Hello Everyone, It's Joan again. Just want you to know that our stores/resources are having some spectacular end of season sales. Too good to pass up. In some cases, they are offering 75% off the original price. Click "Resources" in the upper left of Shopsicle's home page, and go into "Sur La Table", "Red Envelope", "Hammacher Schlemmer", and "Bose". As a matter of fact, all of our resources are having great sales. You can save money by shopping now for next Christmas, or birthdays that are coming up. Happy hunting! J

Hello again everyone. Want to make sure that all of our Shopsicle customers are aware of the fact that Shopsicle is a directory and information web site. We represent an assortment of fantastic retail merchants whose products we endorse. We represent only well known and highly reputable companies. When you click "to purchase" any item that we have profiled, you are taken to the merchant's website and you provide that merchant, (for example, Hammacher Schlemmer or Red Envelope or Design Within Reach) with your credit card information. Shopsicle does not take credit card information. Best regards, Joan

Hi everyone, It's Joan again. New beginnings abound. We're getting Shopsicle ready for February. We're in the process of changing our home page, and introducing some great new accessories. We appreciate your patience.

By the way, it makes us very happy to hear from you, so please email us your suggestions and thoughts. If you have a design query, feel free to ask for our opinions as well. We want to be as informative as possible answering your home design questions. If there is a subject you would like for us to address in our articles and newsletters, just let us know. Email us at saloomey@shopsicle.com or simply add a comment to this blog. Have a wonderful day. Joan

Dear Friends,

What a whirlwind holiday it has been for us. First of all, our computer crashed, thus setting us back in our work and causing us to lose a few files. Ugh! What a nuissance! Never happened to us before. Back up all your files, folks. We keep excellent hard copy files, so we really didn't lose anything but our own time. That's a blessing.

Because of the interruption, we are late with our January newsletter. Please forgive. The good news is that you will have the January 2007 newsletter very soon, hopefully in the next week. Thanks for your patience.

Hope you all had a jolly Christmas and Channukah. Despite the computer problem, we had a great time with friends and family. Christmas Eve is the big event in our household. We get together in a large group, sing and carry on and eat a lot. The kids open gifts from family members on Christmas Eve, and Santa comes when the kids go to sleep.

Dear old Santa leaves even more gifts from Mom and Dad. Wouldn't it be great to be a kid again? I'll never forgive my friend Gail Morris for telling me there is no Santa Claus. Didn't have any affect on me. I'm a grown up who believes in Santa.

We spent a quiet Christmas day with our New Hampshire nieces. We stayed in our nightgowns, ate comfort food and made glittery ornaments. We have a collection of beads, rhinestones, ribbons, feathers, cords, sequins, appliques. You name it, we have it, and we get very creative together every year. My nieces are extraordinarily prolific and inventive. I recommend ornament making parties with friends and family. Everybody just loves it.

We have big plans for Shopsicle this year. We'll probably have some spin off websites and some other surprises. So stay tuned.

Karen and I wish you all a healthy and prosperous new year.

Meanwhile my best to all of you, As ever, Joan