Just for Redheads mascara

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I don't always wear makeup. But, when I do, I prefer to not look like a raccoon.

Tra Vigne Wine Cellarette

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You know how sometimes, you can fall in love with somebody you know will never, ever feel that way about you, and that's okay? You love them so much that you really, honestly just want them to be happy and find somebody who will treat them the way they deserve to be treated? That's how I feel about this wine cabinet, designed and built by Minnesota woodworking artist Mark Laub. It is incredibly expensive. It is also the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. The photo cannot possibly do it justice. My husband and I have gone to Minneapolis' Blue Sky Gallery just to pet it. Laub does incredible things with wood, at an obsessive level of detail. For instance, in one side of these cabinets, there's a tiered stack of curved drawers meant to hold tea. Open a drawer, and inside it, where most people will never see, is an intricate, exquisite wood inlay flower. It is amazing. I can't afford it. But I want it to go to a good home, with Happy Mutants who grok the time and skill and love that little, hidden flower represents. Link (I can't link specifically to that picture, but it's the third one down on the right)

Wire vine necklace

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Brittany Foster is a Minneapolis artist who turns abstract metal sculpture into wearable jewelry. She does great earrings and pendants, too, but I love this series of necklaces made from twisted lengths of silver.

Duet cherry wood and acrylic earrings

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I went shopping for grown-up stud earrings this summer, which is a frustrating task. Thank god for Etsy, and for Duet, which makes really cool contrasting studs in a variety of shapes, using white or gold acrylic. I bought the "Droplet" style, but I'm also pretty fond of "Strike".

Infrastructure necklaces

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Susan Elnora is a Minneapolis artist who makes jewelry using some wonderfully geeky motifs, from antlers and bison skulls, to embryonic turtles, curled in their early developmental stages. One of my favorite things she does, though, is these great infrastructure pieces: Railroad tracks, telephone poles. All three have depth and perspective–the tracks, for instance, appear to get smaller, shrinking into the distance somewhere on your clavicle. Add them together, and you've got a little landscape.

Glow-in-the-dark "Science!" print (Second from the top on the right)

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Based on old science kits from the 1950s, this 12" x 12" print by Todd Thyberg of AngelBomb Design is a wonder of Easter Eggy fun. Read the tiny print for lots of great, geeky jokes. And did I mention it glows in the dark?

Wintercraft starter kit

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Make ice globe lanterns to decorate your yard or light up a table. You can freeze the water outside using the power of winter, or indoors, using your freezer.

Buffalo Trace Bourbon 750ML

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There are two whiskeys I've developed a particular fondness for this year. Buffalo Trace is one.

Rogue Dead Guy whiskey

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This is the other. If you can only pick one, pick the Rogue. It's a damn good special occasion whiskey.

Surly Coffee Bender

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A great gift for beer lovers, it's made with cold-press espresso. Which pretty much means it's awesome.

Dry Soda 24-pack

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I stumbled across this soda at a burger joint on Route 66 near Oklahoma City. The burgers were good. The soda was outstanding. And this is coming from somebody who isn't a huge fan of soda. Dry, as the name implies, has great flavor and tangy, carbonated punch without being cloyingly sweet. It's soda that's actually refreshing. After trying a bunch of their flavors, the cucumber remains my favorite. But don't shy away from the rhubarb, juniper berry, or wild lime.

Season Tickets to WITS

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This is a weird gift suggestion, since it really only applies to people within driving distance of the Twin Cities, and the tickets aren't actually on sale yet. But bear with me. It's worth it. WITS is a live variety show, recorded for Minnesota Public Radio. It's kind of like Prairie Home Companion's hip, geeky, slightly tipsy younger cousin. For each event, host John Moe brings in an author or comedian and great musicians, putting on a show that combines spoken word, conversational interviews and fabulous song interludes. The creators of Mystery Science Theater 3000 serve as the house hecklers. There is a sing-a-long at the end. You should totally go. The 2012 season will start in spring. In the meantime, you can listen to archives from the 2011 and 2010 seasons and obsessively refresh the WITS webpage until 2012 tickets become available.

Recordings from the Conference on World Affairs

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The Conference on World Affairs is an amazing annual event in Boulder, Colorado that brings together artists, journalists, politicians, scientists, and more for a week of free public lectures on pretty much every topic you can imagine. It's a smorgasbord of smarts and geeky wonderment. Each panel gives four speakers 10 minutes each to talk about a set topic — from bioethics, to alternative energy, to comic books, and more. The rest of the session is given over to great conversations, between one speaker and another, and between the speakers and the audience. If you want to see the conference in person, all you have to do is show up in Boulder next April. If you can't do that, you can buy recordings of the panels. CDs are $6 per panel. MP3s are $4 per panel. An entire DVD set of whole 2011 conference is $275. To order, use the 2011 conference schedule to pick the panels you want to hear. Then order the panels, by panel number.