“When searching for gift ideas for friends and family this holiday season,” the magazine article began, “What better way to say I care! than to craft their gift with your own two hands?”

I’m a big fan of homemade gifts, but I’ve worried that giving them doesn’t make people think I care! so much as it makes them think I’m cheap!

Last year, while enchanted with the idea of saving money by repurposing old items into something new-which I’d then give as gifts-I spent many hours transforming an old headboard into a bench for my parents. Except in the wee early hours of Christmas morning, while adding a last minute embellishment to the bench, I tripped over a box and dislocated my elbow. Thus transforming not only a headboard into a bench, but also my least expensive gift into my most costly.

But as we’re told at every turn–in spite of the crowded malls and packed restaurants–these are desperate times. Many of us, struggling with tough financial decisions, are having to make ends meet by doing such things as selling ad space on foreheads or getting Mamaw to work an extra shift doing lap dances at the Palace. For those of us this applies to (and thanks Mamaw–you’re a trooper!), it simply makes fiscal sense to pull out the felt, pipe cleaners and glue gun and give the old creative juices a stir.

Since these are the times that try men’s souls.

That separate the wheat from the chaff. 

Only the strong will survive.

And their leader just might be Martha Stewart.      

Or her bargain basement sister–yours truly.

For instance, who doesn’t have an extra bathrobe in the back of the closet or tucked away in a drawer? Well, pull that puppy out, remove the label, belt, and belt loops, and voilà! Instant Snuggie. 

Those with Photoshop skills can give friends and family members the new body they’ve long dreamt of having. 

And there’s always personalized coupons entitling the recipient to have their car washed, their children babysat, or their pets watched while they’re away on vacation. 

I wish I could get the adults in our family to do a White Elephant Christmas, where each of us would wrap and bring something chosen from in our own house, the stranger the better. On Christmas, each of the White Elephant participants would draw a number, then go in numerical order to choose their gift. 

One year, a family I know that does the White Elephant thing required the gifts given be completely useless, and claims the stipulation made the gift giving even more fun. 

Since the entire family all lived in the same small town, one relative gave a set of postcards from their town. On the back of each one she had written, “Wish you were … Um, never mind.”

Another year, a cousin with a fabulously bad singing voice recorded himself singing a dozen Christmas songs and put it on a CD. He even made a cover for his CD featuring a picture of him sipping cocoa while holding his dog. Both he and the dog were wearing matching holiday sweaters. 

I come from a wickedly imaginative family, so if I can convince them to get on board this White Elephant, not only will we all save some money this Christmas, but I imagine we’ll have a holiday we will never forget.

Last week’s column about a Thanksgiving prank involving a turkey (sneakily stuffed with a Cornish game hen to convince the chef she’d cooked a pregnant bird) prompted an email from my friend, David Miller.

“At Carbide’s Tech Center,” wrote Miller, a retiree from Carbide. “There was a long-standing prank where any newly hired Ph.D. chemists or engineers were told that the company gave away Thanksgiving turkeys. The unsuspecting marks would be instructed that, to get their free bird, all they had to do was go to the stockroom on a certain day and ask the attendant for their turkey.

“The thing was, the gentleman who manned the stockroom wasn’t the sort to be trifled with, and he’d often chew out the poor souls who came there trying to get something for nothing.”

Eventually the company, to save money, converted the stockroom to self-serve, so it seemed the silly tradition might have come to an end.

“But the pranksters were determined to continue their fun,” wrote Miller. “A group of them set up a fairly elaborate fake lottery, which was rigged to make certain their mark would win.”

When the winner was announced, the man was so thrilled about his prize that he called his wife to tell her he’d be bringing home their Thanksgiving bird. Except what he’d won wasn’t actually a turkey at all, but a frozen jug of water the pranksters had wrapped and sealed in plastic to resemble a store-bought bird.

The perpetrators were beside themselves with glee, patting each other on the back, imagining the look on their victim’s face when he went home and unwrapped his prize.

What the guys didn’t know was that their victim’s boss, John Maher (now a VP at Marshall University), had gotten wind of the prank and had gone out and bought a turkey about the same size as the jug. He wrapped his turkey with the packaging the men used on the water jug, then put it in the office freezer, where the jug of water had been. Then Maher clued the mark in about what was going on.

When it was time for the mark to collect his prize, Maher called his group together and told them how thrilled he was that one of their own had won the lottery, then he produced a camera and said he wanted to get a picture of the winner displaying his prize.

As the lottery winner began working to unwrap his prize for the picture, it was clear the pranksters were growing more and more uncomfortable over the prospect of their hoax being exposed in front of their boss.

“Just as the fellow finished unwrapping his prize and held up his Thanksgiving bird, my friend snapped the picture,” wrote Miller. “A shot of a man with a turkey, and a crowd of men with their jaws hanging open.”

Although not Thanksgiving related, Miller shared a few other Carbider practical jokes. This next was my favorite.

