This started as your run of the mill Fabulicious Friday post, until I heard from the people over at Macy's and Make a Wish.

Macy's, Santa, and Make a Wish have teamed up to make a wonderful deal! Macy's has special red mailboxes to collect all your stamped letters for the Santa. For each letter that you mail at Macy's, they will donate $1 (up to $1,000,000) for the Make a Wish Foundation! They will also deliver the mail straight to Santa in time for Christmas Eve. How can it get any better then that?

Believe it or not, there's more! Check out Macy's site for more information (http://www.macysbelieve.com/#/YesVirginia) on store locations and hours, the story behind that famous "Yes Virgina, there IS a Santa Claus" letter, download some special Santa stationary, read more about Make a Wish, or my very favorite-make a Claus! Check this baby out; Jake and I were in hysterics over my sorta scary looking version of Santa Claus!

You think I'm done now? You're wrong! The good people over at Macy's have offered up a $20 gift certificate to me for doing this post and since I don't live in the USA or anywhere near a Macy's, it is totally up for grabs!

AND, I have two $5 Starbucks gift cards that I picked up in Utah this summer that are just kicking around in my wallet that I'd love to send to 2 lucky readers.

How to enter: leave me a comment over at my blog, http://cookienotes.blogspot.com telling me your Christmas wish-don't forget an e-mail address in case you win!

Contest is open to: anyone with a USA mailing address.

Contest closes: 9 pm, PST on December 16 2008, and then Jake and I will pick someone at random. Good luck!

Ahhhh....good intentions.

This week was so busy that I didn't get anything Halloween done. The house was not decorated, and yesterday after work Jake and I were madly carving pumpkins and putting his costume together.

Craziness, I tell you! I did have the most important thing-candy. Nobody cares if your house is decorated as long as you have candy to give, right?!?

Oh and last night we played with Koko, our little hamster of 1 year. She happily ran around and investigated our pockets, let us stroke her and feed her a treat. There was NO indication that anything was wrong, but this morning we woke to find her laying there with her eyes open, dead.

So now I have to conduct a Hammie burial.

sigh

This weekend we're gearing up for the big ol' pumpkin fest over at Notes from the Cookie Jar.

What's to come this weekend and next week.....

-how to make a skeleton from empty gallon milk jugs

-more milk jug crafts for Halloween....who says you can't decorate, save money, and recycle too?!

-how to create a headless mummy from your kid's old clothes

-I'm whipping up some chocolate thin mint cookies, at the request of readers (AND you can vote for next week's cookie)

-Pumpkin carving! Let's hope I keep all my fingers.

-caramel corn! Mmm....yummy.

-a recipe for cranberry orange compote to go with your Thanksgiving turkey (for you Americans!)

And much, much more!

So way up North here in Canada, we celebrate Thanksgiving in October. Namely, this weekend!

Lots of people travel and entertain relatives, but we play it low-keyed. We're sticking to some outdoorsy hiking, some movie rentals, and a good home cooked turkey dinner.

And sleeping in. Lots of sleeping in.

I love fall! This is easily my favorite time of year as the trees all change color and the weather gets nippy. How about you?

A friend of mine gave me this amazing recipe for Chocolate Toffee and Dried Cherry Cookies that is now up over here... http://holidaycookienotes.blogspot.com/2008/09/andreas-amazing-chocolate-toffee-and.html

I would've had a picture but we inhaled them so fast that all was left were crumbs....!

I really encourage you to try them. They are dark and rich, chock full of crunchy bits of Skor bar, dark chocolate, and sour cherries.

Heaven!