Wrapping up Christmas

Sorry if the title misleads you into thinking I'm going to talk about wrapping paper and how wasteful it is. Nope. (Although, I was very pleased with myself for reusing some wedding wrapping paper and ribbon for gifts to my brother and sister-in-law. It was white and gold, so it works for Christmas too.)
Anyway, over the weekend I wanted to actually use some of the Christmas gifts we received. I spent Sunday morning anxiously going over the Barnes&Noble website, trying to pick out only 50-ish dollars worth of books to use up my e-gift card. So tough! I finally managed to settle on 6: the first four books in the Game of Thrones series (I got the books rather than the ebooks because Shane and I will both read them--we watched the series--and I won't want to give up my Nook for as long as it would take him to read them), The Non-Toxic Avenger for something serious and thought-provoking to dig into, and Explosive Eighteen for something purely funny and enjoyable. (The movie of the first book in that series comes out later this month and I'm nervous--will it live up to the Stephanie Plum in my mind?!)
I also downloaded for my Nook the three ebooks one of my brothers gave me for Christmas, but I haven't started them yet because I'm finishing the book I downloaded from ListenAlaska. (Which I highly recommend already--Laughing Without an Accent. Hilarious!)
For dinner, Shane asked if we just wanted to go out instead of cooking. This helped us to take advantage of two Christmas gifts: dinner at Pad Thai courtesy of my younger brother and a movie (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) courtesy of "Santa". (If you want to know about the movie be prepared for some graphic violent/sexual scenes, but it was overall excellent. Also, very long. Three hours, but it never dragged and didn't feel too long. Any shorter and you would have felt they left out too much. And if you're wondering if I've read the book, I have a hold placed on it through ListenAlaska.) It was lovely to be able to go out with my husband and not have to worry if we were spending too much money. We did, however, worry that the truck might not be able to start after the movie due to the cold. (It started up like a champ!)
Saturday was my mom's (60th!) birthday. I wish I could have been with my family to celebrate, but oh well. I called her and told her what I'd gotten for her: a cherry tree. She was really touched and kept saying, "I love fruit trees!" It also planted (ha ha!) the idea of more gardening in her head. When I was a child, we always had a big garden. When we moved to WA, however, I think the combination of (work+4 kids-family) meant that she didn't have enough time to garden as much as she'd really like to. There are some flowers around the house and I know she gets out to trim them and take care of the yard, but that's different from actually gardening. So now she's talking about getting a rhubarb plant again, and where to put the cherry tree. I think it will be good for her. She's been out of work for several years now (thanks to a combination of the bad economy and some memory problems due to--we think--a medicine she was taking) so she has plenty of time to devote to something like this. And it will help her relax.
I told my dad that for mother's day, he should get her some more gardening plants.
Speaking of plants: I'm angry (in a sort of slow simmer way) because over the weekend the janitors did a number on my plants at work. One bit of new growth was carelessly lying on my desk rather than attached to the plant, the jade plant had a bunch of leaves knocked off, and one of my windowsill plants had been knocked to the floor. What the heck?!