Lets face the fact: deciding a gift for your loved ones and friends is often a difficult task as there seems to be too many gift ideas to choose from. Lately, I have come across some great gift ideas which you will find great too!
With coffee and tea being one of the most commonly drunk beverages in the world, your loved ones or friends, may most likely be coffee-drinkers as well. If that is the case, coffee sleeve from Posy Lane may be an excellent gift for your loved ones or friends. These coffee sleeves, not only keep the gift-recipient’s hands insulated from the hot coffee drink, but also being monogrammed, are great gifts highly customized for him or her. What’s more these coffee sleeves are made from reusable materials, enabling the gift recipients to make an environmental statement as well as a fashion statement about themselves.
If you are considering gifts for children, personalized placemats are excellent choices of gifts. As we all know, eating is the forte of most children, thus what’s better present to give to these young kids than these personalized placemats. These placemats are no ordinary boring placemats, these feature games appropriate for the kids as well as other activities on the back. These placemats come securely laminated and hence are safe for the children.
Last but not least, as Mother’s Day is Near, if you are considering what gifts to give to your beloved mother who has toiled hard to bring you up and shower you with unwavering care and love, you may consider mom agenda, which comes in varied different colours. These organizers even come with a 17-month calendar running from August 2009 to December 2010 and have different formats such as week-at-a-view format and monthly view formats.
I hope after reading this post, you have some great ideas for the choice of your gifts!
2009年5月13日星期三
Monogrammed Coffee Sleeves and More Fancy Items on My Mind
I am a coffee person. I believe I might have inherited this from my granny who used to stay with us when I was still in high school. I remember her so well: she wakes up at around 4 or 5 in the morning, and always find her sitting at the dining table, holding her coffee mug on the right, while her left hand making table taps in tune with her soft hum. I started to have my coffee since then on. I used to take 3-5 coffee cups a day, but managed to tone down to 2 cups now. I fancy monogrammed coffee sleeves lately, since I intend to have my personalized coffee cup. Would it not be even more enjoyable to have coffee with so much style?
Fancy #2: My bestfriend has a monogrammed towel wrap that really looks good on her, a birthday gift from another friend who ordered it online. This towel wrap is a non-traditional cut from the bath towel we usually have. She gave me the link, and look at this simple black towel wrap with sequins that caught my eye:
Fancy #3: Bedtime is the real bonding moment that I have with Tarko. That is the time when I get to read books to him, talk about anything or everything that interests him, or just tickle him until he begs me to stop. I realized yesterday that a couple of his books are missing, and fact is I cannot remember who borrowed it. So I am also thinking of putting children's die cut stickers on his books, to personalize it, such as this:
So what kinds of stuff do you fancy, too?
Fancy #2: My bestfriend has a monogrammed towel wrap that really looks good on her, a birthday gift from another friend who ordered it online. This towel wrap is a non-traditional cut from the bath towel we usually have. She gave me the link, and look at this simple black towel wrap with sequins that caught my eye:
Fancy #3: Bedtime is the real bonding moment that I have with Tarko. That is the time when I get to read books to him, talk about anything or everything that interests him, or just tickle him until he begs me to stop. I realized yesterday that a couple of his books are missing, and fact is I cannot remember who borrowed it. So I am also thinking of putting children's die cut stickers on his books, to personalize it, such as this:
So what kinds of stuff do you fancy, too?
2009年5月8日星期五
Weekly DIY Roundup: Coffee Sleeves and Mug Cozies!
I am a coffee drinker year round, but especially in the winter of course I like my coffee to stay hot, so mug cozies and cup sleeves are the way to go! I love to make sleeves from recycled felted sweaters, and you can easily adapt any of these designs to make them with felted wool, just by cutting the shape out and stitching as needed. Here is a super simple sleeve pattern by The Caffeinated Crafter:
Freakapotimus has another simple pattern for a coffee cup sleeve:
And a third basic sleeve pattern, this one made with gorgeous Noro yarn, can be found on another knitting blog:
Moving on to mug cozies, danido crafty designed a great adjustable one, so it'll fit all of your assorted mugs!
I think this design by mk carroll is beautiful, and it's made to fit either a mug or a french press:
This one by My Fair Katie has a different way of tying onto the mug, with i-cords:
Chronicle Books offers an excerpt on their website from their Winter Knits Kit, including the pattern for this mug cozy:
This mug cozy by Pippi Knits Stockings is designed to also function as a hand warmer!
Hooks and Knives wrote up a super simple crochet pattern for a coffee sleeve:
And yarnattacks on instructables shows us how to crochet these great mug cozies that also act as coasters!
