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December 15, 2008

New Year’s Eve
What are the options? An expensive dinner out, at-home entertaining or something in between? Going out doesn’t necessarily mean going all-out…make reservations for an early simple entrée out, followed by a spectacular dessert and champagne at home en famille or surrounded by friends. Or stay in but put on a party mood. Drape your dining table with simple, yet dramatic white table linens. Sprinkle with fake snow and apply Styrofoam snowballs as tabletop decor. Power up the romance; illuminate your setting with an overload of white candles from Cherry Creek North. Take-out simplifies too…and Whole Foods can meet your every culinary whim.

Snow Etiquette, the New Rules

When the weather outside is frightful, conditions call for special forms of etiquette Imagine Miss Manners in UGG boots. Would she have worn them through dinner? Likely not. And neither should you. Ladies, it is fashionista-appropriate to wear your heavy-duty snow boots with formal eveningwear. Just park them at the coat-check where you can discretely slip on your Manalos.

Stamp your boots/shoes clean outside the boutique or restaurant NOT inside. Who wants a puddle at the entry door?

Gentlemen: Unlike any other time of year, it is perfectly acceptable in deep snow season to drop your lady friend off at the door of your destination, circumventing her having to wade through a snowdrift. Meet her where she is waiting inside the warm entrance and then, kind sir, please do the same closing out the evening.

Drivers: Clean the frost and snow from ALL the windows of your car, not just a swath across the driver’s front window. Peripheral vision is the new Lasik. And pedestrians will thank you.

Pet owners: Check your pet’s paws for salt if you’ve walked them on sidewalks covered in it. Salt can irritate their paws and ruin your BFFF....that’s Best Friend Forever’s Floors.

Shop Until, Well, the 25th and then Shop the Sales

	Thanks for the Swarkovski Crystal Collar. . . WOOF! Whatever the economy brings, our four-legged friends are never short-tailed on holiday gift lists. A manager at CB Paws, between 2nd and 3rd Avenues on Fillmore, says a common store mantra is “We’ve cut back on ourselves, but no, not on our pets.” Crystal collars fly out the door. Anything breed-specific sells. Treat Bowser to yogurt-covered snowmen or gingerbread mailmen from this bakery bonanza. If you’re a cat person, the catnip candy canes will send kitty into convulsions of joy.
	HOLD THE SLEIGH! Last-Minute Gift-Giving: $25 and Under One stop at the venerable Artisan Center on Third Ave. at Detroit solves all your last-minute gift quandaries with items from $10 to $200. Fused glass angels by a New Mexico artist start at only $16. For the guys on your list: An Oregon-based company is producing key chains ($8.50), bottle openers ($12) and picture frames ($39) crafted from recycled bicycle chains. Free gift wrapping with every purchase adds Manager Julie Hayward.
	Hey! It’s Mom’s Turn At The Wizards’s Chest, on Fillmore between 2nd and 3rd Avenues, general manager Cliff Jackson says families are overwhelmingly opting for board games (that the entire family can play) versus video games that only a solitary player can use at one time. Besides the quality time spent together, board games can “be played more than once,” notes Jackson. Settlers of Catan from Germany ($42) is a hot European strategy game for kids and adults. Stuff the stocking of the person on your list who’s big on do-overs with collectible $1 Iweko erasers from Japan shaped like French fries or a slice of cake.
	Stow Your Bag Safely Pinecones’ best-selling stocking stuffer: the $24 “purse holder,” a device that safely clips your handbag to the arm of your chair. Use it at restaurants or at meetings to safeguard your bag from being lifted. They’ll call you “Moneybags” when theirs go missing and yours doesn’t. Also at Pinecones on Third Avenue between Fillmore and Detroit, dual-duty outerwear—the season’s hit. Jan Berge, owner, reports that reversible jackets–fur on one side, suede on the other–deliver 2:1value. The little black skirt that coordinates with 10 different tops is selling better than single-service clothing.
	Ta-Ta to Taffeta Ribbon: Creative Gift Wrapping So what if the $10/yard silk ribbon that your mother-in-law prefers her gifts be swaddled in is a little out of reach this year? Top off her gift organically using natural pine cones, branches and dried leaves (avoid berries, which can be toxic). For kiddos, wrap gifts with the Sunday funny pages and forgo the expensive bow in lieu of tying on an inexpensive stuffed animal. Innovation turns a skein of worsted yarn into “ribbon” that will go around every package on your list. Recycle your home projects leftovers using fabric in lieu of wrapping paper or tucking the gift into a basket or tin. Who said wrap had to be paper?
	The Gift that Gives Twice Ten Thousand Villages, located on Third Avenue between Columbine and Clayton, is the Cherry Creek North store where every gift gives twice: Once to the person to whom it is given and again to the person – usually halfway across the world – who created it. “People definitely shop here because they know their money is going to a good cause,” says Assistant Manager Charlotte Otto. Ten Thousand Villages is a fair-trade store, staffed by only three paid employees plus 50 volunteers. This year, along with ornaments and native jewelry, food preparation packets made by The Women’s Bean Project, a local group from The Gathering Place, top the best-seller list.
	Junior at the Wheel Forget the big-screen TV. This year many dads are shopping for the ultimate baby stroller, complete with the best shock absorbing system money can buy. “It’s their little car,” says Janci Lowry Frisby, co-owner of Belly at 3rd and Milwaukee. Dads kick the tires of the stroller wheels as seriously as they do when making a real auto purchase. Baby daddies are also porting their offspring around in designer slings of reversible fabric: bright prints on one side (for mom), solids on the other (for him). Slings have been the preferred method of baby transport for hundreds of years in Africa, albeit they’ve only been introduced to U.S. parents recently. Parents are dressing their youngsters in green (and we don’t mean the color) fabrics such as bamboo. Gift of choice: Diaper bags. “Parents may not be spending on themselves this year,” Frisby says, “but they still dote on their children.”
	Shoot for the moon “Bigger than ever,” is how Kim Walker, owner of outdoor DIVAS, describes women’s Moonboots, available in assorted colors starting at $129. Another trend: wider skis, a big seller already. For stocking stuffers, reusable Baggu Bags ($8.95), and water bottles. “Looking good while staying fit is what our clients want,” says Walker, whose store is on Third Ave. between Clayton and Detroit.

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