Le Creuset 12-ounce pumpkin casserole (photo from Amazon.com). Let’s not even look at the price. Let’s just focus on the cuteness and imagine making each dinner guest their own personal Thanksgiving-leftovers casserole in one of these. They’re 4-for-3, so…. No. Let’s not compute the price. Let’s just daydream a little longer.

Wilton pumpkin-pie-shaped pie tin (photo from Amazon.com). This seems clever AND adorable, especially for families that make more than one kind of pie. Er, not that there’s any confusion once the pies have been cut into. Still. Cute.
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One reason I love “saved items” area of online shopping carts is that it takes me a long time to decide to spring for something. Well, or else it doesn’t, like when someone mentions something and I have it on its way within 2 minutes. But MOSTLY I have to think for awhile. Here are the things I’m currently thinking about:

I am on a bit of a break with Postcrossing, but I suspect I’ll be going back to it. I already have way more postcards than I can possibly send—but Pantone color-chip postcards (photo from Amazon.com) are making me very tempted.

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I saw one of these fancy Easter baskets by chance, and now am dazzled by the idea that grown-ups can have Easter baskets too, with excellent fancy chocolate instead of the “chocolate-flavored candy” kind.

Godiva Enchanted Easter Basket (photo from Godiva.com), $85 with free shipping if you use code BUNNY.

See’s Deluxe Easter Basket (photo from Sees.com), $59.50 plus shipping, which they call the “Extra Large Family Basket” but I changed the name because I don’t want any lip about how many people ought to be sharing it.
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Already the requests are coming in: Can you bake for the Valentine’s Day class party? For the Valentine’s Day Family Fair? For the Valentine’s Day fundraising bake sale? For the class parties of your other three school-aged children? For the bake sales of their other two schools?

Why, YES. Yes, I can. I’m not going to make roll-and-cut cookies (I would rather volunteer to be in the fundraising dunk tank, in my bathing suit in front of everyone, YES I REALLY DO HATE MAKING ROLL/CUT COOKIES THAT MUCH), but I can still bake things in heart shapes. (Or, alternately, I can go to the grocery store bakery department and purchase them, then transfer them to baggies so it looks like I made them. But I am not going to get a post out of THAT.)

Wilton heart-shaped cake pan, about $10 (photo from Amazon.com). This is the classic. You can frost the cake in any pastel color, and if you can write with frosting you can write “LUV U” or any conversation-heart message. Or don’t write on it, it’s still pretty. Or frost it white and use red sugar around the edges. If you don’t want to buy a heart-shaped pan, use a round pan and modify the easy bake-sale Christmas tree cake: put it on a red or pink or white paper plate; and instead of a tree, rough out a heart-shape in red sugar. One cake mix makes two bake sale cakes.
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So I made some New Year’s resolutions this year. Some are lofty goals (”Start writing a book”, “Finish at least 16 credits of college classes”), some are less so (”Ped Egg my feet more often so my scratchy heels don’t snag on the bedsheets”).

A bunch of my resolutions are health/fitness related, which I am sure is totally blowing your mind because that is such an unusual nonstandard sort of resolution category and clearly I am a special creative person with many—okay fine. Baaaaaaaaaaa. ANYWAY, I’ve got 3 main goals, dietwise, that I want to achieve in 2010:

• Eat more whole foods from local sources
• Keep a food journal for more than a week at a time
• Make more of our staple foods from scratch

These are mostly about personal choices and, you know, seeing things through, but since this is a blog that mainly talks about fun stuff to buy, here are some of the tools I think will help me:
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I suppose that the one night a year when no one really NEEDS a special holiday treat would be Halloween, since it already features a metric truckload of individually wrapped cavity-bombs, but what are we, GRINCHES? No we are NOT.

Here’s some cooking inspiration for your Halloween evening, if you can put the fun-sized Butterfingers down long enough to spend time with a recipe or two:
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I’m not quite in the BACKTOSCHOOLOMG headspace yet, since my oldest kid is in year-round preschool and the other is still young enough to lustfully gnaw electrical cords if you don’t watch him, but I understand it’s kind of a Big Deal, getting all the supplies and whatnot. I assume preparation is exactly how it’s depicted on The Wire, where a violent criminal named Marlo gives children money to buy their school clothes, in order to create a lasting debt and sense of loyalty so he can better use them as pint-sized drug dealers? I mean, I don’t want to have to pay for these things myself, for crying out loud.