Idle Hands has a very detailed how-to for this sewn coffee sleeve with a pocket:
Poppy tutorials shows us how to sew a velcro coffee sleeve that can double as a cuff!
Mary Ray on Craftstylish explains how to use a twin needle to make this super cool sleeve, I love it!
Also on Craftstylish, Shannon Dennis shows us how to make this sleeve from an old sweater:
And I'll show you one of mine, made with a felted sweater, with some embroidered embellishments:
So now you can keep your coffee (or tea!) hot and prevent your hands from burning! Comment with any of your favorite patterns or tutorials that I missed!
2009年4月22日星期三
Will Gay Marriage Help Tame Men’s “Piggishness”?
Before Andrew Sullivan decided that the purpose of gay marriage was to confer “dignity” on gay relationships (a definition ironically bought by the California Supreme Court), he made perhaps the most solid social argument for extending state recognition of marriage to same-sex couples.
In his landmark 1989 essay, “Here Comes the Groom,” what he called a “socially conservative” argument for gay marriage, Andrew claimed the institution is “good for gays” as it “provides role models for young gay people who, after the exhilaration of coming out, can easily lapse into short-term relationships and insecurity with no tangible goal in sight.”
If the experience of Patrick Range McDonald, an openly gay writer for the LA Weekly (and correspondent of Bruce and myself) is any indication, the recent spate of gay weddings in California appears to be proving the point Andrew made now nearly twenty years ago. After covering the gay weddings this week in West Hollywood for his paper, Patrick wrote me (and granted me permission to publish his comments):
The wedding on Monday touched my deeply. I don’t feel any peer pressure to get married, which I think some gays may be feeling these days, but it made me realize how nice it would be to go forward in life with another man as my husband. Life turns into something bigger than yourself, and I like the idea of that.
Maybe gay marriage will indeed promote the cultural change Andrew once (and may still) advocated.
Yet, other evidence suggests that for many gay men, marriage does not impose the same requirements on them as it has on heterosexual couples. According to the New York Times, one “married”* gay man, Eric Erbelding says, “men view sex very differently than women. Men are pigs, they know that each other are pigs, so they can operate accordingly. It doesn’t mean anything,” adding that while “most married gay couples he knows are ‘for the most part monogamous, but for maybe a casual three-way.’”
Sorry, Eric, that ain’t marriage. If you want to engage in occasional threesomes or any other extramarital liaisons, you should certainly be free to do so, but once you do, you can’t call yourself married. Nor should a swinging heterosexual couple call their non-exclusive union marriage.
With advocates like Erbelding, no wonder Maggie Gallagher (whose National Review article alerted me to the Times piece) claims “the conservative case for same-sex marriage is looking pretty tattered.”
She contends current evidence suggests marriage will not help tame what Erbelding might call men’s piggishness. Taming such “piggishness” has been one of the institution’s many purposes for as long as it’s existed.
Unfortunately, Gallagher conflates her argument with another, contending gay marriage will limit religious freedom, a point Dale Carpenter effectively demolishes in this piece, noting the problem is not so much state-sanctioned gay marriage as it is non-discrimination laws. Dale’s post helps make my point about the detrimental effects of such laws.
While I don’t agree with everything Maggie and Dale have to say in their respective pieces, each makes strong points. I recommend their pieces highly. We do need address the problem Maggie raises about gay men wanting marriage without the monogamy long associated with the institution.
If gay marriage is to have any meaning, its advocates must take issue people like Eric Erbelding who wish to redefine the institution so it does not limit their ability to mess around with someone other than their partner. If they want an open relationship, fine, just don’t call it marriage.
Those who are serious about gay marriage should call him — and others like him — on their failure to acknowledge monogamy as a defining aspect of the institution..
Please contact me if you find other gay bloggers, pundits or activists taking issue with such redefinition and I promise to link them in this post.
In his landmark 1989 essay, “Here Comes the Groom,” what he called a “socially conservative” argument for gay marriage, Andrew claimed the institution is “good for gays” as it “provides role models for young gay people who, after the exhilaration of coming out, can easily lapse into short-term relationships and insecurity with no tangible goal in sight.”
If the experience of Patrick Range McDonald, an openly gay writer for the LA Weekly (and correspondent of Bruce and myself) is any indication, the recent spate of gay weddings in California appears to be proving the point Andrew made now nearly twenty years ago. After covering the gay weddings this week in West Hollywood for his paper, Patrick wrote me (and granted me permission to publish his comments):
The wedding on Monday touched my deeply. I don’t feel any peer pressure to get married, which I think some gays may be feeling these days, but it made me realize how nice it would be to go forward in life with another man as my husband. Life turns into something bigger than yourself, and I like the idea of that.
