Coffee Break: Ultra Lite Sweater Hoodie
This is always a strange time of year — I find the meme to be very true. What day is it? What year is it? Why am I so full of cheese?
In any event… happy New Year to everyone! May you have lots of occasions in 2025 to wear snuggly, comfortable clothes like this Barefoot Dreams sweater and relax.
The sweater, as it happens, is on sale — it was $165, but is now marked to $107, with lots of sizes still available in the three colors (sizes XS-XL). There are matching PJ pants as well as “rib rolled edge pants” for $128-$228, as well as matching pieces for men.
Sales of note for 1/1/25 (HAPPY NEW YEAR!):
- Nordstrom – The Half-Yearly Sale has started — up to 60% off! See our roundup here.
- AllSaints – Now up to 60% off (some of the best leather jackets!)
- Ann Taylor – Semi Annual Sale! Up to 40% off your purchase; extra 60% off 3+ styles
- Banana Republic Factory – The Winter Sale: 50% off everything + extra 60% off clearance
- Boden – Sale, up to 60% + extra 10% — readers love this blazer, these dresses, and their double-layer line of tees
- DeMellier – Sale now on, free shipping and returns — includes select options like Montreal, Vancouver, and Venice
- Eloquii – Semi-annual clearance, up to 85% off; extra 60% off clearance
- Everlane – Sale of the year, up to 70% off — reader favorites include their scoop tee, Dream Pant, ReNew Transit backpack, silk blouses and their oversized blazers!
- J.Crew – 25% off full-price styles; up to 50% off cashmere; 70% off 3+ sale styles
- J.Crew Factory – 60% off winter faves; extra 25% off $100+
- L.K. Bennett – All sale half price or less
- M.M.LaFleur – 30% on almost everything with code
- Rothy's – End of season sale, up to 50% off fall and winter styles
- Sephora – Extra 20% off sale items for Beauty Insider members
- Spanx – Lots of workwear on sale, some up to 70% off, plus free shipping on everything (and 20% off your first order)
- Summersalt – BOGO sweaters, including this reader-favorite sweater blazer
- Talbots – Semi-Annual Red Door Sale – 40% off + 25% off, sale on sale!
- Universal Standard – 25 styles for $25, 1/1 only
I have had two (peer-reviewed, academic) papers accepted in the past 2-ish weeks: this is huge for me and I want to celebrate. OTOH, I’m completely burned out and am having trouble feeling celebratory or picking something. What would you do? Here are some things I’m considering:
(1) Jewelry (possibly on a February work trip as a souvenir, although it’s to a rural area of Europe so maybe from somewhere else? I usually prefer vintage jewelry.)
(2) A piece of art for my office
(3) A week off (but I can’t take it until March) around home to indulge in some hobbies and take a nap every day
I don’t like spas/manicures/massages. Most of my favorite foods are not popular with the rest of my family so there is limited celebratory scope there. Budget maybe $500?
I think a piece of art for your office sounds wonderful! I think you’d look at it regularly and smile!
I also would pick the artwork!
(Still take the week of vacation when you can!)
Folk art from a rural part of Europe sounds cool to me. Something embroidered, or carved, for example. Take a week off, too.
A celebration is the perfect time to indulge in the foods you love that your family doesn’t enjoy! I don’t eat meat, but I cook steak for my husband’s birthday. My husband is low-carb, but he buys me chocolate cake for my birthday. The whole point is that the celebrant gets a special treat they love but don’t usually get to enjoy for whatever reason.
It’s not a celebration when the kids make sad faces and grouse about my bad taste, even if we make them their favorite dinner of butter with a side of noodles. :)
I vote jewelry + go out for a nice dinner now (no kids!!), and still take time off in March.
Do something art-adjacent. When they publish, get the cover and article matted and framed (or at least the first page that has your byline if it would be too lengthy). And maybe treat you and your SO to a restaurant night that serves your favorite food.
Congrats!
A peer-reviewed article will definitely be too lengthy to frame in its entirety. You might be able to paper a whole wall with it.
Depends on your journal. I’m the commenter at 4:35 and a former association editor who worked on a peer-reviewed journal (healthcare adjacent but not medical). We occasionally had some that were done as spreads or three pages. More typical were 8 to 16 pages. Not “whole wall” length in my 17 years working in that position. Not the point though.
Not necessarily… My husband is in math and his best paper is 4 pages. He has longer ones too; it just really varies.
