After almost six years, a wedding, and a house, there aren’t a whole lot of “firsts” left for my husband and me. In a few weeks, we’re adopting our first pet. When we have some spare money, I hope someday we can take our first trip to Europe. Maybe one day we’ll have our first child. But in the meantime, one of those rare “firsts” is coming up, and it’s our first Christmas as a married couple. It also happens to be the first Christmas I’ll spend away from home.

Sure, it’s the season of twinkling lights, favorite classics on TV, batches of cookies, and pitchers full of eggnog, but it’s also the season of those dreaded soirees with people you’d like to never spend another evening with, wine-soaked or otherwise. Whether it’s an office party you’d love to get out of, an ex who insists on remaining “friends,” or a former neighbor’s yuletide bash, the Holiday Party Excuse Generator can compose the perfect note to send to the host, so you don’t have to endure another evening making small talk with satin-draped people who make your skin crawl. Check out this awesome note the generator composed for me, and give it a whirl yourself! Unless, of course, you’re one of those rare people who’s never met an invite you can’t turn down. [Holiday.enlighten.com]

Being single around the holidays can get you extra seasonally depressed.  Everywhere I go, I see couples choosing knick-knacks together, making out in front of store windows, and drunkenly leaving parties early so they can go off and do it. Barf! Just kidding, it’s totally cute. I’ve been there and I’ve had a great time getting showered with expensive gifts from boyfriends! But something tells me I’m going to like being footloose and fancy-free this winter. After all, there are plenty of reasons to be happy that I didn’t stick with someone who wasn’t right for me just so I could cash in on a present….well, besides the fact that I’d have to shell out a gift for him too. After the jump, what I’ve discovered about the grass being greener on the single side of the season…

The current historic economic nosedive has two unintended consequences. One of them is that hobos just aren’t really cute anymore. Maybe they never were. All these years I thought they were adorable dirty clowns, carrying little bundles tied to the ends of sticks. I never realized those bundles were full of cans of beans and broken dreams.

The other consequence of what economists are finally calling a “recession” (and what I call “The Brokepocalypse”), is that we’re all, well, broke. Tightening our purse strings, gettin’ all thrifty, learning how to turn a bag of 99 cent ramen noodles into a gourmet feast. A lot of us are laid-off, and my heart goes out to you. As a society, we’ve all been living off credit, from the government to corporations to yours truly. It’s just the way it is. The manic pursuit of the Good Life has officially been detoured.

And this is the season to question what exactly is the good life? Is it expensive handbags and marked-up bottles of vodka at the clubs and the absolute coolest gizmo that will be obsolete before you take it out of its box? This holiday you should ask yourself: Which came first, the people you love or the big price tag on the gift?

So, this morning Simcha professed her hatred for holiday music, sadly, one of my greatest guilty pleasures. But I think I’ve found just the thing to open her eyes to the joys of festive tunes! For some unknown reason, adorably nerdy-hot actor John Krasinski (Jim on “The Office”) stopped by an Aimee Mann show and did a duet with her on “Winter Wonderland.” And, yes, it’s true. Nerdy-hot guys get even nerdier and hotter when they sing…Christmas carols. [Via BuzzFeed]

I can’t stand Christmas music.  After a weeks worth of shopping I’m already up to my eyeballs in “Silver Bells” and “Feliz Navidad.” Don’t get me wrong, I love buying gifts, but if I hear one more light jazz rendition of “Jingle Bell Rock,” I’m going to lose it. There are plenty of non-Christmas celebrating shoppers out there, slowly being tortured by seasonal elevator music—the Heebs, Muslims, Buddhists, Jehovah Witnesses, Atheists, Taoists….well, you get the point. Still, since it’s our job, if we have the means, to help boost the economy, I would just like to suggest some tracks to the retailers out there, unless they want me to do my holiday shopping at home—where I can blast my own awesome non-denominational music. Now, let’s get in the mood to spend with these hot holiday-free jams that revel in consumerism…

The December holidays are a time of romance and sex, right? Whimsical jewelry commercials, love-themed Christmas songs and invitations on pretty paper to parties for “you and a guest” all add up to a magical time of year… except if you’re single.

There’s nothing like the smell of fresh pine this time of year, but having a real Christmas tree comes with some downsides: those freaking needles get everywhere, the thing needs to be watered even though it’s dead, and none of us have the space for a 9” beauty. The fake options below will make your apartment festive this December without the drawbacks. Just make sure to buy a pine-scented candle so you don’t miss out on the smell of Douglas Fir.