Maybe gay marriage will indeed promote the cultural change Andrew once (and may still) advocated.
Yet, other evidence suggests that for many gay men, marriage does not impose the same requirements on them as it has on heterosexual couples. According to the New York Times, one “married”* gay man, Eric Erbelding says, “men view sex very differently than women. Men are pigs, they know that each other are pigs, so they can operate accordingly. It doesn’t mean anything,” adding that while “most married gay couples he knows are ‘for the most part monogamous, but for maybe a casual three-way.’”
Sorry, Eric, that ain’t marriage. If you want to engage in occasional threesomes or any other extramarital liaisons, you should certainly be free to do so, but once you do, you can’t call yourself married. Nor should a swinging heterosexual couple call their non-exclusive union marriage.
With advocates like Erbelding, no wonder Maggie Gallagher (whose National Review article alerted me to the Times piece) claims “the conservative case for same-sex marriage is looking pretty tattered.”
She contends current evidence suggests marriage will not help tame what Erbelding might call men’s piggishness. Taming such “piggishness” has been one of the institution’s many purposes for as long as it’s existed.
Unfortunately, Gallagher conflates her argument with another, contending gay marriage will limit religious freedom, a point Dale Carpenter effectively demolishes in this piece, noting the problem is not so much state-sanctioned gay marriage as it is non-discrimination laws. Dale’s post helps make my point about the detrimental effects of such laws.
While I don’t agree with everything Maggie and Dale have to say in their respective pieces, each makes strong points. I recommend their pieces highly. We do need address the problem Maggie raises about gay men wanting marriage without the monogamy long associated with the institution.
If gay marriage is to have any meaning, its advocates must take issue people like Eric Erbelding who wish to redefine the institution so it does not limit their ability to mess around with someone other than their partner. If they want an open relationship, fine, just don’t call it marriage.
Those who are serious about gay marriage should call him — and others like him — on their failure to acknowledge monogamy as a defining aspect of the institution..
Please contact me if you find other gay bloggers, pundits or activists taking issue with such redefinition and I promise to link them in this post.
By FETISH-BDSM-Bondage-Lite in Lite Bondage, Video
Bondage passion and love in Italy. Dedicated to those who get turned on by the bondage that creates sexual release, romance and fantastic foreplay. Two guys, tied up by their Master, see immobilizing scenes while they try to set them free. After the bondage, and after they got signs on their skin, once free they let them go to flood of love. Bondage gay - what a passion!!! This video is dedicated to all the lovers for the soft - under control domination.
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明星: Matteo Locati, Diego Sierra, Jago, Marco Colosso, Alex Drago, Iuri Nero, Riccardo Nocera, Ronaldo Ribeiro, Luca Vampiro, Giacomo Faggi, Enrico Levrero
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明星: Matteo Locati, Diego Sierra, Jago, Marco Colosso, Alex Drago, Iuri Nero, Riccardo Nocera, Ronaldo Ribeiro, Luca Vampiro, Giacomo Faggi, Enrico Levrero
The Five Mistakes Married Women Make
1. Mistake: Handing Over the Purse Strings
"Ignorance is not bliss," says Patricia Powell, a CFP based in Martinsville, N.J. By not engaging in the family finances, women set themselves up for potential hardships. Powell says she has worked with at least two clients who managed their finances perfectly well while they were single, only to file for bankruptcy after they got married because of their husbands' premarital debt and extravagant spending habits.
Solution: Pay Attention to the Household Finances
Both partners should attend the meetings with insurance agents, accountants, financial planners and lawyers, says Watchung, N.J.-based Kaye. Women should also look over monthly bank statements and credit-card bills. And Kaye recommends that couples make a list of all bank and brokerage accounts and insurance policies and keep it with other important documents, such as wills and medical directives.
2. Mistake: Losing Your (Financial) Identity
When Elizabeth Lundin (who asked that we not use her real name), now 33 years old, got married six years ago, her husband offered to take over the couple's finances. She happily agreed. The couple merged all of their bank accounts, and Lundin even gave up her individual American Express card and started using a shared credit card. Two years later, when the couple decided to divorce, Lundin learned that the couple's credit card was actually held in her husband's name, and that she was simply an authorized user. Her name was taken off that account, and she let many months go by before trying to secure credit in her name. When she tried, she found that her lack of an active credit history worked against her. She was offered only high-rate cards with small lines of credit.
According to Craig Watts, spokesman for Fair Isaac Corporation, the company that helps generate consumer FICO scores (the most common credit score used), the credit bureaus won't calculate a FICO score for an individual whose credit history has been inactive for six months or longer.