“Every year, when the new phonebooks arrived, a memo would be sent out instructing employees where to take their old books so they could be recycled. Except on a number of occasions, the official memo would get intercepted and the wording changed, instructing everyone to take their used phonebooks to so-and-so’s office. That poor soul who’d been selected would arrive at their office to find hundreds of phonebooks piled up.

“One year, though, the intended recipient caught on and managed to redirect the books to a senior colleague’s office. This senior colleague was well known for being a perpetrator of these events, and he took the assault in good stride, even complimenting the young engineer on her resourcefulness. The engineer was proud, thinking she’d staged the ultimate in one-upmanship. Until she went to her car that evening.

“And found it had been propped up on four large stacks of phonebooks.”

The air smells of leaf piles and wood smoke. And tastes of pumpkin pie. 

And yeast rolls and dressing and cranberry sauce.  And broken bits of candy cane. 

The still-sandy Coppertone bottle begins its annual migration toward the back of the bathroom shelf. Cut offs and flip-flops and swimsuits and diets get boxed up ’til next year. 

Coffee tables are littered with catalogs, pages dog-eared. Items circled.

The door opens and cold barges in, sending tumbleweeds of dog hair skittering down the hall, past dusty stacked boxes of Christmas decorations, ambitiously brought out even earlier than previous years. (What heightens the holiday spirit better than tripping over unopened boxes for nearly two months?) 

It’s a time of red kettles and hand bells. Construction paper chains. Nut rolls and cream cheese icing and cards from every imaginable service provider wanting to make sure they aren’t forgotten.  

And time to recall my favorite Thanksgiving prank. One I’d give anything to have thought of myself, but it comes second hand, courtesy of an anonymous friend. 

“One year at Thanksgiving,” the story goes. “Our family was invited to dinner at my sister’s house, where she planned to prepare her first-ever holiday feast. “My sister Patricia is sweet, blonde, and innocent, and totally inexperienced in the kitchen-all qualities that made her an irresistible target for our mother, who prided herself in being a top-notch practical joker. 

“Mom waited until shortly after the turkey went in the oven, then told my sister she needed something from the store.” Since they were unfamiliar with the area, they convinced Patricia to run to the store to get the item for them, while they kept an eye on the bird. “As soon as my sister left, Mom took the turkey out of the oven, removed the stuffing, then shoved one of those small Cornish game hens deep into the turkey, then she restuffed the turkey and put it back in the oven. 

“Patricia came back with whatever it was Mom had asked her to get, and we continued preparing for dinner. When it was time to eat, my sister pulled the beautifully browned turkey out of the oven and proceeded to remove the stuffing. When her serving spoon hit something hard, she looked puzzled. She grabbed a pair of tongs and used them to reach inside and grab hold of the object. Once she got a good grip on the thing, she yanked. Out came the little bird. 

“That’s when my mother, with a look of total horror, exclaimed, ‘My God, Patricia! That turkey was pregnant!’ 

“My sister, of course, shrieked–and then started to cry. It took our family nearly an hour to convince her that turkeys lay eggs.” 

Making me think how funny it would be if, this next Thanksgiving, they sneaked out the stuffing and refilled the bird with hard-boiled eggs. 

Amy is asking for patience to deal with stupid people and courage to tolerate their ignorance, “Because Lord knows if I ask for strength, I will beat them to death.”

Madeline is making a cow laugh to see if milk will come out of its nose.

Candace is wondering if it really is possible to laugh one’s ass off. 

And Karin is intimidated by the need to come up with something clever.

Karin is not, however, a fan of Mafia Wars, collecting sea creatures, snowball fights that involve no actual snow, or married folk inadvertently reconnecting and rekindling with an old flame. Still, in spite of the many pitfalls and annoyances of Facebook, Karin is still a big fan.

Although she’s tired of speaking of herself in third person.

During a recent meeting, a coworker complained that Facebook was ruining friendships; that all this online back-and-forth was taking the place of face-to-face (or phone-to-ear) contact. Since I’d only been a sporadic user of the site, I didn’t speak up in Facebook’s defense. It wasn’t until this past week that I recognized what Facebook can provide-the sense of community that I’m sometimes missing. 

Growing up, I’d say we knew about 90 percent of the families who lived on our street. We knew whose yards we could cut through, who would buy Girl Scout cookies, and who put the strangest stuff on the curb come trash day. 

The familiarity was more than comforting. It provided a sense of safety, of being cared about. Of belonging. 

Social networking sites, like Facebook, can make it possible to experience that sense of community again.

Last week, I was sitting at my computer, honing my mastery of procrastination skills by flitting around the Internet, half-heartedly looking for column ideas. I wanted something fun to write about, as I’ve been stuck in a serious rut far too often of late. I decided to pop over to Facebook and ask for suggestions. 

Within minutes, friends had supplied me with a long list of ideas. The comments generated some back and forth chatting among those posting, some of whom hadn’t met before then, but they had a common denominator-like living in the same neighborhood once provided-that opened the door to them conversing. 

