Holiday Gift Ideas 4: Holy Wood, Handmade Houses.

Tis the season: every day this week, I'll be posting ten holiday gift ideas - fifty total by Friday. This year, I aimed to feature items from small businesses (Etsy and otherwise), or my favorite local  shops here in NYC. Other items are things I own and love.

Day 4: Holy Wood. Handmade Houses.

-Woodstock Handmade Houses, $35. From 1974, a peek into the homes of the Woodstock generation.

-Bradley Mountain Traveler's Mug, $20. For camping trips and outdoor excursions, mugs wrapped in hand-stitched leather. I'd use them in the city, too.

-Turkish slippers, $45. Hot pink for cold mornings.

-Beaver pillow, $108. The best part of this pillow, which features a woodland scene embroidered on linen: there's a pocket sewn into the beaver's dam, so you can tuck him in at night.

-Flower Power Healing Bath, $24. A floral elixir of rose buds and witch hazel, clover and chamomile. 

-California pouch, $25. For pencils, pens, and magic wands.

-Felt party hat, $40. Made by hand in Bolivia, these alpaca wool party hats are fair-trade and hypoallergenic.

-The Adjustable Clampersand, $40. Says creator Tony Ruth, "I'd recommend using it to clamp verbally-associated objects together into some sort of visual pun: bacon and eggs, salt and pepper, turner and hooch. That sort of thing." (More inspiration here.) 

-Audubon Field Guide Series, $60. Everything you'll ever need to know about shells, mushrooms, spiders, and the night sky.

-Palo Santo Wood, $15. My friend Jamie got me some of this incense (also known as "holy wood") for my birthday, made from the bark of the Ecuadorian Palo Santo tree. Use it to "cleanse a space, cure a hangover, or ward off mosquitoes."

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More tomorrow! For the rest of this week's guides (and other gift ideas from my archives), click here.