"[Recent] college graduates had an easier time securing credit than I did," Lundin says. She says it took her two years to get a card with a competitive interest rate and sizable credit line.
Solution: Maintain Some Individual Accounts
"You always want to maintain your own credit identity," says Lisa Caputo, president and CEO of Women & Co., a division of Citigroup. She recommends that couples keep three bank accounts (his, hers and ours) and maintain separate credit cards.
3. Mistake: Walking Away From Your Career
The number of stay-at-home moms has increased by 18% over the past decade, according to 2006 U.S. Census data. While you might welcome the chance to stay home with your kids, the longer you're out of the work force, the harder it can be to jump back in. Women often face lowball wages or lower job titles when they try to return to work after a long hiatus.
Solution: Keep Your Skills Fresh
It might be hard to do when you're up to your eyeballs in dirty diapers, but unless you're independently wealthy, you should always be aware that you might someday return to the work force for one reason or another. (Kids, after all, do grow up.)
So don't lose touch completely. Try to take on consulting projects during your industry's busy season and attend professional networking events. Even charity work can give you a leg up when you start applying for a new job. For more tips on re-entering the work force, read our story.
4. Mistake: Not Saving for Retirement
Many married women don't make retirement-saving a priority. If the husband is the primary wage earner, the wife often trusts her spouse to save enough for their collective golden years, says Ginita Wall, a certified financial planner and co-founder of Women's Institute for Financial Education, a San Diego-based nonprofit dedicated to educating women on finances. Compounding the problem, women are more likely than men to blow what little savings they have on something other than retirement. Nearly 24% of women who take a lump sum distribution from a retirement plan spend the money on general consumption, vs. 19% of men, according to the Employment Benefit Research Institute.
A woman spending her retirement savings is particularly distressing considering that women, on average, live six years longer than men.
Solution: Penny-Pinch Now for Your Future
Make saving for retirement a priority, says Women & Co.'s Caputo, even if it means stashing away less for your children's college education. If you're working, save as much as you can in your company's retirement plan, or in an IRA. If you're not employed, contribute to a spousal IRA, which has an annual contribution cap of $5,000 in 2008 ($6,000 if you will be age 50 or older by the end of the year). Click here for more on these accounts.
5. Mistake: Asking for the House During a Divorce
When Borden separated from her husband, she decided her priority was to get custody of her two children. So she hired the best child custody lawyer she could find. Looking back, she says she now regrets her decision to focus on just one issue and wishes she had found a lawyer who had also looked out for her financial well-being. While she succeeded in getting custody of the kids, she is now struggling on the meager child-support payments her lawyer negotiated for her.
Borden's story isn't unusual. Women often focus so intently on winning custody of the children or keeping the house that they lose sight of the bigger financial picture, says Wife.org's Wall. On average, a woman's standard of living decreases by 27% after divorce, according to Richard Peterson, of the Social Science Research Council.
Solution: Get Financial Guidance
When women are going through a divorce, they need to determine which assets will help them pay their bills and reach their long-term goals. Some women might want to consult a financial planner, says Wife.org's Wall. Too many women, says Wall, fight for the home to avoid uprooting their children, only to find that they don't have the cash flow to pay for it.
"Ignorance is not bliss," says Patricia Powell, a CFP based in Martinsville, N.J. By not engaging in the family finances, women set themselves up for potential hardships. Powell says she has worked with at least two clients who managed their finances perfectly well while they were single, only to file for bankruptcy after they got married because of their husbands' premarital debt and extravagant spending habits.
Solution: Pay Attention to the Household Finances
Both partners should attend the meetings with insurance agents, accountants, financial planners and lawyers, says Watchung, N.J.-based Kaye. Women should also look over monthly bank statements and credit-card bills. And Kaye recommends that couples make a list of all bank and brokerage accounts and insurance policies and keep it with other important documents, such as wills and medical directives.
2. Mistake: Losing Your (Financial) Identity
When Elizabeth Lundin (who asked that we not use her real name), now 33 years old, got married six years ago, her husband offered to take over the couple's finances. She happily agreed. The couple merged all of their bank accounts, and Lundin even gave up her individual American Express card and started using a shared credit card. Two years later, when the couple decided to divorce, Lundin learned that the couple's credit card was actually held in her husband's name, and that she was simply an authorized user. Her name was taken off that account, and she let many months go by before trying to secure credit in her name. When she tried, she found that her lack of an active credit history worked against her. She was offered only high-rate cards with small lines of credit.
According to Craig Watts, spokesman for Fair Isaac Corporation, the company that helps generate consumer FICO scores (the most common credit score used), the credit bureaus won't calculate a FICO score for an individual whose credit history has been inactive for six months or longer.
