Random: The Holiday Season Already?

By Blushingantics @BlushingAntics
Hello! I figured I would write about something other than makeup or skin care today. I have a little disclaimer, though. I celebrate Christmas, so I will be talking about Christmas rather than the other holidays that fall around this time of year.
Is it just me, or does the holiday season begin earlier and earlier each year? I really enjoy Christmas and some of the tastier things that come with winter (to name a few: eggnog, gingerbread, and my grandmother's version of Chex mix), but I feel like it is becoming more and more about the consumerist side of things. I'm not going to say I don't appreciate the gifts that my family and friends give me, but I don't want that to become the only thing people associate with Christmas in future generations. Oh, and I associate Christmas with winter and ice and I hate driving on ice and being cold in the winter, so thinking about icy roads in the middle of November is something I do not enjoy.
And to contradict what I just said, I thought it would be fun to share what I want for Christmas this year! Most of the things I want are on the practical side, I would say. Sure, there are bigger makeup items that I've been lusting after (Urban Decay's Naked 2 palette, a bigger bottle of my staple LaVanila perfume, etc), but overall I think my list has a lot of things that I can really get good use out of, so here it is:
  • Cookbooks! One of my professors made fun of me for this, but I want to cook more when I am at home and I want easy recipes that are also healthy. Then I want to move on to more complicated recipes and yes... I want to learn to make sushi. I know that you can go online and pick recipes with ease, but it's nice having everything in one place for once. I suppose once I have a nice enough collection of recipes I've found online then I'll probably just print them all off, laminate them, and put them in a binder... but until then, I am looking at cookbooks that follow specific themes.
  • Money. To be specific, my parents usually have a set amount they spend on Christmas. I said "hey, put it in my savings account!" and they responded with "that's not FUN, give us a real list!" - I dunno, I would rather plan ahead and have that money for things like furniture for my first apartment.
  • Gift cards. Particularly for clothes. I haven't bought more than maybe 2 pairs of jeans and 3 pairs of shoes since last year. I've also accumulated some t-shirts with my school's name and logo on it, but as I like to keep some parts of my life private, I can't exactly make videos if most of my tops have my school's name. Plus I need to work on building a wardrobe that is more acceptable for the workplace as my first internship will be in the summer.
  • New camera. This is so I can take higher quality pictures and videos (I know I haven't recorded a video in a long time, but I want to at some point because I just worked on this group video project and I realized that I miss recording and editing videos and that I shouldn't be so particular about things).
I'm sure there are other things I have mentioned to my family in passing, but these are the things that came to mind.
What do you want for Christmas/the next event in your life in which you would be receiving a gift?
PS- hopefully you don't mind that I want to start writing more personal blogs on occasion. I love makeup, but changing the subject matter of my writing is also fun.