13 New Years Resolutions You’re Welcome To Steal

I almost never have an answer when people ask me what my New Year’s resolution is. It’s not that I’m averse to self-improvement as a concept (I promise, I’m not!), but between actually celebrating the holidays, reading a zillion books to hit my reading goal for the year, and finally getting the eight hours of sleep that I need, I run out of time to reflect and choose something that I want to change about myself. Also, if we’re being honest, I’m not entirely sold on the whole a) pick something you want to change b) share it WITH OTHERS and c) start changing that thing on the same day as everyone else. I don’t know when we normalized asking people what their worst habits are, but at some point, we did and now we do it every year! I hate it!

Anyway, even though I hate it, we live in a society and people are inevitably going to ask me what my resolution is. This year, I decided I would come prepared. I’d have a bunch of resolutions handy (in my Notes app, like a good old-fashioned celebrity apology) so that when the clock strikes midnight, I could just pick a few. Feel free to steal one of mine, because let’s be real — this list is too long.

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1. Floss more. It’s the quintessential New Year’s Resolution for a reason. My dentist would probably love if I did this, and yours would too. If you already floss daily, congratulations. You’ve set an impossible standard.

2. Build a stretching practice. Looking down at my laptop to type has left me with horrendous posture, and I’m convinced that stretching will cure me. Plus, wouldn’t it be cool to be able to do a split?

3. Read more nonfiction. Not everything I read in 2024 needs to be fiction. Will it be? Probably (unless the news counts) but it’s nice to dream.

4. Alternate water and alcohol when drinking. I’m too old to get hangovers, especially ones that could be easily prevented by drinking more water.

5. Do my own nails. Gel manicures are expensive and take forever — plus the repeated UV exposure cannot be good for me. It’s time I go back to doing my own nails. They won’t be as cute, but they will be cheap.

6. Lift more, and heavier. I’ve been having this recurring dream where I do a bunch of pull-ups all at once, and I’m always so sad when I wake up and find out it was just a dream! In 2024, we are doing a pull-up. Maybe even TWO pull-ups.

7. Buy a new bra. My pandemic bralettes are not hoisting the way they used to, and it’s time for them to enter retirement. Even if they are extremely comfortable.

8. Wake up earlier. I can’t do this, but maybe you can. Best of luck.

9. Sleep with mouth tape. I’m a little scared of this one. TikTok claims that if I loosely tape my lips together before I go to sleep, I will have better sleep and a more defined jawline (two things I want). It seems improbable that mere scotch tape can replace melatonin and filler, but I honestly have nothing to lose. Except a little air, I guess.

10. Meditate. Wouldn’t it be so sexy to achieve inner peace?

11. Listen to more music. Spotify Wrapped will come for all of us, and I want to get my headstart now. Last year, I (embarrassingly) did not listen to enough minutes of music for them to assign me a city based on my listening habits. We’re not doing that this year.

12. Make my bed. Just so I can unmake it again later that same day.

13. Talk to my neighbors. I know it’s New York and we don’t talk to our neighbors, but they’re the only ones I can commiserate with about our terrible landlord. Plus, they have a cute dog.

New Year’s Resolutions Can Be Fun Actually

Feature image by FG Trade Latin via Getty Images

Maybe it’s the storyteller in me, but I’ve always loved the new year. Not New Years Eve, mind you — too many chaotic alcohol-fueled nights to throw my love fully behind that one — I love the new year itself. January 1st may be just another day, but it’s also an excuse to reflect and reset, a demarcation of time allowing for gratitude and change.

Given my appreciation for the new year, it may come as a surprise that I hate New Year’s resolutions. Or, rather, I hate the way most people do them.

Why should a new beginning start with self-judgment? What’s the point of setting goals that will melt away with the thaw of spring?

But there is one secret way to almost always achieve your New Year’s resolutions: Choose resolutions you actually want to do. Choose resolutions that are fun.

This can mean so many different things to so many different people! Maybe exercising or cooking healthier meals is what brings you joy in which case hooray what great goals! But if those typical resolutions are things you think you should do then save them for a time less fraught than a new year right after the holidays when the sky is dark and the weather is cold. Instead start your year off with intentions that bring you joy!

Some of my past resolutions include: reading 10,000 pages, watching every movie on Autostraddle’s best lesbian movies list (before I started working here and rewrote it), and having my first threesome. You know, fun stuff!

Choosing things you actually want to do sets the year up for positivity and success. And it makes not achieving a resolution less painful. My 2022 resolution was to make my short film. I wasn’t able to make that happen but because it’s something I wanted I rolled it over and made it happen in early 2023. It didn’t feel like a failure, because the desire was still there so I still fulfilled it when I could.

