‘Twas the night before Christmas. Sit down with you family and write all your holiday traditions. It is a keepsake for grandkids and in 20 years things will have changed.

It would be nice to have you get a Personal Bucket List book to write everything in but you can write in a pad DEDICATED to your holiday traditions. Just get a new and nice one! You want to have it around for a while.

Write down:
Foods you HAVE to have.
Places you go every year.
Songs you have to hear.
Do you do Ugly Christmas Sweaters?
A charity you give to every year?
Is there some special thing your family does?
Special tree ornaments?
Re-gift?
Red and wrapped?
A card tradition?
When do you open gifts?
Traditions for the week between Christmas and New Years?
Do you take holiday, family photos? If so put them in the book. They will be fun to look at in 20 years.

Barbe Awalt

‘Tis the season for parties. With Christmas on Sunday, Friday and Saturday are prime party times. I am going to one and the following week is good too. New Year’s Eve is on Sunday too so you can party on Saturday.

Here are some ideas for hostess gifts:
1. You can’t go wrong with the Christmas Bucket List book. Something for the holidays and combine it with a bottle of holiday wine.
2. If they are in Santa Fe or anywhere in New Mexico give a book!
3. If you are visiting a cowboy you know what to take!
4. You can’t go wrong with a Green Chile Cheeseburger Bucket List book.
5. If they need to get their own Bucket List going give a personal Bucket List book.
6. Space, Kicking, and Genealogy are specialized but if you know the host or hostess is into this – do it!
Remember when it was bad form to go to someone’s house for dinner and parties and not take a gift? Be cool this yule!

Barbe Awalt

So you got a Bucket List book as a gift – thank you! But want to give it painlessly but with flair. No problem: Try these ideas – they work with any Bucket List book:
1. Throw it in a bag with tons of holiday candy. Done and fun!
2. Combine it with the many candy cane popcorns. Don’t take the popcorn out of the bag – it is greasy and will do no good to the book!
3. Make an in-front-of-the-fire gift. Wine or hot chocolate, pine cone starters and a match, and if you go all out an inexpensive throw blanket.
4. For the Personal Bucket List book put in a pen, post its, and a New Mexico passport.
5. The Genealogy Bucket List book is similar – pen, post its, pad of list paper, and any family histories you may have.
6. The Santa Fe and New Mexico Bucket List books can have a map, a pad, and anything else local to throw in and enjoy on a trip.
7. The Green Chile Cheeseburger Bucket List book needs a gift coupon to a place in the book and a can of Hatch Green Chiles.
8. Space Buffs can have Space Ice Cream, Star Trek Cards, or frankly anything space in the bag.
9. Cowboy is easy too – toy figurines of cowboys, Cowboy bandages, or cowboy socks!
10. Kicking the Bucket List is easy – a pad, sticky notes, marker, a map of Goodwill donation boxes, and obits!
11. The Christmas Bucket List book can have candy canes, ornaments, tinsel, holiday recipes and the dreaded fruitcake in a bag!

Have fun and the receiver will too!

Barbe Awalt

The stress of finding a fun gift! But never fear if you have run out of ideas give a Bucket List book. If you can’t find the right gift you can never go wrong with the Personal Bucket List book – they write their own list! Or Kicking the Bucket List book addresses end of life matters in a fun way – we are all going to die. Though not a Bucket List book per se, The Basic Genealogy Checklist would appeal to almost anyone. Of course the spirit of the season is the Christmas Bucket List book. Combine it with a candy cane and you are golden or red and green!

Remember, books make great gifts, they are easy to wrap or throw in a bag, simple to ship, and THEY DON’T BREAK!

Barbe Awalt

Thought you would like to see pictures of the Holiday Craft Show at Pius X High. The set up was beyond terrible! Sheets of cold, nasty rain at 6:30 am. But it stopped and the crowds came out. It was well attended and the kids and adults from Pius were great!

Sometimes you just have to bite the cranberry!

Barbe Awalt

Thought you would like to see pictures of the Holiday Stroll in Old Town. Jean Van Dusen took the pictures at Treasure House. It was Ross Van Dusen doing a signing for his new book – Lyle Got Stuck In A Tree for kids. The best selection of New Mexico books is there!

Make sure you visit me at Pius X Holiday Fair Saturday! Say hi! 9am to 4pm.


Barbe Awalt

Local of course!

Walker’s Popcorn – They have red & green chile and for the non-hot people – Christmas – red & green popcorn. Walker’s is made right in Albuquerque on Central Ave.

Hatch- Anything! Salsa, peppers, enchilada sauce. New Mexico is known for Hatch!

Ornaments – New Mexican of course!

Speaking of good chile – I always get things at the range Bernalillo store. It probably is one of the best gift stores in the area. They have chile products, the Range bottled items, and gift things you never see in other stores. The Range also has some great t-shirts.

BOOKS!! – Of course everyone is getting a copy – signed – of my Christmas Bucket List book. Kids get our great kid’s books from award-winners – Ross Van Dusen, Nasario Garcia, Rudy Anaya.

People outside of New Mexico want New Mexico products.

