Say Cheeeeeeese!

My father is nearly impossible to shop for.

My entire lifetime he has returned nearly every gift I can recall anyone ever giving him.

I usually err on the side of caution and choose one of three strategies:

1. Make him a gift - he can't return those;

2. Buy him exactly what he has asked for, with absolutely no variances;
3. Get him a gift card.

Dad is a contradiction: he is, at the same time, minimalist and extremely high maintenance. God love him.

This year for Christmas his entire list was:
"Raising Sand" by Robert Plant and Alison Krauss and a wallet.

I should specify his request for a wallet: Dadso wanted a black, leather wallet with little to no stitching and absolutely NO ornamentation. Also, he only wanted it to be able to hold three cards on each side AND it had to have a "little plastic thingy" in the center for his license. He even went so far as to measure his old wallet so that I would be sure to get the dimensions right.

I knew going into this that the wallet would be a chalenge but, what I did not know, was that "Raising Sand" has been atop the best seller list for months, meaning that it is next to impossible to find anywhere. Three towns/malls and about five stores later, I finally found the CD on Christmas Eve.

I think the worst part, for me, is that he gave me these very specific requests only a week and a half before Christmas. Aside from Dadso, I had been finished shopping (and wrapped, I might add) since the day after Thanksgiving. This is, to me, incredibly frustrating. It was beginning to look like I was going to have to choose option #3, when a coworker gave me a great idea!

Vintner's Cellar Winery, a new-ish, local establishment has a program called "Adopt a Batch" whereby you adopt a batch of wine. You get about 30 bottles of whichever particular varietal you desire and then, for only $5.00 each, you can have as many custom wine lables created as you like.

I was lucky enough to get in on someone else's order so that I didn't end up with 30 bottles of chianti but I did get a great, really creative, custom gift that even my dadso loved!

I e-mailed the nice folks at Vintner's Cellar three photos of me and dad when I was just a peanut:

Do you love the '70s couch?

The folks at the store liked the third one, and this is what the finished label looks like:

Aren't we cute?