Again, this should be specific to you. If you want to work out more, that’s great. But it’s also great if what you want is to watch every episode of the original Twilight Zone or dedicate more time to long masturbation sessions.

This year my personal resolution is inspired by my move to a new apartment. I spent most of 2023 in limbo, floating between my girlfriend’s place, friends’ places, and sublets as I saved money and figured out where I wanted to live. But now I’m in an apartment that feels like mine and part of that is having all my DVDs/Blu-Rays and books together. That’s why my resolution this year is to watch and read everything I own that I’ve yet to watch or read.

I’m most guilty of retail therapy when it comes to movies and books plus over the years I’ve received a good amount of free stuff from friends and for work. But I want to get into the habit where if it’s on my shelf it’s because I’ve experienced that work of art and like it/respect it enough to have it on display. That means watching about 50 unwatched movies and reading about 35 unread books. That’s a lot — especially for the books — so I’m giving myself a margin of 5 unwatched movies and 10 unread books.

Now this all may sound exhaustingly nerdy to you, but that’s kind of the point! Watching a lot, reading a lot, and having a curated library of my own brings me joy. That’s why it’s my resolution!

So what brings you joy? Think about it and enter the new year with that in mind. There will be plenty of time for shoulds and have-to’s when the sun comes out.

What Should Your Questionable New Year’s Resolution Be, According to Your Sign?

Listen. 2023 was a little much. And if you’re anything like me, then you’ve already made a plan to kidnap 2024 and MK-Ultra this year into submission in your basement before we even get started. Because listen, we’re not pulling another 2023. So let’s all agree to make THIS year call us “Daddy.”

So how are we going to do this, hmmm? With these totally, absolutely, not not not not unhinged New Year’s Resolutions for you, based on your zodiac sign, many of which are actually New Year’s Projects that I can, at the bare, bottom-of-the-pit minimum, assure you will have an effect on your year. So, raise a glass of whatever fizzy or flat thing you’re guzzling, and let’s toast to a year where we gain a sense of control over our fates by whatever means necessary!

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Aries

Get serious about prepping. Now, there are different kinds of disaster preparedness. I am going to say this now, hoping dear Aries that you didn’t just read the first sentence and run off to build a bunker with a tilapia tank. Okay, you’re still here? Good.

Emergency/disaster preparedness can take many forms. It can mean making sure you have enough food, water, shelter, and first aid supplies accessible and well packaged should you need them. It can also mean actually ensuring that your closest people have each other’s’ phone numbers and that you have secondary contacts for them in turn. It might mean that maybe that you’ve undergone some basic first aid training.

But Aries, I know you want more. This year, why not learn some basic electrical, get trained on how to Stop the Bleed, or organize a local group of queers to practice basic self-defense together? If you don’t know self-defense, someone in your network surely does. Download Signal. Start participating in mutual aid and jail support groups if you don’t already. Learn to recognize and treat hypothermia and heat stroke. Get to know your neighbors. Make a go bag.

Why is this questionable advice? Because I know that an Aries is likely to take this too far, get a little obsessive, maybe develop a sense of know-it-all expertise. But, um, hey. At least if there’s a hurricane or other natural disaster in 2024 (not less than likely), your friends are going to know who’s got the generator and the extra food.

Taurus

Stop buying things. Stop buying anything at all except groceries and basics. Do not get liberal when it comes to defining “basics.” See how long you can go.

Even better, shout about it on social media. Make a big deal of it. Really trap yourself in this commitment by making sure your entire circle knows about your year of not buying things.

You heard me. I already know you don’t like it. I also know you’re spending too much money. Now, this is going to tear you right out of your comfort zone. What are you going to do when you can’t get a new candle or robe or piece of quartz or nose ring? You are going to sit there and cope. And if you cannot cope without new material comforts in your life, you are going to have to get there and find clothing swaps or clean out your closet and make trades with people or get crafty.

I don’t know, Taurus, what you might be going through, but it’s time to clear that online shopping cart because it’s not going to help anyway. This might be sound advice, except I don’t know that you’re ready to look at the ways you’re obscuring a deeper connection to yourself and the world around you through your fixation on making the perfect nest, on making sure your appearance is just as you want it. What happens if you say fuck it to coziness? What could you accomplish? I think that if you redirect your energy, you might come out the other side a completely different person.

