"Damn, girl, you ain't playin'!"

Word on the street is, my friend Grace liked her TAPGE present. In her own words:

This year I was able to spend a whole week in Minnesota, which was wonderful even without any snow, and I came home to my package waiting for me. I had to go into work for our Secret Santa exchange, because I didn't want to be the ass that left someone without a present, and found out that the person who had me had been fired on Christmas (fall-on-his-ass-drunk; not good). This fits the theme of my previous SS experiences ("Oh, I forgot your gift, but I'll bring it after the Christmas break." NOT), so I was pretty happy to go home and open a legit TAPGE gift.

My envelope had three items with a card, one carefully wrapped in bubble wrap, some cloth tied with a string, and a wrapped package. I undid the tie on the fabric, but couldn't figure out what the cloth squares were meant to be. Coasters? I am crafty, but I do not sew in any way and so I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do with this (cute) fabric. Then I went for the fragile bit and found a bottle of Johnnie Walker, and I have to admit I cried out, "Damn, girl, you ain't playin'!" The final package was a book on canning, and suddenly I understood the fabric - the squares are for the tops of my canning jars! The book is packed with recipes, and ordered by season, with a chapter for winter, even. I had thought I wouldn't be canning until the spring, but I will be searching for kumquats come the weekend! I took my pictures for you, and settled down to read through the book when I discovered personalized tags in the cover of the book. Now I will officially have the cutest canning jars ever, complete with my name and a darling fabric accent.

I settled down with my "spot of whiskey" and read away the evening (discovering Kerry's note recommending the dilly beans along the way).

Best Secret Santa ever.

'Nuff said.