Favorites Dec 5th, 2010 – Scared of Santa Edition

I really don’t understand why a kid would be excited about santa coming to give them stuff but then want nothing to do with him in person  Every year my company has a Kid’s Christmas party at work and a retiree comes in with his wife to play Santa. He does a really great job and doesn’t take it personally when my kids fear for their lives when I force them to have a picture with him.  Afterwards, with gift in hand, my son usually changes his tune.  This year my 5 year old finally lost his fear in santa, but already started questioning if “santa was real” But my 2 year old was deathly afraid of both Santa and Curtis the Clown.

Last year, my son declared that my husband and I have the coolest jobs because we get to go to work with Santa.  I had to explain that work isn’t quite as cool and Santa’s not there every day but just made a special stop to see us. You can tell his visions of us running around dressed like elves and taking orders from santa were shattered, but such is life.

Santa is Scary and He Smells Funny – These pictures remind me of every photo I have of my son with Santa. He either is screaming bloody murder, or as he got older, he furrows his brow and has a big frown on his face.

Okay, since I did just write an article of buying a house without a Mortgage this week, I figured I’d share an older article from Want What you Have called Do you live in your Dream House? Heather is a SAHM and lives completely debt free with her family of 5.

Mom Advice has a fun home made advent calendar. I wish this article came out before I spontaneously mail ordered 6 of them last week.

KNS Financial has an article that blew my mind about how welfare recipients were able to use their welfare card at psychics and marijuana parlors. Wow. My corporate credit card has more controls on it than the state of California’s welfare card. Who’s the idiot that rolled out that card without putting basic blocking technology on it. Shame on California and shame on the card issuing company for not bringing that feature up.

Okay, my husband and all his buddies would have loved to be students at this middle school where a teacher used World of Warcraft as a teaching tool.   I commend the teachers for being creative and trying to reach the kids in an interesting way. I wonder about the claim that an introverted kid gained social skills by gaming. If I think of the stereotypical gaming comic book guy, it’s the dude living in his mom’s basement, not someone running for class president.

Weakonomics found a study showing that there really is a correlation between being Fat and Stupid. Thank you McDonald’s for making us all a little dumber.

This guy’s story is all over the internet, but I’ll feature Everyday Tip’s version of the dude who managed to Squander a $14 Million dollar inheritance in 10 years and now is broke.

Frugal Village has some creative uses for old baby clothes.  I personally like to re-sell or give them to friends but I can see salvaging some of the stained ones and using parts for quilts and things if you’re really handy.

Retirement: a Full Time Job tells us why Sex is better than Retirement.

Moolanomy shares the best High Yield Savings Rates. Yup, still pretty depressing for the savers out there where 1% is considered High Yield.

Invest it Wisely is on a tear challenging readers to think differently about personal finances.  In fact, it inspired 3 articles of my own these last 2 weeks. See what he says about 3 unconventional investment moves for 2011.

Here are some of the articles he inspired in the Blogosphere:

• Don’t Put Money in Your 401K (First Gen American)
• Don’t Save for Your Kid’s Education (First Gen American)
• Buy a Home without a Mortgage (First Gen American)
• F$&*(%&# Frugal (Ultra High Networth)
• Five Reasons To Stop Being Frugal And Get A Life (Aloysa’s Kitchen Sink)
• Scrooge Had The Right Idea (Control Your Cash)
• Top 5 Reasons Not to Budget (Budgeting in the Fun Stuff)
• Who Are You To Tell Me It’s Not Worth The Money? (Financial Samurai)
• Why I Have No Budget This Year (Barbara Friedberg Personal Finance)

And for those of you who missed our Holiday Themed event on December 1st, here are the articles that were inspired by the 12 days of Christmas:

• From This Pint On writes about must have holiday drinks with her article The 12 Sips of Christmas.
• Aloysa’s Kitchen sink shares the 12 Days of Giving
• Budgeting in the Fun stuff has a personal finance and blogging themed 12 Days of Christmas.
• Invest it Wisely bucking the trend yet again and parodying Walking in a Winter Wonderland instead.
• Every Day Tips writes about the 12 Email Spammers of Christmas.

Thanks all for your great articles, comments and visits. Have a great weekend. We’re off to the Yankee candle flagship store this weekend for a little roadtrip. It’s a very cool store that has a nutcracker room and lots of little villages all set up and there is a room where it snows and the toy store has creepy singing animitronic elves popping out of the walls and there’s boxes conveying all around the rafters so it looks like santa’s workshop.  I always wanted to go during the holidays but normally we’re too busy and it’s impossible to go in and out of there without spending money. The irony is that my cheapness was the motivator. I’ve been trying to sell a Robot Dinosaur that I bought for my son last Christmas. It was over $100 and he never played with it. I found a buyer on Craigslist who lives right near the store, so I figured that would fund my day trip there