Gemini

Actually summon a demon, though.* Like, you need some help getting your New Year’s Resolutions moving? You want to feel more spiritually connected? You’ve got at least 72 ancient and tried and true options. Kayla didn’t tell you how to in her post, but in honor of my fellow air sign, our Gemini Managing Editor, I am going to tell you how to do it (draw a scary circle on the floor summoning a demon but also summoning the angel that many recommend you need when doing this as well). Keep in mind that a lot of people have various problems with Thelema/Crowley/Ceremonial style magic, and that’s because it is in fact problematic. But I’m not here to give you Woke Witch advice. You said you wanted to summon a demon. So now I’m here to tell you how to summon a demon.* Don’t say I never did anything for you:

1. Start with a book like this. As Kayla suggested, you may also be able to get one of these books from your local library. This one is recommended for its updated and modern approach, but you can also raw dog it with some Crowley though that is going to be rather more dense.
2. Choose a demon. There are 72 in the Ars Goetia — cool. There’s even a demon for learning geometry. Like, you can get specific.
3. Follow instructions. You might need some chalk, candles, sundry items.
4. Leave me out of this.

*I do not actually advise doing this. Proceed at your own risk, etc. etc.

Now this is absolutely questionable advice to give a Gemini specifically because you know they’re gonna succeed if they try. Those silver-tongued babes are gonna recite their Hebrew and their Latin. Luckily, I don’t actually know Gemini exes to be thaaaaat vindictive.

Cancer

2024 should be your year of asking for help from others, recklessly, with abandon.

Ask for help from family and friends, and then ask for help from strangers. Ask for help when you don’t need it. Don’t get all Ted Bundy and weird about it. Keep it relatively safe for the other person, just emotionally unsafe for you.

Now, why do I think this is potentially a bad idea? Because people are going to disappoint you, Cancer, if you give them the chance to. They’re going to let you down. You might come out of this with fewer friendships than you started with, but also, you’ll know who your real friends are. They won’t just be the people who you’ve been continuously initiating plans with. They’ll be the people who come around on their own. You also might find that you did, indeed, get help with some things that you needed, and now you’re going to have to live the rest of your life with that vulnerability.

Leo

Start sneaking into places and telling elaborate falsehoods. Look, Leo, we know you’re always fibbing a little bit for effect, or, on the other side, being completely blunt for effect. I can’t say what’s going to be on the other side of this, but if you’re really going to push your nature to its limit, I want to see how far you can go. Can you sneak into an event by carrying a box and wearing a pair of coveralls? Can you crash a straight wedding? Make up a new persona when flying. I’ve heard people do this. Get really into it. Start making up new personas on the bus. Start making up new personas at bars. Never be yourself, then ask yourself: what do my fake selves have in common, and “what am I missing from my life and how I treat myself that I could concentrate on in order to bring myself into greater alignment with who I want to be?” Or just have fun embracing your trickster self. Don’t get caught, and if you get caught, don’t get in trouble! And remember, I’m definitely not telling you to do anything illegal!

Virgo

Take up karaoke. In a big way. Tegan and Sara are Virgos — did you know that? No matter what your voice sounds like, I want to hear you sing. Already into karaoke or truly refuse to sing? Fine. I want you to take up doing an even more elaborate public performance, then, like burlesque or stand-up.

Virgo, in 2024, you are going to get on stage. You are going to fuck up. You are going to embarrass yourself, and you are going to persevere — or not, but you are going to say you tried. I want you to challenge yourself with the fact that you can prepare and prepare and prepare and then inevitably there is going to be a drunk person in the crowd or a technical mishap or you’re going to forget one of your lines and you are going to have to cope, or not.

I don’t know how you’ll do, but you can’t live in your little bubble of order forever. As a bonus, leave the dishes undone one night when you’re tired, skip a workout to play video games, get takeout instead of cooking — not all the time, just once or twice.

Libra

This year, as a New Year’s resolution that is really a project, I want you to start writing letters to people you admire. No, not emails, not DMs, not “conversations in your head.” Letters. In the mail. To people who you don’t know, famous people even, or less famous ones, just ones who are doing things you think are cool. I want you to start doing this and I don’t want you to stop (in a non-stalker-y way. Like, please don’t keep sending someone who never answers you letters unless this is some kind of art project). All year. You hear me?

When someone inevitably writes back, I want you to keep up correspondence. If you really hit it off, I want you to find a way to visit or run into each other in person. There, now you know a whole new person who you previously only admired from afar. Good luck out there. People are just people, after all.

