candy cane kisses and christmassy case-y cuteness

I read an article yesterday about seasonal affective disorder and the importance of Vitamin D to our immune systems and the ultimate prevention of such an emotional disorder. Vitamin D primarily comes from the sun and although it would take a significant amount of exposure to create enough Vitamin D to aquire our daily intake, the shorter days and cooler weather during the winter diminishes the amount of time we spend outside and therefore seriously detriments our Vitamin D intake, thus making us feel sad... giving us the colloquial "winter blues". Now, I am a huge supporter of the "daily stroll", no matter the weather or the several essays you have to work on - neither of those things are worth being cooped up in your house for an entire 5 months (oh, Canadian winters). I am also rarely affected by such seasonal sadness because I find that there is just so much to be happy about during this season. I mean, there are clementines, christmas carols and one of today's happies: Candy Cane Kisses.

A few days ago my housemate got a hold of a bag of these wonderful seasonal candies and they have been sitting in a bowl on our living room table since then. It's bad for my waistline but my god, I can only eat them once a year so I'm going to indulge when I can. There's something about the combination of white chocolate and peppermint that is so Christmassy and wonderful. And the festive candy cane striped wrapping is just so festive it makes me smile. Thank goodness the four of us (my housemates and I) are so addicted to them that they're almost gone... but I think I am going to have to pick up another bag to get us through the exam season when our sugar cravings usually increase ten-fold - but according to that article about Vitamin D, the more vitamin D you have in your system, the less frequent your sugar cravings. Now, I don't think that strolls outside will provide me with nearly enough Vitamin D to curb my cravings for candy cane kisses, but I think I may have found another solution.

Yesterday, the wonderful Allison Case posted a video on youtube. The video is of her singing and playing the first song she learned on the Ukulele, "Away in a Manger". I don't even think words can describe how wonderful it is, so I'm just going to include it in this blog, because you just have to see it to get the full effect of the happy:

I mean, come on. First of all, she's incredibly talented (like you didn't know that already...if you actually didn't...shame on you). I could honestly listen to her voice all day long. Secondly, she's adorable, especially when she messes up, it just makes me love her more. Finally, she just can't help but make you smile. I cannot believe that I'm not more eloquent in my description of Allison than I am in my description of Candy Cane Kisses, but she's just so wonderful... she's ineffable. She's just such a delight in everything she does...on camera, on stage, on twitter, in her blog, and in person. She's a ray of sunshine.

Who needs the outdoors when you've got her?

Allison Case - Solving Vitamin D Deficiencies Everywhere.

peace. love. smile.