A week off. No question.
This is a little silly but is anyone using the app Finch and wants to be buddies on it? I just downloaded it yesterday and it’s the little dopamine boost I need!
My friend code is —
MF6SEMWG9J
I downloaded it and added you! Maybe it’ll get me to exercise a bit this year.
Here’s my friend code: 2K3PAJET42
I added you and Tomatoes! My friend code is A3A29H3AKY.
Happy to see you both there!!
Since people were interested in my New Year’s Day open house, I thought I’d report back:
We invited 154 people, got 82 “yes” responses, 61 showed up (which is about what I expected). Party time was 10-1 and the first guests arrived at 9:50 and the last stragglers left at 5 (we are die-hard partiers around here!).
I made 150 cinnamon rolls and only needed half of those. Next year I will plan on one per person — in the meantime I still have 30 or so unbaked and about a dozen or so baked in the freezer. I also made a huge fruit salad and most of that got eaten. I asked people to “bring something brunchy if you feel like it,” and maybe 1/3 of the people did so we had some savory food, too, which all got eaten. People also brought other sweets and most of that did not get eaten. Next year I might make a savory dish myself to make sure we have enough.
Beverages: We got a case of champagne and it all got used. We got two gallons of orange juice for mimosas and only used 1/4 of that. Also had a half gallon of cranberry juica and almost none of that was used.
Had a case each of white wine, red wine, and beer, and used a couple bottles each of the wine and almost none of the beer. (I guess our friends are not a beer crowd LOL.) Oh, and we have a lot of inexpensive champagne flutes and stemless wine glasses and we used those because I just can’t stand drinking wine out of plastic cups. The helpers (see below) made sure there were always enough clean glasses and I think it classed up the event nicely. Coffee was in paper cups and beer/soda was just in bottles/cans.
Bought four 12-packs of La Croix (on sale, yay!) and about half got used. Two cases of plain water, used half. Two 12-packs of diet soda we already had on hand, all of that got used.
Made coffee throughout the day and had it in air pots and people drank a lot of it. Set up the coffee station with coffee in air pots, cream, sugar, various sweeteners, paper cups and lids (lids mostly didn’t get used), and people served themselves. Didn’t bother with decaf and nobody seemed to care. Some people asked for hot tea and we were able to accommodate although we hadn’t planned on it. (Next year we will plan on that.)
Bottom line: People mostly don’t want to drink alcohol in the morning/early afternoon.
We were lucky to have gorgeous weather and most people congregated in the back yard, where we had four seating areas. We had a lot of seating available inside the house but mostly people didn’t use it. I was afraid it might feel crowded but it never did so that was nice.
Had the football games on the TV in the family room and outside on the patio and the people who cared about that were able to watch, which was nice.
A lot of people brought gifts (mostly wine), which was a surprise. Many of them didn’t have tags so next year I will write the names on them as they hand them to me so I can thank them properly after.
I made a real effort to spend at least a bit of quality time with every single guest and I think that really paid off. Everybody seemed to have a good time and stayed for a decent amount of time.
The key to the whole thing? I hired two helpers who came early to help set up, and kept the glasses washed, the trash handled, the food table looking fresh, etc. It was by far the biggest expense but TOTALLY WORTH IT.
All in all, to borrow the theme from this year’s Rose Parade, Best Day Ever! (Plus as a bonus we got the house and yard nicely cleaned up and it’s never looked better!)
Lovely. Thanks for sharing. Happy New Year!
Your party sounds fabulous! Wish I could come take those rolls off your hands.
On your alcohol comment, at brunch party I’m (and judging by my friends, not alone in this) really only interested in sparkling (and if it’s a decent bottle, not diluting it with OJ) or rose – not the right time or food for hard liquor, beer, or red. So your supply-demand sounds about right for the types of hooch. Especially after some may have been up late the prior evening ;).
Having done brunch with ladies groups recently, I love a good mimosa but found that many of the other women preferred just bubbles and commented on how the sugar makes them feel worse than the booze! Good to have juice available but sounds like that lines up with OP’s experience and your preference.
Yeah, we splurged on decent champagne and I was really glad we did! Lesson learned for next year!
Too bad you’re not all around for a cinnamon-roll reduction party! ;)
Thanks for the read out! Sounds like a ton of fun.
Party goals! Thanks for breaking it down for us.
Thanks for reporting back! I was hoping for an update!