Scorpio

Re-wild yourself in 2024. Take this seriously. I want to see you off-grid for extended periods of time this year, dear Scorpio. Sure, you’ve got responsibilities, sure there’s a society that we live in. In 2024, I want you to resolve not to touch grass, but to smell the dank under-belly of a pile of leaves, to sink your fingers into black compost, to having gone so feral that one night while you’re looking up at the full moon in complete dark you realize that you have not one but two sticks or brambles or pieces of debris stuck in your hair. Pull them out or don’t. You should be getting scrapes and bruises, poison oak or ivy, a mysterious bug bite or seven, learn how to react to whatever dangerous wildlife inhabit your area. If your phone screen breaks, let it stay broken for a week or two before you fix it. Take a friend if you need to, for safety. I didn’t say you had to go it alone.

You might think, why me? Why Scorpio? “I’m a sign of secrets and boudoirs, libraries and tombs,” you say. But if you look at the Death card in the Tarot, go and pull it out or google it, you’ll see in the Rider Waite version a five pointed white rose on the flag death carries. This rose represents purity through change — and the number five is one of change — change that comes from stripping yourself down to your most basic elements. In the Thoth deck, Death is depicted almost in their fisherman form, surrounded by sea creatures, symbols of fertility. Dead marine life makes for some of the best fertilizer, and it’s time to consider what needs to die in your life so that you can actually make sure your soul is fed. By making sure you are not just playing the role of a tourist in nature, but instead, fully recognizing your place in the all-encompassing thing that is nature, you can actively work to remember that you are also an animal, as much as you are a human. Our bodies are animal bodies. See what priorities come to the surface when you slip on a wet rock or on a loose patch of dry earth and you think for a second that you might fall.

Sagittarius

Religiously record your weird thoughts as voice memos to a character who you’ve made up. Do not re-listen, share or review these memos until year’s end, when you should have a listening party. I’ll leave who, if anyone, you invite to said party up to you.

Why do this? Because I don’t think you know yourself, Sagittarius. You’re changeable, your heart always wants, but what it wants can be so inconsistent. There’s an ephemeral beauty in that, though, and a challenge to distill the truer parts of yourself at the same time. So, while you’re on those impulsive road trips, crying in the bathroom after rage-quitting, bouncing back after getting your heart broken, slaying it at a costume party, or deep-diving into scholarly articles on your topic of the week — leave yourself a weird little voice memo. Do it.

Then face down who you are and all the moments you forgot about from your year in a medium that is, by its very nature, time-consuming to consume and not very Insta-gram-a-ble. You’re welcome.

Capricorn

Investigate a mystery! I’m serious. You’re always using your analytical skills and work ethic for such normative measures, Capricorn, and it’s time you embraced the darkness within and put those skills toward uncovering things that someone else would rather be left hidden.

Yes, I’m suggesting that, if you go in one direction, you could go all Misty Quigley Citizen Detective. That is one option. Go, go find the message boards. See if you can’t put the pieces together about a local serial killer. Good luck, stay safe.

You could also start taking a look at your local city council or school boards or any number of places where Moms for Liberty types are starting to infiltrate, get to know what they’re going for, do opposition research on them, and start showing up and pushing back.

If you want to go even further, you can start trying to infiltrate and expose local rightwing groups. I don’t know! You can probably get into a private Facebook group or on a Discord pretty easily with a few strategic Capricorn lies. Then, it’s time to screenshot and expose! Remember to protect your identity. Don’t get doxxed, cutie. Remember that finding and exposing fascists is a great way to prevent them from taking future action; it deflates their clout and makes them compromised from a security standpoint and useless to their movements!

You can also, like, go in an old tunnel or something.

Aquarius

Start going to sex parties, unless you already are, in which case, take up gardening, and if you already do both, are we friends? We’re probably friends. Anyway, it’s going to be time to start seeds, soon, so get out your seed catalogs and make this our year for blossoms and fruits and eggplants and juicy things galore. You’re never too old to get some more bruises on your knees. From gardening.

Is this questionable because both these practices are great building blocks when it comes to acquiring the skills, aptitude and attitude it takes to be a cult leader? Mayyyybeee. Look, dark times are ahead and if there are gonna be cults, you might as well be heading one up because you know what’s best, right? Gaslight, gatekeep, girlcult.

Pisces

Start and finish an extremely complex and potentially life-altering project.

Some ideas:

• Start an alternate reality game. Tell no one at first. Then, tell only the other people who you bring on as other architects of your game. Watch We’re All Going to the World’s Fair and say, hey, yeah that seems like something I want to both bring into the world and participate in.
• Dig a tunnel under your place of residence.*
• Learn to fly planes.
• Make a plan to hike one of the longest trails in the U.S. either by year’s end or in 2025. Follow through.
• Write a novel.
• Start your own business, and it’s something you’re actually passionate about.
• Find an Aquarius and team up to start an intentional community.
• Go to circus school.

