive.

Next up: Presents for little people, presents for home-owning nesting people. And, if I can ever, ever overcome this hurdle, presents for my dad.

The big kahuna

You might have noticed my recent preoccupation with all things travel? There's a very good reason for that.

I've lived abroad. I've been on some pretty amazing holidays. I've been all over the place with my job. But I've never actually been travelling for longer than a few weeks at a time.* I went straight from school to university, spent a year doing work experience and saving money for my post-grad course, and since graduating from that I've been working solidly.

Ha Long Bay, Vietnam

Ljubljiana, Slovenia

Monkey, Bali

Now I've been at my job long enough to take a little sabbatical, which coincides very nicely with the dates I'd already planned to go on a mega-holiday with my friend A, and with the round-the-world trip my married friends B and T are going on in 2013.

The list of places I've never visited, but really want to, is long. Like looooooooong. Tanzania? Rwanda and Uganda? I'm kind of obsessed with travelling in Africa. Croatia and Montenegro, New Zealand, China, Nepal and Laos are also high on the list.

But my current location makes one continent an obvious winner for this trip - South America here I come! The only country I've previously been to in Latin America is Costa Rica, way back in 2007, so it's a whole new continent for me. And for as long as I can remember I've been strangely fixated on seeing Bolivia.

So. The (for me) big trip is being planned for next summer. Six weeks, five countries.

Two weeks travelling around and chilling out in Colombia with A, my oldest friend (this trip will mark 20 years of her putting up with my general absurdity).

Then ten days solo travel in Bolivia...

... Before meeting up with B and T in Argentina and travelling back northwards, through Argentina, Chile and Peru, finishing up in Machu Picchu and flying back to Los Angeles, leaving them to make their way across to Brazil, which is where they'll wrap up their eight-month adventure.

Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. That, in case you were wondering, is the irritating, high-pitched sound of me being insanely over-the-top excited about this whole shebang!

* I read this back and realised that statement is not 100% true. I spent six weeks in Australia when I was 16, but much of that time was spent sitting at my friend's house watching The Craft, Dirty Dancing and a six-hour Shirley MacLaine biopic (it outlines her belief in aliens. I highly recommend it). So I don't feel like that counts...

Round here

Mocha from Espresso Profeta in Westwood

Cake pop! Style over cakey substance...

My favourite studio lot.

Are you noticing a trend here?

Caffeine has been my friend over the past few weeks while work has been crazy. Also cake. Running, not so much. Time to try and wean myself off the coffee/tea/diet coke/sugar a little and get some semblance of balance back before Christmas, methinks.

Although not until I've satisfied my need for autumnal stodge of the kind that tastes pretty amazing, but is, perhaps, not the most photogenic...

Baked apple. Custard.