It gave me a nice feeling. Not quite the warm fuzzies, since no cutesy pictures of kittens were involved, but more that comfortable sense of belonging that comes after a talk over the fence with a neighbor or when the kid from up the street stops by just to chat. 

When I first signed up with Facebook, I wasn’t all that enthusiastic. It was more to see what the fuss was about. It wasn’t long before I understood.

It was exciting to be “friended” by my favorite Camp Carlisle buddy, Martha McKenney Elliott, now a Texan; to play catch-up with my ages ago Movies 3 coworker, Todd Hensley; to hear from my long lost friend, Jona Bayless Pritt, who I’d known in grade school, then worked with one summer at Dairy Queen.

Facebook has given me a chance to know some of my former Nitro High classmates much better now than I did then, as well to see the lighter (and far more sarcastic) side of some coworkers. 

It wasn’t long, though, before the novelty began to wear off. I found myself visiting less often, and almost never posting a status update. 

Most people, when faced with an entire blank page to fill, might suffer writer’s block, but that never deterred me. It’s Facebook’s small box for status updates that makes my mind blank. 

I wondered if perhaps I was intimidated by the idea of sharing information about myself since I’m such a shy and private person, which I really am-except for that column business where, y’know, I occasionally hang dirty laundry. But I think it’s more that I’m intimidated by my desire to be briefly clever, to come up with witty one-liners or profound thoughts that will make those who read it think highly of me.

Now that I’ve experienced the sense of community that Facebook can offer, I’m determined to be a more active participant, responding to others, sharing more of myself.

Regardless of whether Karin is feeling clever or not. 

I recently wrote about a series of struggles that had me coming unglued. A recently paid-off car that needed a new engine. A surgical procedure that required the $900 co-pay up front. Both a dog and a furnace in need of repairs. A disgusting plumbing problem.

And a gross of squirrels in our pear tree.

Instead of complaining about the situation, I began an earnest effort to follow the simple advice of missionary Elisabeth Elliot and “Do the next thing.” I wasn’t going to allow myself to look at all that had gone wrong or the many small and large things I sensed were lining up, planning to jump out at me next.

But it seemed for every step forward, I’d get shoved two steps back. And then came a well-timed e-mail from a reader.

“I had a similar experience back in 2007,” wrote Jennifer Goddard. “Within a four-week span, I received the news my corporate job was eliminated, my mother was diagnosed with Stage 4 cervical cancer, and my sister-in-law was hospitalized with potentially deadly complications after a routine surgery. I couldn’t believe the mess my life had become. In despair, I foolishly asked the universe ‘What next?’ with no regard for karma’s sense of irony.

“Was it because I dared ask that question my house caught fire after a freak December thunderstorm? Lightning struck the pole by our house, traveled through the power line and caught our breaker box on fire, which caught the laundry room ceiling on fire! Thankfully (though I didn’t feel that way at the moment) we were home. We heard the smoke detector, we had working fire extinguishers and we knew how to use them. My husband quickly put out the fire while I called 911.

“If you’re going to have a house fire, that’s the way to have one. We saved our home and pets and only had to move out for 24 hours. We found cleanup of smoke damage is much easier and really just an inconvenience compared to recovering from extensive fire and water damage.

“Our breaker box was replaced and we celebrated having a cautionary tale to share with friends and family. My sister-in-law recovered from the blood clots with no lasting health problems. Not everything was resolved the way I would have hoped, but because I wasn’t working, I was able to care for my mother during her brief illness and was there at her side when she passed away in March of 2008.”

What comes next is my favorite part of Jennifer’s e-mail.

“This experience parallels my mother’s early attempts to keep me focused on the positive things in life when I was little. Apparently (my brother backs this up), I was a bit of a whiner when I started preschool. My mom made me tell her three good things that happened before she would allow me to share a complaint. She said it was often a challenge for me to find something good to share. With prompting from an early age, and now as a way of life, I try to find the good things and be thankful.”

When I e-mailed Jennifer Goddard to ask permission to use her e-mail in my column, she said her mother, Donna Reed, a longtime teacher and volunteer at First Presbyterian Preschool, was such an amazing woman that sharing her with others helps keeps her spirit alive.

Said Jennifer, “It is hard to stay positive, and I’m certainly aware how easy it is to fall off the wagon and gripe. Sometimes you just need to vent, and that’s OK, too.”

You hear all the time how a good marriage takes work. How raising children is work. How being healthy takes work. What I never seem to hear is that being happy takes work, too. It isn’t something that just happens when the stars align right. It’s an attitude that takes nourishing and shoring up and attending.

I like to believe that I’m one of the happier people you’ll meet. I can find the funny in most any situation, and that comes from having had a life that’s frequently forced me to look.

So I’m having to look a little harder this time. I know that I’ll find it.

I’m lucky that way.