Pisces, you’ve got the deep thinking and the dreams, and also, not always the most practical judgment. This year, you’re not going to listen to the naysayers, though, because it’s time to follow your heart and make your dream a reality, with or without financial reward, potentially with serious ramifications. If you dream it, you can be it, and that includes becoming a literal clown if you want.

*For legal reasons, this is a joke.

You Need Help: How Do I Become Less Afraid of New Year’s and the Expectations it Brings?

Q:

How do I go into the new year feeling anything other than dread and exhaustion? NYE/NYD has always been the most stressful holiday for me, and I’d like it to feel less scary. I want it to feel like an actual fresh start but I’m not sure how.

A:

What you’re describing is so real. Everything from the economy to politics (especially as QPOC folks!!!), and even personal stuff like health and relationships feel so much heavier in the past few years than ever before. It makes us all wonder how any of us can go on into the new year with any sense of feeling renewed or hopeful. I get that sense that you’ve held New Year’s traditions in the past that just don’t sit the same, or maybe this particular holiday holds a certain collection of memories or expectations that aren’t serving you. Whatever the case, I can feel even through your message that no matter what you end up doing, you might be really struggling with your mental health overall. I’ve totally been there, and I have a few suggestions you can take or leave.

You’re holding the weight of the entire new year on your shoulders. No one is blaming you, though. Western consumerism is structured to make us feel like we should have our life together, planned, and ready for action on January 1. Frankly, this is some bullshit. We have an entire year to explore and navigate what life brings us or what we’ve been manifesting. However, there’s definitely a certain sense of relief that comes with the idea of “starting over.” What immediately comes to mind is the season we’re in: winter. Winter calls us to hibernate, reflect, and settle into routines or patterns we’ve carved out for ourselves throughout the past year. I find it odd that we, as a collective Western culture, place so much emphasis on change in the middle resting seasons. It feels counterproductive. I’ve spent the past few years reconceptualizing the structure of my own year based upon seasons. For me, it makes a lot more sense to do rituals that renew and reflect as spring starts to blossom from winter. It’s the season for new ideas, warmer weather, and taking smaller steps towards action. Even though the pressure of a new year tells us to rethink our lives, the first step could be reframing why that doesn’t work for you (and honestly for most people).

We may not be able to control the cultural and social pressures of what NYE/NYD brings, but we can tailor it to our own lives in smaller steps or traditions. One way to press pause on carrying exhaustion into the new year is to wrap up this current year with some closure. One of my intimate traditions is reflecting on the year’s ups and downs and molding it into one word to bring closure and perspective. Last year, my word was “closer.” Sometimes it’s overwhelming to move forward if we haven’t processed the past. Once you’ve processed 2023, take only baby steps to picturing your 2024. I know folks who create Pinterest mood boards to capture the essence of what they want their year to look like. I know other folks who get together with loved ones and share their intentions for the new year. My cousin and I actually agreed to have a little “powerpoint night” where we throw a bunch of images into a slideshow and describe what we’re feeling about this year, next year, or in the current moment. Having someone around to just process this with can make all the difference.

Finally, another option I always recommend to folks over the winter holidays is seeking mental health support. If you have a therapist, bring all the above suggestions to them. If you don’t have a therapist, consider what steps you need to take to getting one. You can also reach out to many different help lines at any time throughout the holiday stress.

Suicide & Crisis Lifeline – CALL OR TEXT 9-8-8
Talkspace 
Trans Lifeline – 877-565-8860
The Trevor Project – 1-866-488-7386

This time of year inherently brings stress, so please treat yourself with kindness. Give yourself permission to rest, do nothing, or opt out of traditions that aren’t serving you. Seek the things or people that bring you comfort. Allow yourself to feel whatever you actually feel with the trust that a refreshing start is coming, just maybe not on January 1. I’m wishing you the type of New Year you need, whatever that is.

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You can chime in with your advice in the comments and submit your own questions any time.

Holidays Are for Best Friends, Teletubbies, and Arthur

Most of us need traditions and rituals, secular or not, to commemorate achievements, growth, or time. After 28 years of celebrations and holidays, I’ve been grateful enough to experience all kinds of traditions with family members and partners. Throughout the many, many, many cities I’ve lived, I’ve cultivated a chosen family in places where I couldn’t access friends and family or during periods of my life when my family wasn’t around. I’m lucky to have family members now who love and accept me, but that hasn’t always felt like the case.

Once I moved away for college and naturally forgot about various traditions, I realized how much I missed them. As I figured out who my friends were, I connected with folks who shared a similar sense of nostalgia. It was usually my way of coping with being away from the familiar so I found people who felt like home. My now-very-best-friend and I connected over a few nostalgic memories we both still cling to as Midwesterners in a big(ger) city.