"[Recent] college graduates had an easier time securing credit than I did," Lundin says. She says it took her two years to get a card with a competitive interest rate and sizable credit line.
Solution: Maintain Some Individual Accounts
"You always want to maintain your own credit identity," says Lisa Caputo, president and CEO of Women & Co., a division of Citigroup. She recommends that couples keep three bank accounts (his, hers and ours) and maintain separate credit cards.
3. Mistake: Walking Away From Your Career
The number of stay-at-home moms has increased by 18% over the past decade, according to 2006 U.S. Census data. While you might welcome the chance to stay home with your kids, the longer you're out of the work force, the harder it can be to jump back in. Women often face lowball wages or lower job titles when they try to return to work after a long hiatus.
Solution: Keep Your Skills Fresh
It might be hard to do when you're up to your eyeballs in dirty diapers, but unless you're independently wealthy, you should always be aware that you might someday return to the work force for one reason or another. (Kids, after all, do grow up.)
So don't lose touch completely. Try to take on consulting projects during your industry's busy season and attend professional networking events. Even charity work can give you a leg up when you start applying for a new job. For more tips on re-entering the work force, read our story.
4. Mistake: Not Saving for Retirement
Many married women don't make retirement-saving a priority. If the husband is the primary wage earner, the wife often trusts her spouse to save enough for their collective golden years, says Ginita Wall, a certified financial planner and co-founder of Women's Institute for Financial Education, a San Diego-based nonprofit dedicated to educating women on finances. Compounding the problem, women are more likely than men to blow what little savings they have on something other than retirement. Nearly 24% of women who take a lump sum distribution from a retirement plan spend the money on general consumption, vs. 19% of men, according to the Employment Benefit Research Institute.
A woman spending her retirement savings is particularly distressing considering that women, on average, live six years longer than men.
Solution: Penny-Pinch Now for Your Future
Make saving for retirement a priority, says Women & Co.'s Caputo, even if it means stashing away less for your children's college education. If you're working, save as much as you can in your company's retirement plan, or in an IRA. If you're not employed, contribute to a spousal IRA, which has an annual contribution cap of $5,000 in 2008 ($6,000 if you will be age 50 or older by the end of the year). Click here for more on these accounts.
5. Mistake: Asking for the House During a Divorce
When Borden separated from her husband, she decided her priority was to get custody of her two children. So she hired the best child custody lawyer she could find. Looking back, she says she now regrets her decision to focus on just one issue and wishes she had found a lawyer who had also looked out for her financial well-being. While she succeeded in getting custody of the kids, she is now struggling on the meager child-support payments her lawyer negotiated for her.
Borden's story isn't unusual. Women often focus so intently on winning custody of the children or keeping the house that they lose sight of the bigger financial picture, says Wife.org's Wall. On average, a woman's standard of living decreases by 27% after divorce, according to Richard Peterson, of the Social Science Research Council.
Solution: Get Financial Guidance
When women are going through a divorce, they need to determine which assets will help them pay their bills and reach their long-term goals. Some women might want to consult a financial planner, says Wife.org's Wall. Too many women, says Wall, fight for the home to avoid uprooting their children, only to find that they don't have the cash flow to pay for it.
Follow your cheating wife with GPS in real time!
MiniTrakPRO - The Smallest GPS Vehicle Tracker available!
Sure cabbies, trucking companies, Fed-Ex and UPS all use GPS for tracking packages or vehicles but with this wicked little GPS device, you can now track your wife as she drives or walks around town without her having any idea that you are keeping a watchful eye on her!
This GPS tracker enables you to see you wife on both Street Maps and GOOGLE Satellite Maps. One-click to locate her or automatically setup your location intervals for as little as every 5 minutes for 4 weeks straight!
You have complete control over your interval tracking. Get easy to read and printable location reports plus last known locations from the logged history. Now you will have print outs showing exactly where she was and for how long.
Finally you will be able to check and make sure her alibi is actually true!
Sure cabbies, trucking companies, Fed-Ex and UPS all use GPS for tracking packages or vehicles but with this wicked little GPS device, you can now track your wife as she drives or walks around town without her having any idea that you are keeping a watchful eye on her!
This GPS tracker enables you to see you wife on both Street Maps and GOOGLE Satellite Maps. One-click to locate her or automatically setup your location intervals for as little as every 5 minutes for 4 weeks straight!
You have complete control over your interval tracking. Get easy to read and printable location reports plus last known locations from the logged history. Now you will have print outs showing exactly where she was and for how long.
Finally you will be able to check and make sure her alibi is actually true!
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