Do you ever notice how conversation always turns to sex and relationships when you’re having cocktails with friends? It’s probably because your inhibitions get drowned the more you drink. Well this board game is the perfect accompaniment to cocktail convo because it tests your sex IQ and asks funny personal questions. Plus, you’ll learn a lot about your friends’ personal lives when you try to guess their answers to some really tantalizing trivia. [$14.99, Amazon.com]

We’re self-proclaimed beauty junkies, so one of our favorite gifts to receive and give is a Sephora gift card. But since there’s no joy in unwrapping a gift card, we put together this list of beauty products we’re just dying to receive…Oh, and give. Plus there are some great ideas for your guy, so he’ll start caring for his lovable mug.

Though I can’t remember his name, I can still recall the face of the guest who whipped out a handful of Ziploc bags as a long ago Christmas party was winding down. “Do you mind if I take some of these cheese puffs home with me?” he half-asked, shoving the leftover snacks into a bag. “What about these tortilla chips?”

Too shocked to do anything but nod, my acquaintance left with a stash of snacks and a permanent place on my own personal Do Not Call list.

When I first started writing this piece, I figured it would be about not making a fool of yourself at the company holiday party. But the more I researched, the more it seemed that pretty much every business on the planet has cancelled their annual soirees. I get that you can’t lay off half your staff and then ply the other half with six-foot sandwiches and cheap booze, but I think a lot of companies are using this financial downturn as an excuse. Bah humbug!

On Monday it was finally made official: the U.S. is definitely in a recession. While most of us have been feeling the pinch for a while, the holidays bring an added challenge to stretch our dollars as far as we can. The good news is that from gift giving to decorating and dressing for parties, there are definitely stylish ways to celebrate this time of year on a tight budget. Learn a few tips after the jump.

We’re just going to come right out and say it: staying in a bad relationship just because you a) don’t want to be alone for the holidays or b) don’t want to be the bad guy/gal who dumped someone during the most wonderful time of the year is a waste. Why wait until after the new year (or worse yet, after Valentine’s Day) to make a change and move forward? It’s not going to be easy, but isn’t it better to be free than to be dreading an impending breakup for the next couple of weeks or months?

Here are our top 5 highly unscientific reasons you should break up before January 1st:

Just because your pockets are hurting doesn’t mean you have to give crappy gifts. After the jump, 25 totally sweet gifts for $25 and under. We might just buy them for ourselves. For fun.

It’s always tricky when the holidays arrive and you’re in a relatively new relationship. What do you get your boy or girlfriend after just a month? Or what about that odd three-month mark? You don’t want to go overboard, but you don’t want to under-buy and look like the thoughtless cheapo. Well, we’re here to help – we’ve compiled a list of holiday gift ideas for guys and girls at each of the pivotal relationship points.

Have you ever gotten a gift so ugly, so utterly not you, that you can’t even fake a kind response? That’s how I felt opening a box that contained the silver-plated, faux-turquoise-encrusted bracelet my then boyfriend gifted me one Christmas.

“Santa Fe fake?” I asked, slipping it over my hand, and removing it before it could turn my wrist green. I could tell that he was a little hurt, but c’mon. I had fire engine red hair and a pierced nose. He may as well have given me a beige mu-mu and a hairnet.

How does that old adage go? ‘Tis better to give than to receive? Generally, I disagree with this sentiment (after all, who doesn’t like presents?), but in that particular case it rang true. Gift giving and receiving introduces a whole new element of tension in even the most established relationships. Will it fit her? Do you think it’ll cover his bald spot? So I’m here to help you negotiate this treacherous terrain by making sure you don’t do the wrong thing.

Last night, “A Colbert Christmas” made even this Jew get into the holiday spirit.  The hilarious cheeseball musical spoof featured Feist, Willie Nelson, Elvis Costello, Jon Stewart, Toby Keith and some smooth dance moves by the big man himself, Stephen Colbert. While it might be hard to stand out in that crowd, John Legend, dressed as a sexy park ranger, got me in the mood to be a gift that keeps on giving. What is it about a man in uniform?! John did a hot little number about eggnog with nutmeg.  With funny lines like, “Serving eggnog without nutmeg is like serving turkey without a duck and a chicken inside it” and seductive lyrics like, “it’s pure, and it’s fine, and it’s ready to grind,”  let’s just say I’d like to put the “Mmm..” in his nutmeg. [Colbert Nation]

You cannot go wrong buying someone a book as a gift—um, unless they’re illiterate of course. After the jump, 15 books we totally fell for, that would make just about anyone with a shelf happy.