The very first tradition we celebrated together was actually a Valentine’s Day activity. This is my all time favorite holiday, and being far away from people I knew felt strange and lonely, especially for someone who was so extremely single and in the middle of a sexuality crisis. Sophomore year of college, my best friend and I started reminiscing about the Teletubbies and arguing about which ones were better (Po). We soon realized this was a weird, shared, nostalgic thing we could do, especially as two single people who loved the day of love. That Valentine’s Day, we gathered all the ingredients to make tubby custard and also picked up a microwaveable roast from Shnuk’s to feast on on the futon in our closet-sized dorm room. We spent the whole evening streaming endless teletubbies episodes and eating questionable pudding, laughing and crying out of joy and hopeless romantic sadness.

We did this every year we lived near each other and still adapted it in our own homes when we lived far apart. It became such a sentimental tradition that I genuinely didn’t want either of us to date anyone out of fear they would take this precious and strange tradition away from us. She’s now married, and while I always give her shit about spending it with her own family instead of me, it warms my heart to think that every Valentine’s Day, no matter what my chaotic dating situation is, I’ll always have her and tubby custard.

In the coming years of sharing nostalgic hobbies, we both figured out the film Arthur’s Perfect Christmas was a foundational piece of the holiday season. In my younger twenties, I carried my love for this film (and knowledge of every lyric in the songs) with shame. This random PBS special for nerdy kids wasn’t anything a fellow 20 year old would want to talk about. Like most things from my early twenties, I don’t quite remember how we discovered our mutual love for and slight obsession with this holiday movie. It was probably somewhere on that same futon where we studied, cried, and watched Frozen for the very first time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0TZ2zSsu94

The thing about Arthur’s Perfect Christmas that makes it near perfect is that it was truly radical (and subtextually gay) for its time. It’s a musical spectacular about a young aardvark’s perfectionistic tendencies with subplots following his friends’ celebrations of other non-Christian holidays. Sure, the title pulls you in with Christmas, but you learn — through a child’s eyes — about many different holidays and traditions that exist outside of Christianity. Francine, future (nonconfirmed) queer, celebrates Hanukkah and teaches us about her family’s traditions. Buster is dealing with his parent’s divorce and creates his own holiday, Baxter Day, to cope with the stress of the holidays in a non-traditional family. We get to see Brian’s family celebrate Kwanzaa, George’s family celebrate Saint Lucia Day, and Binky’s family tradition of volunteering at a homeless shelter. It’s surprisingly inclusive for the year 2000.

Like most traditional Christmas movies, the characters learn the true meaning and spirit of the holidays in the ways we need them to. Muffy, an ignorant, rich girl/future nepo baby refuses to acknowledge Hanukkah even though Francine explains how important it is to her. Francine eventually helps Muffy see the holidays through her friends’ perspectives. Arthur and D.W. learn that Christmas isn’t about the perfect snow day or the perfect present but about celebrating with loved ones. Amid a wholesome plot of love and light, we are introduced to the presumably single and gay uncle, who shows up to celebrate the holidays. Also, gay Mr. Ratburn makes his appearance at Muffy’s party (which gives Mr. Schuester Glee vibes tbh). However, one of the most important overarching themes of the whole movie is to check your capitalism at the door. Toys and presents and parties mean nothing without the people you love around you! Sure, it might not be that deep, but I see it as my first anti-capitalist propaganda children’s movie.

My best friend and I have always believed this public broadcast children’s movie represents our ideal holiday: music, food, friends, inclusivity, new traditions, subtle queerness. More importantly, it brought us together to create our own type of Baxter Day, one where we sing every single lyric to every single song to kickoff the holidays. It’s one of the traditions I most look forward to every year. Even though we haven’t lived within driving distance of each other for over six years, we’ve somehow found a way to keep this little traditional alive. Watching Teletubbies or Arthur’s Perfect Christmas doesn’t necessarily seem like a deep tradition, but I think that’s what I’ve learned about traditions as a queer, spiritually questioning person: It doesn’t have to be about religion, spirituality, identity, or even food. Winter holiday traditions can be the people you choose to show up for, even in playful, lighthearted, and equally fulfilling ways.

My Favorite Queer Christmas Movie Is “How To Blow Up a Pipeline”

A propulsive heist-like film with a smoking hot cast, flashback-driven storytelling structure, and radical leftist politics that meet climate-destroying capitalism with violence? How To Blow Up a Pipeline is my queer cinema catnip. And upon my recent first viewing, I also made an important discovery: This is a Christmas movie.

