Shopping for men can be difficult...

Yesterday morning on the Today Show, I heard a promotion for Christmas in July sales. The lovely voice of Matt Lauer (I heart Matt Lauer) told me about different stores having "Black Friday" type deals for people to buy Christmas presents 5 months in advance. Part of me started to freak out because we have a lot of people to buy for, and man, time runs out quickly. But then I took a deep breath and said "calm down, Nain, Christmas is 5 months away." After my brief panic attack, I turned my focus back to Mr. Lauer as he told me about the different places doing these sales. And that got me thinking just a bit about gifts and what I want to give my wonderful family this year.

I think I can get the support of all of you ladies out there when I say that men are pretty hard to buy for. They just are. The men in my life specifically. Now, while T would love anything I give him, I always want to give him something he actually wants. I'd rather not waste my money on something that's just going to sit around. The same with my father. I find it ironic because both my father and future husband have the same first name AND they are both engineers, meaning they like gadgets and stuff. They're practical men so they need practical gifts. Last Christmas, I gave T a shop vac. He likes to clean out his car, he didn't have one, so I figured, why not? My dad is a whole other quandry. He has a ton of tools, most of them I don't even know what they are. The man rebuilt a 1972 Chevelle for God's sake, so he's pretty stocked up. Usually I give him the standard Starbuck coffee and case of Microbrew beer. Coffee and beer. You can't go wrong. However, this year, I'm debating going a different direction. You know, keep them guessing?

So I was approached the other day by the folks at Brookstone to feature their store and write a little bit about them. Of course, I was happy to oblige because I'm quite familiar with the store and their products. Back when we were kids, after my brother had gotten his drivers license, he, my sister and I would load up into his beat up Mazda RX7 and drive to the mall to wander around a bit. Since he was the one with the wheels we went where he wanted to go, which meant spending time at Best Buy, the computer game store, and of course, Brookstone. I would always find the massage chair to sit in and would enjoy the back massager for a little bit, while he and my sister would check out the many cool gadgets everywhere. (I'm sure the people at the store just loved us!)

I haven't checked out their Web site in awhile, so I did a little searching (and pre-Christmas shopping brainstorming, of course). They have a lot of great things! I may subtly hint to T about a possible massager (you know, I do have a very stressful job, after all), but they have a page totally dedicated to ideas for your dad. It's great because I can never come up with these on my own, and I really like some of the ideas. I'm sure he could use the anti-snore pillow, but I might insult him with that one. I really like the talking grill meat thermometer.

One idea for T is found in the outdoor furniture covers. See, we have a grill cover that sucks. It really does. Any storm, any breeze, will blow that puppy off and then our grill gets all wet. And it's not like we have this amazing grill, but we've only had it a year and would like to keep it nice for now. So I'm seriously eyeing the grill cover here. It looks much sturdier than our current one.

Ideas, ideas...so anyway, for all of my loyal readers (and yours truly), Brookstone is offering this awesome discount if you click on one of the hyperlinks on my blog. The coupon code is: 22SAVE for $10 off any online purchase or $70 or more. That's a really great deal, and if you're like me, and you like to plan ahead, this is an excellent opporunity to do just that.

As always, I'm open to suggestions for gifts for my two T's for any of those of you who are really good with the ideas. I'd like to thank Brookstone for checking out my blog and giving me this opportunity to talk about them, too.

Enjoy, everyone! And of course, TGIF!