Last weekend I went to Lake Tahoe with some good friends and you know what I got? A big, fat early Valentine’s Day card from God. It came in the form of pouring rain, magnificent boulders, a river of water streaming over our rocky hiking path, a gushing waterfall, a shimmering and misty lake, and gorgeous snow-capped mountains. He took my breath away, and I felt his love as tangibly as I ever have.
*****12/13/14 UPDATE: Congrats to Mintpearls, the winner of the $50 Amazon Gift Card giveaway! Hope this gets you one step closer to your Kitchenaid mixer!*****
I present to you The Cuppacocoa Gift Guide… aka JoEllen’s wish list! Just kidding! (Seriously!) While I think Christmas is about a whole lot more than gift-giving, chances are you have a few people you plan to get gifts for. Here are some ideas. Hope you find something fun in your price range for the baker, the child, or the teacher in your life!
And by the by, wouldn’t it be nice to get an extra $50 to buy others (or yourself!) a gift with? That coooooould be you if you enter the $50 Amazon gift card giveaway below (sponsored by yours truly with a little help from Sambla)! It makes me happy when there are more entries, so don’t be shy about entering every day! 🙂
Reminder: I am an Amazon Affiliate, so if you purchase anything on Amazon through my links, I will receive a percentage. My opinions are my own, and I have linked items for your reference.
| The Baker | The Child | The Teacher |
| $50 – The Baker There is not much on this page I would be sad to receive (esp. those chocolate-chocolate croissants). Just sayin’. For something less perishable, consider a Williams Sonoma gift card. Oh, the possibilities! |
$50 – The Child A season pass for the family to a nearby children’s museum or park! Also, I hear Magna-Tiles  are high on the list. |
$50 – The Teacher For this much money, a gift card is a safe way to go. Amazon  is usually a safe bet. |
| $25 – The Baker A very nice version of a simple ingredient, such as Scharffen Berger Baking Chocolate, vanilla beans, or  fancy olive oil . |
$25 – The Child Try a fun board game that you can teach and play along with them, such as Apples to Apples  or Sequence . |
$25 – The Teacher If she hates killing bugs as much as I do, she’ll appreciate this amazing bug catcher  *. None of the students will be mad that she killed a bug (it happens), and she can still look boss catching those creepy spiders. |
| $10 – The Baker Food packaging supplies  are always fun! (Plus, it may even come back to you ;)). |
$10 – The Child Encourage the love of reading with a good book! Toddlers will love Press Here. Books by Andrew Clements were a universal favorite with my third and fourth graders. |
$10 – The Teacher Make this! Similar to a project I shared earlier, but a little easier and probably less messy. |
| $0 – The Baker Hmm… offer to wash dishes on a big baking day? |
$0 – The Child Play with them! Teach them a game, or let them suggest one that you can join! Spend 20-30 minutes giving them your undivided attention. Kids love it when adults play together with them! |
$0 – The Teacher Like I’ve said before, a sincere, heartfelt note is priceless! You don’t even have to force your child to write it– it’s just as meaningful from a parent! |
. Books by 
*Honestly, the Bug Zooka
So. Didya find anything you like? Please share in the comments below if you have more ideas!
P.S. I would love to see $50-$25-$10-$0 lists for:
- artsy-craftsy people
- moms/dads/grandparents
- home/interior designy people
- techy people
So please share if you have ideas :).
GIVEAWAY TIME!
Come back to enter once a day until Friday, 12/12/14!
My baby girl just turned one! I still can’t believe the first year has passed! I was inspired to make the outfit above when I saw this cute outfit on Etsy. For the party, I didn’t have a clear theme, but just picked out things I liked as I perused Pinterest
More ways to keep this up.
This one is simple: it’s Internet stuff I want to tell all my friends about.
There’s a lot of Internet stuff I like– Pinterest, Facebook, www.cuppacocoa.com, Amazon, Yelp, www.DavidLebovitz.com, Twitter, Wikipedia. If a friend had never heard of Pinterest, I’d be happy to give them the scoop on it. Same for my favorite blogs and stuff. I’m sure you’d do the same, right? (See what I did there? ;)).
Here are some lesser known techy things that I think you’ll like, too!
1. The Skimm: Two people who are passionate about the news read it and summarize it for me every weekday. I get the briefing every morning in my inbox. They break it down in an understandable and oftentimes humorous way. I have never been good at keeping up with recent/world events until now! Thanks for the tip, MerryRobin!
2. Camelcamelcamel.com: Enter in the URL of the amazon product you are considering buying, and get a chart showing the price history! Informs your decision, especially when you’re on the fence about buying now or later.
Hello Dear Readers!
Three things!
1) Ack! I spent a long time working on my latest post about reading, scheduled it to post, and then… my website went down for several hours. :(. Just wanted to let you know that it’s back up, and the post is ready for you!!
2) You can now follow me on Facebook or Twitter or Pinterest!
3) And while we’re at it… I don’t know if this is allowed in blogger world, but I have burning questions for you!!! The main one is this: WHO ARE YOU? I’d LOVE it if you could take a moment to leave a comment and tell me something–ANYTHING– about yourself! Which country and/or state do you live in? What’s your blog/website URL? What do you do? Why do you read my blog (food? teacher? parent? you’re my friend?)?
THANKS! 🙂
JoEllen
On a recent email thread with friends, someone asked us to share a favorite memory from the past year. One person responded with, “Jo brought… some kind of banana cream pies to eat with fresh whipped cream once. It was delicious.” That’s gotta count for something!
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Most people who know me think I am a very positive and happy person. Many would never guess how much I tend towards being negative, critical, and judgmental. I loathe this about myself, and it wasn’t until college that I found a very effective way to combat this.
I was at a retreat when the speaker challenged us to write down 10 things we were thankful for every day. That seemed like it was going to get repetitive, fast: shelter, food, family, friends, an education, clothes… I was very much at an 8-year old level when it came to seeing the blessings in my life. But I took on the challenge, and started a blog solely for the purpose of chronicling 10 thankful things I was thankful for every day.
Last week, my friend Kevin dropped off several bottles of juices for me to try— what a treat! I felt so spoiled, and thoroughly enjoyed the fact that we were instructed to finish them all within a few days. Normally, I’d spread out such an extravagance over days and days… but hey, I had to follow the “Best by 8/22/14” sticker, right? So I gulped away, day and night, and drank to my heart’s content. It was GREAT!
Then I finished the last one, and there were no more in my fridge.
I’ve been waiting ALL SUMMER to share this recipe with you. This is definitely on Ben’s favorite list. (Dakota, you are your husband is gonna love this one!) I have been eyeing every pile of mangoes I’ve come across since May, but the stores have yet to produce the perfumed mangoes I’ve been holding out for… so I finally just bought one and have been patiently waiting for this guy to ripen:
Today, I decided he was ready. Ready for bigger and better things. Ready to be transformed into something amazing:
This mango-coconut drink. YUM.
If you’ve been to Hong Kong, chances are you’ve hit up the famous dessert place Hui Lau Shan at some point
***8/19/14 Update: Congrats to Anna L., winner of the Math Menu Giveaway! Thanks for participating!***
It seems like just a couple weeks ago I was talking about summer boredom and math games… but look! I just published the last of the fun math game series, and already the beginning of the school year is upon us.
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