Autostraddle’s Drew Burnett Gregory has already made a compelling argument for why you should watch this film, and I agree with everything she writes about it! I am here to convince you it’s not just a great film but a great Christmas film, a holiday classic in the making for those of us who felt underwhelmed and undercharmed by Happiest Season. A gay Christmas film that has nothing to do with Christmas and everything to do with fighting the consumerism that drives much of how Americans celebrate Christmas. A gay Christmas film for the loud homos who aren’t afraid to fight with relatives about politics at the Christmas table.

But no really, it is literally a Christmas movie! The film jumps around in time and place throughout its narrative, but the present day storytelling that revolves around this group of soon-to-be ecoterrorists (complimentary) executing their long-planned scheme to, well, blow up a pipeline unfolds in the days leading up to Christmas. The establishment of this timeline is subtle at first, a little holiday gift for morbid gays like myself who gravitate toward the specific brand of sincerity How To Blow Up a Pipeline brings to the table, which is far different from the saccharine sincerity of most traditional Christmas movies. We first get clued into the plotline taking place around Christmas when we meet Dwayne and his family at the beginning of the film, during the “team assembles” montage. A stocking hangs behind Dwayne at the dinner table, and his wife tells him she just wants him home safe and alive in time for Christmas.

Then, about an hour into the movie, we get a more explicit acknowledgement of the Christmas timeline when Dwayne says to Xochitl “merry Christmas” just after they’ve placed the two bombs. Dwayne then heads to his alibi location, a local bar where he’s clearly a regular. The bar is decorated for Christmas, complete with a tree and colored lights, and playing Christmas country music.

Dwayne is here in the decked out bar when the explosions happen, the culmination of a lot of hard, sweaty work for something he strongly believes in. It isn’t exactly a normal Christmas celebration; hell, it’s not even a celebration really. But it’s a huge accomplishment, one each of these characters have their own personal reasons for getting involved in. And even though this isn’t textually addressed, planning to blow up the pipeline around Christmas does seem like an intentional tactic. Hitting the economy during a time of mass consumerism would have a significant impact. It’s a similar strategy to the targeted boycotts and global strikes happening this month in response to Israel’s genocidal violence in Palestine. Starbucks sales are down during a time when they’re usually way up (which Vox claims isn’t solely to do with boycotts, but it seems like there has to be some correlation there). The machine of capitalism is indeed powerful during this time of year, and acts of resistance like the one staged by these characters fighting for the planet are bound to hit hard around the holidays.

And it’s with that in mind that I am confidently declaring How To Blow Up a Pipeline a Christmas movie even if it doesn’t look like one on the surface. It’s an anti-Christmas Christmas movie. It’s a story about community, protecting the earth, and fighting systems of oppression. And then it has a queer love story nestled inside it, too. That all sounds like queer Christmas spirit to me!

25 Things To Do if You Need a Break From Your Family This Holiday Weekend

I am not here to judge or question why you might need a little me time over the next few days if you are gay, tired, and dealing with family members who are varying degrees of unsupportive of you and your life. I am simply here to suggest some things you can do to get away for an hour or two.

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1. Make a list of everyone who has ever wronged you.
2. Reach out to other homos home for the holidays in distress and organize a Zoom reading with them of the poems you wrote as a teen.
   Please don’t try to say you didn’t write poetry as a teen…I DON’T BELIEVE YOU.
3. Research paranormal mysteries online.
4. Spam your group chat with selfies edited to have 2010-2014 era tumblr aesthetics.
5. Roll a pair of dice and use the results to determine what episode of The L Word to rewatch.
6. Read Bram Stoker’s Dracula.
   Idk, just seems like people would probs leave you alone.
7. Summon a demon from the underworld.
   I don’t know where one begins this journey, but perhaps at your local library. Support your local library!
8. Go down a social media rabbit hole trying to figure out what your favorite high school English teacher is up to.
   I hope Ms. Smith is thriving!
9. Suggest a game night and then cheat in such obvious ways that you get banned from playing so you can go do your own thing.
   This is for those of you who might need a more elaborate ruse to get away.
10. Make a goth gingerbread house.
11. Cultivate an aura of mystery so thick that literally no one knows what to talk to you about.
12. Befriend the demon from the underworld you summoned.
13. Listen to the score from The Hours on repeat.
    Someone should do a psychological study on why I literally am always doing this.
14. Invite your childhood crush over and ask if they want to play Light as a Feather, Stiff as a Board.
15. Research time travel and become overwhelmed by paradoxes.
16. Invent a new sea creature and convince someone it’s real.
17. Memorize a Shondaland monologue.
18. When someone asks you what you’ve been up to, respond with the entire plotline of the feature film Mamma Mia! (2008)
19. Do…whatever it is the person in this stock image is doing.
    
