Hey, friends. Welcome back to the old-fashioned on-purpose podcast. So we are approaching the holiday

season again. Christmas is coming. And I think more than ever this year, I am just really

feeling the urge to simplify. Now, I'm not usually a big holiday person anyway. I don't know what's

what's up with that. I just have never been someone who puts a ton of energy into decorating or

doing all the extra extra extra things that come with a lot of our modern American holidays.

But maybe this year more than ever, I just want to keep things simple and less commercial and

less consumer-based. You're feeling me? Like, I think a lot of you are also in the same boat.

Part of it's just with the rising prices of everything. It feels crazy and out of control. But

also just like this year more than ever, I felt really drawn to buying less, keeping less

in my home. And I just don't want to feel obligated because of the societal norms around these

holidays. Just keep buying things we don't need or keep stuffing our homes full of stuff. So I've

been rethinking a lot of aspects of holidays this year. And of course, a big part of that right now

with Christmas coming is gift giving and what that looks like. And so today, I thought it would be fun

on the solo episode. I don't have a guest today. It's just me here in the office. I wanted to talk

through some thoughts and some strategies and some ideas and practical tips around homemade gifts.

Because I think there's a lot to say here. Not only just to give you guys some inspiration if you

were wanting to do some DIY gifts this year, but also just to kind of address some of the elephants

in the room with this topic. So should be good. So first things first, I want to tell you that I

did create a little e-book with my team. They help me put it together. It's about 100 pages. It's

beautifully designed and it has a ton. I think over 25 different DIY gift recipes. A bunch of them

we're going to talk about in today's episode. But you know, if I were to give you all the instructions

for those recipes on a podcast, that'd be really boring and dry. You know, quarter cup of this,

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