Sorry You Didn't Receive the Gift that is Actually Nonexistent: A Christmas Gift Giving Guide

Do give coupons: Remember when you were in first grade and your school teacher helped you make coupons for your parents for free car washes and breakfast in bed? My parents thought they were so cute they wouldn't even use them, they just put them in the "cute things Rachel did, but not cute enough to put them on the fridge" pile. The great news is that these coupons never stopped being awesome! I still give a stack of coupons to both my parents every year and they are always greeted with "Wow!" and "I never would've guessed that this is what you would get me!" If you are good at ignoring sarcasm, they sound pretty excited. There are many benefits to giving coupons as gifts. Obviously it fits well into my college Christmas present budget, which is approximately $0.02 per family member. Another great thing is that my track record for my dad using my coupons is currently 0 for 389. I could promise to take my dad to the moon and would be in the back yard, busily preparing for take off and my dad probably wouldn't even use them. This is great because since they are never used, you can promise to do anything and never actually have to do it. Another great thing about coupons is that you can get really creative with them. It is not rare to give my mother a coupon granting her permission to take me to Hawaii, or letting my dad take me to Chicago to see a Cubs game. I have also been known to make coupons offering the service of my siblings, which usually goes over very well. (As long as "very well" means that my siblings get really confused but don't take me to jail for forgery.)

Don't buy something for someone that someone else wanted. When I was younger, I really wanted a life sized Barbie doll. I had seen them throughout the holiday ads and mentioned it to my parents, but as the financially responsible 8 year old I was, I realized it was way too expensive to expect under the tree. Christmas came and went, and I probably wasn't even very sad I didn't receive it because as a financially responsible 8 year old I most likely realized my parents were saving up for my college education. You know, just your mature 8 year old. A few Christmases passed, and my wish list changed from Barbies to things like palm pilots, since every 13 year old needs a good personal digital assistant. (You think I'm joking, but I got one and it totally rocked. I was rarely late to any play dates and I always knew how much my parents should tip the waiter.) The morning of Christmas, my little sister had a gigantic box to open. As she tore off the wrapping, there, in all it's glory, stood a life sized Barbie. And it didn't even have my name on it. I think my sister must have said something like, "Oh, well that's pretty cool." Pretty cool?!? Pretty cool!? Santa brings you a 3 foot Barbie doll with two different outfits and clips for her hair AND YOU JUST THINK IT'S PRETTY COOL?!? A gift my sister didn't even ask for. So there I was, opening up my digital planner and started my first journal entry entitled, 'Santa can Apparently Bring Worse Things than Coal, Like Broken Dreams.'

Do wrap your present in an even bigger box, and then put puzzle pieces in said box. This completely throws people off when they're trying to guess what you actually purchased for them.

Don't ever ask, "Well what do you think I got you?" This gives time for people to list off things that they actually wanted to receive from you, instead of the coupon you created for them granting them permission to do your dishes. Set low expectations.

Do think things through before giving a gift. When I am purchasing a gift for someone, I like to think, "Would the person I am giving this gift to use it to make my life miserable?" For example, my mother is a big fan of practical gifts. She loves receiving gifts that make her life easier, and doesn't really mind receiving household items. However, if my mom asked for a vacuum for Christmas, I would most certainly not purchase her a vacuum because then she would actually make me use it. It's important to remember everything is a risk, unfortunately. One year my mom mentioned she would like some Christmas-y dishes for the holiday season, so I made sure to purchase the dessert platter instead of the vegetable tray. Imagine my dismay when the day after the platter was opened it was used to hold carrots, none of which were covered in Nutella.

Don't forget to make/buy gifts for people you probably should give to. If you do, that person you forgot to shop for will probably stop by your house unexpectedly to give you a super thoughtful gift featuring everything you like in the world, probably costing 7 trillion dollars. You will then be forced to run into the other room, grab something from your stocking that Santa Claus just delivered to you, put a bow on it, and give it to your friend. Your family will be in the other room, laughing at you. This experience once again showed that my decision making skills start to crumble during pressure, joining the many times I've been walking in the dark and have started to run away from dark, dangerous animals that turn out to be people on skateboards.

Do talk up your gift if it can't be fact checked. More than once in my life, someone has said, "I can't wait to see what you got me! I'm sure it's awesome!" More than once in my life I have also explained that I have shot off fireworks or rented a plane to write in the sky, 'Congratulations!' or 'Happy Birthday!'. This is totally fine because it can't be fact checked. If someone said they never saw it, I explain how sad it was they must not have been looking at the sky because the gift was THE COOLEST THING EVER. This way the receiver of the nonexistent gift feels sad, not you, the thoughtless person that you are.

