Blogger Secret Santa

This was my first year participating in Fly On Over's blogger gift exchange. I was excitedly checking my mailbox all through Christmas. I live in Canada though so things take a little longer to get to and from the states (both the present I received and the one I sent didn't arrive until January), hence the late post.

Always exciting to get a package!

I was super excited when my package finally came. I didn't immediately recognize the name on it but the return address was in Ohio, which immediately interested me because I am going to Ohio at the end of January for work. When I read the card I found out that my secret santa was none other than gift exchange organizer extraordinaire, Tracy from Fly On Over! I immediately had to laugh because Tracy had sent me an email before Christmas letting me know that my gift might be late, but she phrased it in such a way that I totally thought she had just passed on the message from someone else.
I have to include that email here because it's hilarious (and also pecan whiskey eggnog sounds amazing):

SarahO,

I've just been notified that your "secret santa" got waylaid by pecan whiskey eggnog ... and then the reindeer found a particularly scrumptious carrot patch. But never fear! Your gift is on the way, it just is a bit behind schedule. 

Sincerely,

Tracy

Card plus 3 parts

The gift itself was divided into 3 parts, one for me from Tracy, one for Kachina from Miles, and one for my kitties from Tracy's dogs. I thought that was an adorable idea! Windy and Apollo (my cats) got some turkey flavoured cat treats, suitably festive. Kachina got some apple flavoured snacks. (both kinds of snacks have been approved by their recipients). And finally, I got some Higher Standards leather care! This is one of the products that I've seen reviewed in blogland and have wanted forever, but I just couldn't justify spending $15 shipping on a $20 product. Even one Higher Standards product would have been awesome, but Tracy put together this awesome sample pack for me that has 1 small tub of the leather balm, and 3 small tubs of the leather soap, all in different scents. They all smell so good! I have to admit that I don't really clean tack much in the winter so they haven't been used yet, but I'm really excited to try them out. Thanks Tracy!

Windy wanted to smell all the gifts, even the ones that weren't for him

As an added bonus, getting the gift from Tracy was the perfect opportunity to non-creepily mention that I would be in her neck of the woods in a couple weeks and so it's looking like I get to do my first blogger meet-up. Anyone else here in the Columbus area? Shoot me a message (see the Contact Me tab at the top of this page) and we can talk :-)

Rocky and Kona are officially Apollo and Windy's favorite dogs now,
no other dogs have ever gotten them treats =)

In the gift exchange, I got Aryelle's name from Horse Hack. She wanted stuff in her eventing colours of black, white, and gold. I saw from her photos that she had lots of black and white so I started looking for gold. Gold is actually a really tough colour to find stuff in. I went to multiple tack stores to search. I eventually ended up finding a gold handled brush, a gold stock pin, and a white and gold bit-themed bracelet.

Can't forget the horses!

I didn't see the gift-exchange post until December so I was in the second wave of gift exchangers. For future years I will try and get in on it earlier so that I have more time to get something better. As it was I didn't have enough time to either order something in or do anything crafty, and even with buying local, my gift still didn't reach Aryelle in time for Christmas (sorry Aryelle!). I still had a lot of fun with both giving and receiving gifts though and I will be participating again in 2017.

All my goodies unwrapped!