Holiday Gift Guide for 2009 – err, I Mean 2008

by :: Cate

I have a confession.

A month ago – heck, even a week ago – I had grandiose plans of creating a 2009 Holiday Gift Guide for the Culturally Curious. Kinda like last year’s Cultural Gift Guide but, you know, more grandiose.

But now it’s December 22.

I still have 2 days of work ’til I’m on vacation (I can’t complain…I used most of my days to go to FAAPI in Argentina in September!). I still need to send our holiday cards (I ordered them just before Thanksgiving in November!). And if I don’t get my gift-giving act together, I’m going end up shopping my house, rather than an actual store, for my husband’s Christmas gift. (Hmmm…do you think he’d like an pack of hot pink post-it notes?)

And…if you’re my friend on facebook you know that I just got my hair chopped off. Which resulted in me spending far too long in front of the mirror brushing, teasing, straightning, gelling, and scrunching. (I’m pretty ok with my new look now.)

Can you feel the drama?

Wait. There’s more!

Here’s the thing: right now I’m more drawn to spending some downtime with my family, rather than my laptop. So, if you haven’t figured it out by now, I didn’t create a grandiose 2009 Holiday Gift Guide for the Culturally Curious. Or any 2009 Gift Guide.

In the grand scheme of things, it’s not a big deal, I know. You might not even remember that I mentioned it at the end of November. I think I’m writing this more for myself than anything else. To justify to myself that I can step away from the computer for a few days and instead of being productive, I can be relaxed, creative, spontaneous…I can just be.

Not that I can’t be relaxed, creative, and spontaneous and still knock everything off my to-do list every day…I guess the thing is that I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about the things that important to me. Doing intercultural work is my passion and my little contribution to making the world more peaceful. My job, my work with SIETAR-NC, the SIETAR-USA conference, and CulturallyTeaching – these things are absolutely important to me. But so is my husband. My family. My house. Even my cat.

Oh my. I sound like an adult talking about work/life balance, don’t I?

Hmmm…I know there’s culture in this conversation. Is the work/life balance thing something people in other countries talk about as much as we do in the U.S.?

Anyway. I’m rambling. Here’s the deal.

Instead of posting a Gift Guide for 2009, I’d like to direct you to last year’s super awesome guide to 7 Holiday Gift Ideas for the Culturally Curious (Each for $20 or Less).

Since I wrote this just after starting CulturallyTeaching, when we had exactly 3 readers (me, Anamaria and Pamela), I think it’s safe to assume that it will be new to you.

Also –

CulturallyTeaching will be on vacation until January 2010. Anamaria has a full house of relatives, Pamela just wrapped up the school year and is enjoying summer vacation, and I will be eating chocoate and pondering the meaning of life.

In addition to taking some time to just chill, we’re also working on several behind-the-scenes website-related projects. You may have already noticed a few of the layout changes. We’ve got several other new things in store for 2010.

But don’t worry. Even though we’ll be on vacation, CulturallyTeaching’s autopost feature will be working hard reposting favorite articles from 2009. We’ll be back to posting new and exciting things on January 4, 2010.

Happy Holidays and see you in 2010!

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