May you all give dessert plates that are used as dessert plates, and may you receive the life sized Barbie doll you always wanted.

The Little Engine that Couldn't

     Last week I was able to spend my Thanksgiving in the beautiful land of T-Rex (Rexburg), Idaho with my family. Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays, along with Christmas, National Donut Day, and Columbus Day. But Thanksgiving is by far my favorite because it incorporates my favorite things: eating a large meal, spending time with family, playing and watching football, napping, and eating apple pie for breakfast the next day. All the while, people are counting their blessings and taking time to notice what they do have, instead of what they don't. Here are a few blessings that I counted during my Thanksgiving break:

Friends: The week before I set out to drive to T-Rex, one of my car tires looked incredibly low. I've never filled my tires with air before, so my best friend Cami offered to come help me. She didn't even complain that we had to go fill the tires in the freezing cold! I also got to see my good friend Melissa when I got to T-Rex. Melissa is one of those people that makes you want to live up to your potential and I was so grateful I got to see her.

Maps: When I mentioned that I needed to look up how to get from my apartment to Idaho, my dad just said, "Rachel. You get on the freeway. You get off the freeway 4 hours later. That's all." But since I'm the person who called my mom when I couldn't find Target last week, I was pretty sure I couldn't handle driving to another state. When I arrived in T-Rex and hadn't called my parents OR begged some random farmer for directions, I gave myself a big pat on the back and told myself that I was truly a prodigy.

Temples and my family:  While in town I got to do a lot of fun things with my family, but one of the best parts was going to go do baptisms for the dead with my entire family (minus one of my brothers, who's on a mission) at the LDS temple. It was such a great experience to do that as a family, and I'm so grateful to have family around to always help me become my best self.

Birthday Cakes and Mom: Even though my birthday isn't for another 11 months, my mother made me my special lemon birthday cake because we weren't together on my last birthday.

Costumes and my sister: Continuing our tradition from last year, my sister and I dressed up for Thanksgiving. Unfortunately we were not met with the same maturity that the original pilgrims and Indians were met with. I'm grateful I have a sister who does such random things with me!

Warm Weather: When my family was moving to T-Rex, all I heard about was how terribly frigid the winters were. "Wait until your nose hairs freeze!" my brother would always tell me. Just the week before I got there, the wind chill was supposed to be between -20 degrees and -40 degrees. However, when I got there, the weather was pretty nice! We even got to play football in our backyard in short sleeved shirts. However, the last day or two I was there the weather started to get nasty again. And whenever I went outside to get to my car you could hear me screaming against the wind to my dad, "COULD YOU HAVE POSSIBLY WORSE PLACE THAN THIS?!?"

Antifreeze, Cell Phones, Prayer, and My Parents: When my mom asked me when I was driving back to Utah, I told her I would stay until the last minute possible, as per usual. Obviously that meant staying until at least dinner, so I could maximize the number of home cooked meals. Multiple times my mom would tell me how she wanted me to leave earlier, because she didn't want me to drive in the dark. She constantly said over and over again how if something wrong happened with my car, she didn't want me to have troubles in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night. She didn't want me to have to drive through a snowstorm. She didn't want me to fall asleep at the wheel. My mom loves me a lot, which is why she worries about me a lot. Every time after she expressed her worries, I would say, "That's okay. I'll be fine." Then I would remind her that I've driven in the dark and the snow, I sing very loudly to keep myself awake, and I have the ability to consume pounds and pounds of pasta, just in case someone kidnaps me at the creepy gas station in the middle of nowhere and won't let me go until I eat 10 bowls of three cheese ravioli. Obviously, I was not worried.
      I set off to Provo right after dinner, and planned to get to my apartment at 10. I made a wrong turn when I was trying to find the freeway, but eventually found the entrance. "Well that started this trip out on the right note," I said, and laughed to myself longer than necessary, because I wasn't worried about getting back. I was cruising for 45 minutes, and then my 'Check Engine Soon' sign turned on. I didn't let that bother me, because my car has a history of that light turning on and off again, with hardly any reason at all. In fact, I mentioned it in my previous blog post, laughing at the fact that it finally turned off again.
     I drove for another 45 minutes and had reached the city of Pocatello. The speed limit is slower there,  so I started slowing the car down as I drove through the city. Just as I was leaving Pocatello I tried to accelerate my car, and nothing was happening. I couldn't go any faster. In fact, I was going slower. Then my car started jerking. I was still moving forward, but it was somewhat reminiscent of the day I first learned to drive, when I would move two feet and then slam on the breaks. All of a sudden my car could only go 60 miles per hour. Then 40. Then 30. The heater turned off and freezing air started coming through the vents into my car, and immediately I think that since it's getting colder, dementors are coming to steal my soul, like in Harry Potter. The independent college girl who had assured her mother that driving at night would be no problem, and that she could inhale 50 plates of pasta on demand was all of a sudden driving 30 miles an hour on the freeway in a car that was jerking more than the Dinosaur Drop ride at Lagoon with dementors after her. I started to pull over, but as I did the car stopped jerking, so I got back on the freeway. No more than 10 feet later, it started jerking again. Fortunately there was an exit just up ahead, and I was really looking forward to pulling into a gas station and looking at my car. As per Idaho stereotype, the exit instead led me to a middle of nowhereish road, no people, and no gas stations in sight. I found a place to park and called my parents. I specifically called my dad, as to not worry my mom. However, when the person picked up on the other end, it was definitely my mom. After our hellos, she asked if everything was okay. Obviously I started off by telling her that everything was great!