Barbe Awalt

For those last minute items on your list, come to the Pius X High School Holiday Fair. The Pius X High School is on Coors Blvd. on the West Side of Albuquerque. Head for the gym for the action. The Show is Saturday, 9am to 4pm.

It will also put you in the holiday mood. And we can’t say it enough, BUY LOCAL! It gives you a chance to meet the person who made the item.

We will be there with our books again and some truly great gift ideas. Of course, we will have all of our Bucket List books.

And if we are lucky, it might snow just a little. Not enough to slow shoppers down. For the La Cueva Show a few weeks ago, the day started out with a little snow to put us all in the holiday mood.

Barbe Awalt

PS — The Christmas Bucket List book hit #166 on AMAZON today! You can order your own copy of this book for an incredible price of just $11.90 (25% off) HERE! Merry Christmas.

I put Boofy’s painted windows in my Christmas Bucket List book last year because they were well done, happy, and very specific to the pet store. But I have to say, I think this year’s windows are even better. They make you smile!

I signed books at Boofy’s, Saturday, with the ultimate cowboy – Slim Randles. I could listen to Slim’s stores all day!

Boofy’s still has some signed books for kids and adults or almost adults left. There is nothing better than a booksigning with a bunch of really good-looking dogs and cats. Oh, of course there was Santa too!


Barbe Awalt

We have made it with 100 entries. So appropriate in the middle of book signings and a busy weekend. See the sign at Bookworks?

Slim Randles will be at Boofy’s Best at noon Saturday. Boofy’s is located at PETroglyph Plaza - talk about great! If you go on Plaza del Norte west it dumps you at Golf Course and Boofy’s is to the left of Smith’s.

Slim will be signing Ol’ Jimmy Dollar for kids and his new Cowboy Bucket List book that just won an Winner in the NM & AZ Book Awards. He will have some other books there too.

I will be there with the Christmas Bucket List book that has Boofy’s windows in it. They are worth seeing!

We will be with Santa but ALSO, if you buy a book you get FREE a More Pet Friends book. Talk about cool! Come over and say HI!

Also Pat Hodapp is at the Santa Fe Women’s Club Holiday Event on Saturday. She is signing her Santa Fe Bucket List. We are so proud of the book because today we are making emergency refills to stores in Santa Fe. We are happy to do it! Get it at Collected Works, Garcia Street Books, op cit, Santa Fe Botanical Gardens Store, Museums of New Mexico store, Kimberly’s Hallmark, Marcy Street Cards, and more!

Barbe Awalt

Go to nmsantos.com for four GREAT deals for gift giving OR yourself!

3 Bucket Books for $36 – 25% OFF!
OR
An Albuquerque Deal with the Balloon Bucket Book for $39 – 40% off!
And two other deals for kids books and Don Bullis’ History Books.

Award Winners and worth a look.

Deals only good until January 1, 2017 and postage is extra. Shop from the comfort from your lounge chair!

Barbe Awalt

Thursday, December 8, at Bookworks on Rio Grande Blvd, 6pm – a signing for the Christmas Bucket List book. For those of you who haven’t gotten everything you need for your gift list to be DONE – come to Bookworks. There are so many wonderful books that can make great gifts AND bookstores just don’t have books! They have t-shirts, bags, candy, cards, magnets, and even tea!

And if that weren’t enough – Gail Rubin will be a Treasure House, Saturday at 1pm with her Kicking the Bucket List book, and Pat Hodapp will be at the Santa Fe Women’s Club holiday event on Saturday!

But wait, that isn’t all! Saturday also, Slim Randles will be at Boofy’s Best for Pets on the West Side of Albuquerque with his Cowboy Bucket List Book and I will be there also with the Christmas Bucket List book. Boofy’s windows – they are great! – are in the book. We will both be there at noon WITH SANTA !

Come see us and make mince meat of your holiday list! And remember TO SHOP LOCAL! These are all good places.

Barbe Awalt

Gail Rubin and I, brave Bucket List book authors, will be at Page 1 in Albuquerque, 3:30pm today. We will be with Ross Van Dusen. He has written 4 kids books and has a new one out – Lyle Got Stuck in a Tree.

Poor Ross – such an underachiever! He is only the Best Book Children’s Book Winner in the 2016 10th Anniversary NM & AZ Book Awards and a Gold Medalist in the 2016 Moonbeam Children’s Book Awards. Come to think about it, Gail is a past Best Book Winner too!

Maybe I am the underachiever – I have only won a bunch of Winners in the category. I will have to try harder.

Barbe Awalt

A lot of HO!HO!HO! going on this weekend!

The Old Town, Albuquerque, Stroll is Friday night. This is a great way to see the lights, participate in the lighting of the Old Town Tree, and stroll or shop – whatever you want! Many shops have hot cider or cocoa. Go early and get a parking space then stroll. Make sure you say hi! to Ross Van Dusen in Treasure House. He will sign a book for your favorite elf! This is the beat way to see Old Town lights. So festive!

The La Cueva Holiday Crafts show is Saturday and say hi! to ME! selling books! I will also be with Ross, and Gail Rubin – another Bucket List book author at Page One Books on Sunday at 3:30pm. You can get a lot of gifts at a bookstore.

Barbe Awalt