Confession: I wait until the last minute to do lots of things, which often works out smashingly for a girl like me, but sometimes…not so much.I guess you could say, I’m a bit of a procrastinator.

So, several weeks ago, I was talking to Katie (Of yesterday’s guest post and Words for Worms Katie) and she said to me, I’m in on a sweet Secret Santa blogger thing. You need to get in on this. And so I looked up Pocketful of Joules, and her fun Fall Swap. I e-mailed her and requested to join the club.

When I received my secret swapper…I was so pumped! I felt honored and excited to get Heather from the B(itch)log. As a Chicagoan(ish) myself, I felt that it was my duty as a blogger and new blogfriend to find Heather the perfect little piece of Chicago (as she is currently residing in California).

As any good Chicago-land native knows, if you’re born here…this will always be your home. If you move here and acclimate into the joy of northern Illinois…this will always be your home. They don’t call it Sweet Home Chicago for nothing. It’s the best.

So, I decided that dammit, I was going to give Heather a piece of Chicago, come hell or high water. And I searched. And searched. And I realized that sending something from Chicago will give the secret part away immediately. So despite my better judgement, I moved to the online world. I found a lot of “Chicago in the Fall” products…but they were cheesy and uninspiring. Even the “Chicago in the Fall” Apron, after reading that Heather digs aprons…it just wouldn’t do. I’m a perfectionist by nature, and I really wanted to get this right.

So finally, in the home stretch, on the last week of the swap, I was searching the digital world like a maniac. And came across this SWEET poster. Sure, it may not be completely “fall” themed. But shit! It was the coolest thing ever. A World’s Fair Chicago poster dated May-November 1933. And it was everything I was looking for (you know except for the fall theme). But it did say November… November = fall… Truth be told, I totally searched “November Chicago.” I call it a success.

So I had it shipped to Heather without any purchasing info, and the really nice guy even offered to throw in a secret message!

Of course, because it was shipped from a third-party to keep my identity a secret…and I waited so long to send it…it took forever to get to Heather. Joules was worried. Katie asked if I had sent it. and Heather was waiting and waiting and waiting.

Then she got it, and I was worried that she didn’t like it (I worry a lot…an ex used to tell me I was wound tighter than an 8 day clock…douche.) I kept thinking, “Maybe she was hoping for a cute scarecrow or pumpkin or fall snack…”

In the end, I think I did alright… You can read about Heather’s super excited reaction (She loves me more than French toast! MMMmmmm French toast…maybe I’ll make some for breakfast—nah Fritos and queso is more my style) on her blog post about being homesick for Chicago.

In other procrastinator news, I finally get to send my giveaway today to the winner! Lily from It’s a Dome Life… I had to dig through a lot of moving boxes to find my Huck Finn books.