Then I looked out my window and remembered that the only other thing that that could hear me were cows, so I told her what really happened. When I was talking to my parents, however, I started my car and it was acting fine! I decided to see how far it would take me, with a promise to call back if there were problems. I got back on the freeway at normal speed. I had gone less than a mile when the car started jerking again. I called back home, and my dad promised to come get me. We also agreed that my mom definitely should have warned me that I shouldn't drive at night in the middle of nowhere, because there may be problems with my car. (Obviously not. But when I was on the phone with my dad I'm not sure if it was my mother or the voice in my head that sounds exactly like my mother that said, "This is why you don't drive to Utah at night!!")
     So there I sat, on the side of the freeway in the middle of some Idaho farmland right next to mile marker 60, losing feeling in my feet because it was so cold. Just as I was beginning to wonder if I really was in a state where people actually lived, or if I truly was the only one left during a zombie apocolypse, a cop pulled up to help me find the problem of my car, which was that I was all out of antifreeze, even though I had just filled it up the week before. (He also gave me some flares to put around my car, which would be awesome if I wasn't terrified of fire. Unfortunately, he gave it to the girl who made her roommate light her jack-o-latern on Halloween so she wouldn't have to get too close. Nevertheless, it was a nice thought.)

And then, two hours later, my dad arrived at mile marker 60, a container of antifreeze in his hand. Not only did he help me get the car up and running, but he followed me for the next 45 miles to make sure we thought my car would last through the night, with the promise of following me all the way to Provo if he needed to. Once the antifreeze was full again, my car was seemingly back to normal. (I found out later that I had a cracked radiator, which is why even though I had filled the antifreeze just a few weeks prior, it was completely drained.) Once my dad and I reached Malad, he drove the two hours back to T-Rex, and I drove the two hours to Provo. Yes, I arrived in Provo in the early hours of the morning in a car I knew I would need to take in to the repair shop for hundreds of dollars in repairs. Yes, I was exhausted and had seemingly just wasted a lot of time doing nothing. However, I was grateful. I'm so grateful that my car broke down in a place where my cell phone had service. I'm grateful that I have a dad that left the house to come save me without an extra thought, and didn't even seem to mind that he would be up all night. I'm grateful for a dad who works hard, and let me know that making sure I was okay was more important than his workday the next day. I'm grateful for a mom who waits up to make sure I get where I'm going safely, even if it's hours away. I'm grateful for a mother who insisted I take half a pumpkin pie back to Provo, along with half of the family food storage. I'm grateful for parents who give me a glimpse of how much my Heavenly parents must love me. I'm grateful that I could get back to Provo safely from spending a lovely week with the people I love most. I'm grateful for all the friends that I can count on that could've come to help me with my car. I'm grateful for a Heavenly Father who listened to my constant prayers when I asked him for help to know what to do. I'm grateful for a sense of humor, so not only can I laugh about the experience now, but while it was happening, in the dark, beautiful fields of Idaho.

There are always things to be grateful for, and from now on, I'm going to act like it.

P.S. Mom, you were right.(Again)