Now that I've toned down my high pitched squealing considerably, I think I'm finally prepared to report on the gift from my secret Santa. I also present you with far too many photos, because believe me, this demands photographic evidence.

One important thing to understand before I get into this, however: My Santa happens to be a member of my favorite subreddit, r/Indiemakeupandmore. How freaking lucky am I that I was matched with someone who totally shares interests with me, and also turned out to basically be the nicest person in the world?

This is important to understand because the gift I received was a personalized reconstruction of a "Indie Makeup Advent Calendar" that I desperately wanted, and that sold out within 45 seconds of its listing. I got my ass whooped in that rush. If it was a real-world Walmart-type scenario, people would have died for sure, but as it stands, I just lost. My Santa personally curated 9 days of goodies, each beautifully wrapped with an adorable description on my card (which was turned into a freaking adorable little advent itself).

There are five days of Christmas left, and I have the barest, smallest shred of self control left, so I decided to do this advent calendar as an advent calendar should be done-- one day at a time, except for opening up the first four (because 1) PRESENTS and 2) well, there are 9 gifts and only five days left!).

Day 1- "SNAP! (under the post-it: So... I honestly don't remember what tube holds which items. Enjoy!)"

A Hello Waffle Jane Pawsten lip balm (which I TOTALLY missed out on and was kicking myself for not getting!), and two perfume samples from a new company I was DYING to try, House of Madame Josephine: Sugared Flames and Dulce Vita. I'm wearing Dulce Vita now, as well as a dab of Sugared Flames, and smell delicious.

Day 2- "To share! (under the post-it: My favorite tea company! They started at the Urbana Farmer's Market, near where I went to school. Love the Earl Grey Creme!)"

TEEAAAAA. Oh god. I drink SO MUCH TEA. These are my two very favorite flavors, with totally unique twists! Two bags of Tiesta Tea, Earl Grey dela Creme, and Minty Winter Wonderland. I'm drinking Minty Winter Wonderland right now and frankly I'm in lust with it.

Day 3- "You're making me... (under the post it: BLUSH! I thought this color from Baroque would look great with your complexion!)"

Aaahhh, Baroque Cosmetic's Such Galle blush!! I absolutely love Baroque Cosmetics, and this blush is hands down gorgeous. Absolutely the kind of blush that I love using all the time.

Day 4- "(For Mr. Benoit_Balls!) (under the post it: I saw that you said he was almost out of beard balm- hope you both like the scents I chose for him!)"

My husband and I have four pets-- a cat, two dogs, and a beard. We both love them all very much. He's been digging Beardology's beard balms recently, and now he has a terrific beard balm in Avalanche (which he loves) and beard oil, which he hadn't tried before and is psyched to give it a go! Both of the scents are terrific!

Days 5-9 ... TO BE DISCOVERED.

This gift was so beautifully wrapped, and it had BIRDS ON IT. Which I teach people about for my job, and absolutely love. I can't put into words how thoughtful this gift was, and clearly tried to make up for that by typing out word vomit, but Emmian, thank you from my bottom of my heart for one of the sweetest gifts I've ever received! I will be updating this as I open additional days of gifts between now and Christmas!

UPDATE: And here we are, 5-9! I'm so proud of myself, I in fact only opened one gift a day, despite massive temptation to just rip it all open.

Day 5- Beautiful beautiful Mad Labs eyeshadows, two that I have been making yes at for weeks! I've worn these twice since, and the rose gold is a perfect every day color, and the green is just in time for Christmas!

Day 6- She made this beautiful ornament herself, in magpie colors!! It is holding a place of honor on our tree right now, right at the top.

Day 7- Ah ma gad, these chocolate covered peanuts are AMAZING. She saw somewhere that I'm from Chicago, and picked up some local treats from the area!

Day 8- I feel like a doofus, I didn't get a picture of this day because I was too excited-- but I got three beautiful, crazy Limnit Lipsticks, in Between the Lines, League of my Own, and and Goodness Graycious, all amazingly pigmented!

Day 9- It is pretty much impossible to choose a favorite gift amongst all of this, but in a lot of ways the final day really takes the cake. I love magpies, and I have been looking for sweater clips recently, but told no one the latter. I feel like she read my mind or stalked my browser history, because my last gift is a pair of magpie sweater clips that are seriously freaking GORGEOUS.

Emmian, thank you from the bottom of my heart again... and watch the post over the next week or so, you might find something in it ;)