Anyway, in the back-to-school theme, I was thinking about lunch-toting products that might be useful to read about. We did a post on lunchboxes last year, and we also covered some BPA-free products—I’m thinking these subjects are two great tastes that taste great together, you feel me?

(God. Sorry. The Wire: ADDICTED.)

I’m still not super worked up over BPA, but my thinking is this: since BPA-free products are so accessible these days (and generally not more expensive), why not buy those instead? It’s a pretty easy choice for me, and I’m all about easy choices. Here’s a neat selection of food storage solutions—perfect for holding school lunches—that are all BPA-free.
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I try and eat healthfully, although god knows I’m not always successful at it. It’s awfully tempting to dive face-first into my favorite junk foods at the end of a long, stressful day, especially when the kids have been performing Tantrum Relay Races for hours on end. (The preschooler is screaming because the toddler touched his blankie! Now the toddler is screaming because the preschooler ripped the blanket out of his hand! Now they’re shoving each other! Who will drive Mommy up the wall first? This is going to be a photo finish, folks!)

Despite that oh-so-confident blog title up there, I don’t actually believe in “must-haves” when it comes to diet and exercise. Like most things, what works for me may not work for you. However, here are a few of MY must-haves for staving off that daily desire to strap on a Frito feedbag, in case you find them useful:
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Do you realize that Christmas Eve is one week from today?  I’m making a list of gifts that have been given to ME in the past year, gifts that were a success and that you might want to consider buying for someone on your list.

My brother and sister-in-law gave me several pairs of earrings from the Etsy shop Kneehighs-n-Pigtails, and I LOVE them.  They’re so classy and dressy if you’re looking classy and dressy, but they look chic and awesome with t-shirt and jeans, too.
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After some initial, ah, resistance, my 7-month-old has embraced the concept of spoon-fed solid foods. He eats like a champ these days, mowing through YoBaby yogurts, puréed fruits, sweet potato, corn, oatmeal, smashed-up muffins, and basically anything goo-oriented that isn’t bright green. (I know, I know, he should probably be eating more strained peas, but listen, I tried a bite and frankly I don’t fault him for having a sense of taste.)

The inevitable introduction of solid foods has a couple of downsides; for one, the diapers. It’s no longer a relatively inoffensive milk byproduct in there, you know what I mean? And also, the sheer chaotic mess of mealtimes, my god.

Well, kids are messy, and I’ve discovered it’s really easier on everyone’s sanity if I try and be zen about this fact and not go fussily wiping down surfaces after every bite. There’s not much that can be done about a baby who loves to stuff his feet into his yogurt-filled mouth — who am I to deny such pleasures? — and it’s inevitable that at some point, the feeder will receive a sneezed faceful of banana slime from the feedee.

Some products do help smooth the process a bit, though. Here are some of my favorites:

Munchkin Soft-Tip Spoons. I really like these spoons. They’re long enough for me to get bites in Dylan’s mouth while dodging his grabby little hands, and the bowl of the spoon is just the right size. Plus, they’re groovy and colorful.

The First Years Take & Toss Bowls. I’ve had a bunch of these bowls forever, despite the fact that they’re “take and toss”. They’ve held up fantastically through a million washes, and they’re a great size for sending little goo-meals into daycare. They’re BPA-free, never leak, and can be nested for easy storage.

Chicco Caddy Hook On Chair. My friend gave me this chair when her boys outgrew it and it’s amazing. We use it at our kitchen nook table for our 3-year-old — I stashed away the giant toe-stubbing highchair and he’s been sitting in this ever since (uh, is it weird to put a 3-year-old in an infant seat? Whatever, it keeps him in one place during mealtimes). It’s designed for travel, but it’s a great space-saver at home. I’d like to use it for Dylan, but I’m guessing he’ll need a tray — this seems like a good similar product, I think I might buy it soon.

Circo Bibs. I know: bibs, DUH. But man, some bibs just suck. You want either a thick enough fabric so stuff doesn’t soak right through, or something like these handy Circo bibs that have a vinyl backing. I like these because they’re cheap, they don’t stain too easily, and they hold up through many, many launderings.

What sorts of things do you find useful when it comes to feeding babies?