Oh no! Here comes Marcia with her Christmas basket.

I am a happy woman. I just got back from the fabric store and I’m deep in thought as to what I’ll be making for Christmas. Every year, my poor work friends are besieged and beset and not so besotted with me following them around asking which gift they want to choose from my basket.

When I was younger, I made almost all of my presents. I remember one Christmas when I made my mother, my grandmother, and my three aunts flannel granny gowns. For some reason, they never seemed to wear them when I was around. Another Christmas, I created nativity scenes out of dough made from flour, salt, and water. I sculpted Mary, Joseph and Sweet Baby Jesus in his manger, and even a few sheep to graze around and then gaze upon the little baby. I was really proud of those Tiny Tidbits of Godly Art until my preacher asked why I’d included turtles along with the Holy Family.

I’ve made lots of ornaments, including little fabric baskets with reindeer poking their antlered pom-pom heads out to see the world, knitted wreaths with yarn accessories, surprisingly heavy angels made of tiny flower pots with Christmas balls for the heads and moss for hair, little what-nots made from leftover potpourri that looked like miniature dirt dauber nests, and perhaps my strangest creations ever: tiny hanging pillows with pictures of Paris on them. There were very good reasons for all of the brilliant creations mentioned above, although I can’t think of any of them right now.

Last year, I hit the jackpot when I figured out a way to make festive coaster sets out of fabric and polyfill layering. I even came up with a great tag, which read “Roller Coasters: Putting the Fun Back into Drinking!” If that doesn’t say Let's celebrate the birth of Christ, I don’t know what does.

When one of my gifts turns out to be even more lame than usual, I tend to write a poem to go with it. One year, I gave my colleagues muscadine jelly from grapes I’d gotten free from a friend. Although home-made jelly would normally be a great gift, I managed to screw up the recipe somehow. But, that didn’t stop me. I just added a poem, which, I’m sorry to tell you, I can’t find. But I do remember it ended with something like this:

Since I had no money to splurgil,

I got my grapes from Virgil.

The poem would have been much easier to write if my friend’s name had been Bob or Frank. But, then again, real art is never easy.

Back to this year. Since I’m finally seriously considering retirement, I’m thinking this may be my last year for workplace gift giving. I’m definitely leaning toward ornaments again, this time trees stuffed with chopped balsam I ordered from some place that actually grows balsam trees. Maine, I think. 

I hope my latest gifts turn out okay, but if they don’t, I have a poem percolating in my head. I just haven’t yet figured out what rhymes with balsam. Wait a minute.  How about this?

My trees are awesome.

They smell like balsam.

As to what I’ll do when I no longer have work friends to entertain and annoy with my baskets of home-made gifts, I’m considering  giving to those who may not have access to a lot of Christmas cheer. So, if you see the pimps and pros from the corner hightailing it down Ponce de Leon Avenue in midtown Atlanta some time around the next Yuletide Season, just know that what they're screaming isn't "Cheese it! The cops!" Instead, it will be “Oh no! Here comes Marcia with her Christmas basket!"

Genius

My need to create greatly exceeds any talent I might have in the arts, which may explain this blog. I have some really innovative ideas and a pretty good work ethic. It's the honing of skills that never seems to happen. Another problem is that I'm also lacking in anything anywhere approaching taste. Innovation without good taste usually leads to something that looks like, well, like my last creative project, which was an adaptation to my Aunt Madge's lovely oil painting of a serene river scene. I tried to "spiff it up for the new millennium" by adding edgy colors (in acrylic) and abstract embellishments. It now hangs proudly in my sun room as a testament to my many gifts.

My interior decorating endeavors led to my selling the home I'd lived in for 13 years for LESS than I'd paid for it, an almost unknown occurrence before the real estate bust. As my house went on the market, one wall of my guest room had been painted a shiny copper color; a wall of my kitchen was covered with torn strips from paper bags; the ceiling in my bathroom was sponge-painted green; and a door in my dining room sported a rendition of someone else's garden, partially done in magic marker. I continue to be nonplussed as to why any of the above was a problem for buyers.

My creative edge has, at times, caused me to be socially ostracized. My brief tenure as a member of the Warner Robins Junior Women's Club was made even more abbreviated because of a minor faux pas having to do with the annual Christmas Wreath Sale. Each year, members were charged with creating a wreath to be sold for charity at our local mall, and then with working the booth for a specified number of hours. When I arrived at the sale site with my cinnamon-colored wrapped wreath, adorned with what looked like a homeless woman, I noticed that burnt orange wasn't as popular a color for Christmas as it had been for Thanksgiving. Somehow, while I was happily wrapping my styrofoam circle with tangerine-hued velvet ribbon, other members were adorning their wreaths with Della Robbia fruits and red and green plaid trimmings. Needless to say, my one-of-a-kind creation was the only wreath left on the rack at the end of the day. As they say in merchandising, "We couldn't even give it away." I wasn't ever actually banished from the club but nothing was the same in the new year.

Speaking of the holidays, friends and family run for cover when sleigh bells start to ring, as I am quite apt to make their Christmas gifts my own self. I tend to have a theme each year. One year it was tiny baskets, this year, coasters. The common thread is the tacky factor.

Last year, I knitted hats for everyone in my family, a gift they eschewed immediately upon opening. Please see the attached photo if you think I'm exaggerating. While the adults seem just mildly amused, my granddaughter, Cami, appears to be seething under her placid countenance. What? She doesn't think the jester's hat goes with the skull and crossbones bib?


Then there are the money-making schemes involving artistic endeavors. I've drawn pencil portraits for money; I've sewn all manner of folksy accoutrements for money; I've cut up and stuffed vintage doilies to make pillows for money; and now, I'm writing this blog. Speaking of money, you may have noticed the ads on my blog and how they seem to correlate in some way to my posts. Just how smart ARE those Google boys? The theory is that I will get a certain amount of cash (I think it's 2 cents) each time someone clicks on one of the ads. When I was setting up the blog, I had to agree not to click on the ads myself, therefore earning money for me and not for the advertisers. I was also asked to tell you guys (my many readers) not to click on an ad unless you are seriously interested in, say, purchasing sundresses in January or finding a Toyota dealer near you. So, here goes: Unless you really need a lawyer to get you out of a DUI (and if you do, I would strongly suggest your reading something other than my blog), don't click on the DUI ad. Apparently, you all are already following the rules as, so far, I have earned zero cents.

It's funny how things work out. As a little girl, my dream was to be an artist. I even majored in Art for one college quarter. As life happened, though, I tended to take the more pragmatic route at each turn. But the spark is still there, and I'm just glad that, now, I can laugh about my few successes and many failures. And, more importantly, I'm happy I no longer feel the need to try to fit into a group that doesn't understand and appreciate my genius, or, at least, accept me in spite of my flaws and pretensions. That, in a hand-knit, acrylic-painted, doily-covered nutshell, is what makes being "past my prime" pretty great.