Santa!! First of all, I KNEW IT WAS YOU!! I saw a post about a week ago about someone shipping their gift out to NC, and just knew that they were gonna be for me. I just knew! Mostly because I HAD TO HAVE that rat wrapping paper!!

Fast forward to a long week of the postal service not getting around to updating the tracking or anything, and I’m driving back from the mountains with my mother. The second 6 hour road trip day in two days. I’m beat, BUT I see that I have a surprise waiting for me!

So I get home, and lo, I open the box and that adorable, amazing, majestic ratto is peeking back and me and I just about die. Seriously, Santa, you could have just sent all the wrapping and I’d have been happy! I am 100% framing this rat drawing as part of my gift, so thank you Santa’s fiancée who did all of the art!

I carefully unwrapped and de-taped the first parcel and revealed: BATH BOMBS! I’m so excited!! I tried to give my Santa a lot of different info to go off of so that they could have a variety of paths to take, and one thing I mentioned was that I love relaxing with a nice bath and maybe a little fan fiction. Hah. So I am definitely going to use these as Santa recommended to de-stress from the holidays! A nice tea, one of these babies, my iPad, and you got a nice stew going! Wait...

Next, I moved on to the gift wrapped with the cute little pine sprig. I love it. Again, I was careful to de-tape the artwork before digging in to the gift. A LIL RAT HARNESS! All festive and utterly adorable with its little bow. I told my Santa that I’m the proud mom of four rat boys. My co-rat mom and I have a lot of trouble keeping one of the boys on the couch at couch time, so we’d wondered if a harness like this might help. How did you know, Santa!?

Santa also mentioned later in his letter that he would like to request a photo of one of our babies in particular in this new getup, because they share a name. As soon as I get back to them in Florida I’ll do my best to get Dean to pose for a photo for you, Santa! He will be thrilled, I am sure.

I HAD to dig into the gift wrapped with some Harry Potter flair next, of course (and yes, Santa, please let your fiancée know that I noticed the Deathly Hallows as snowflakes when I first saw the post!!). Inside was a beautiful (and giant!) Hufflepuff banner to show my house pride! I love it, and I might even have to customize it with a beaded fringe or something.

The excitement was nearly up, but I still had one last gift to open. It was wrapped with a festive snow globe with a little house nestled among some trees. Adorable, but I didn’t make the connection quite yet. I unwrapped the gift and out popped Cabin in the Woods!

I’d mentioned to Santa that I spent a lot of October trying to watch as many scary movies as possible. Santa wrote in his letter that he wasn’t a big fan of scary movies, but that Cabin in the Woods was his favorite. Well, Santa, I just have to tell you... MINE TOO!! And I didn’t already own it!! We both must have excellent taste, Santa. Horror, comedy, tropes, world building, Chris Hemsworth, and a MERMEN!? How could you go wrong?

So then the wrapping paper made sense, too!

Lastly, Santa included a lovely personal letter, which is honestly one of my favorite parts of this exchange. He introduced himself and his fiancée (the artist extrordinare) and told me a bit about them selves and why he picked the gifts that he did. It made me really happy!

Thank you so much, Santa! Your gift is a big hit and I want to thank you and your fiancée so much for sending me some holiday cheer!