    
20. Make a hat from recycled goods.
    I have no idea what this might entail or what kind of hat one can even make, but it seems like it would take up a lot of time and energy so seems like a good redirection.
21. Have a dramatic friendship breakup with the demon from the underworld you summoned.
    And then write a letter to an advice column asking for help about the situation.
22. Make an upsetting collage.
23. Rewrite the lyrics to a pop song to be about your favorite soup.
24. Propose marriage to the moon.
25. Figure out how to re-banish the demon from the underworld you summoned if it isn’t too late.

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Did you do any of these activities? Let me know in the comments! And let me know if you know how to banish a demon from the underworld for no particular reason hahAha!

I Think I Accidentally Bought My Fiancée a Haunted Music Box for Christmas

There I was, casually scrolling eBay and Etsy in search of clown antiques, as one does…wait, you DON’T do that? Okay, my bad, I thought we were living in the Clown Era. I thought we were, as a community, ready to add a C to LGTBQIA for clown. Okay, fine, maybe I a little biased because I’m soon marrying a queer author whose next novel is going to be about a lesbian clown. And maybe I have been looking at clown antiques more than usual because of said impending nuptials with a clown-appreciating freak. And maybe JUST MAYBE I thought a vintage clown music box that inexplicably plays “Memories” from the musical Cats would be a very romantic gift to give said freak this holiday season.

You know, the thought did occur to me as I pressed purchase on the vintage clown music box that inexplicably plays “Memories” from the musical Cats that it could be a haunted artifact. It contained several potential haunted artifacts wrapped into one: a porcelain clown, a mirror, and a music box. I am no stranger to the dangers of haunted figures. But the potential for a haunting also promised a little bonus, a gift within a gift. Perhaps it would lead to wonderfully macabre stories my partner and I could share. Perhaps we’d strike up a friendly rapport with a ghost, as we briefly did when a decanter on our bar cart was seemingly haunted by an elderly couple who liked to announce happy hour every evening with the clink of their glasses (true story, btw).

Well, apparently the the vintage clown music box that inexplicably plays “Memories” from the musical Cats was so haunted that it never even made it under the tree. My sister texted me yesterday with a photo of a package delivered in my name, asking if it was indeed fragile like the label on it said, since it arrived looking like this:

“Looks like it was chewed by a dog and then ran over,” my sister said. I asked her to open the package to see if it was at all salvageable, even though she warned me she could hear broken glass clattering inside. I thought perhaps a bit of superglue could repair it, add a bit of character. She opened it to find this:

Far past the point of repair and beyond recognition, the vintage clown music box that inexplicably plays “Memories” from the musical Cats was in no condition to gift to my beloved. It was supposed to look like this:

“Literally looks like paranormal damage,” my sister texted. I wondered if perhaps a neighborhood dog could sense the horrors it contained and attacked the package or if the music box had started playing phantomly, spooking the mail person to the point they had to smash it repeatedly with a heavy boot. I suppose I should feel grateful, should assume someone or something else interfered so that my fiancée would not befall some horrible fate at the hands of the vintage clown music box that inexplicably plays “Memories” from the musical Cats. 

But I am sad, I’ll admit. A haunted gift is the gift that keeps on giving. And I fear I’ll never find a clown artifact as gloriously spooky and lovely as this one, certainly none that is a crossover between clowns and Cats, which felt exceptionally fitting as we adopted a cat together this fall. Ah, well, there’s always next Christmas.

Power Ranking Italian (and Italian-American) Christmas Desserts

It’s Christmastime and that means I’m back with another dispatch from my very particular corner of Christmas celebration. Last year, I brought you a hard-hitting power ranking of all the Italian Christmas cookies that are extremely popular whether you’re Italian, Italian-American, or not. But even though the Italian Christmas cookies are probably the dessert we’re most well-known for at this time of year, the treat train doesn’t stop there.

I don’t think it’s any secret that Italians and Italian-Americans love to eat. I know I’m not supposed to encourage a stereotype but this one is simply true across the board. Every holiday — seriously, every holiday, from the major Catholic/Christian ones like Christmas and Easter to the more minor saints’ days to Carnevale — is accompanied by some traditional meal or dish or sweet confection of some kind. Given that Christmas is, by far, the biggest holiday in the Gregorian and Catholic/Christian calendar, you can imagine what our Christmas meals look like. It occurred to me this year that while many people know about the tradition of sharing cookies with loved ones and acquaintances, not many people know there are lots of other sweet indulgences on the Italian and Italian-American Christmas table.

Being that dessert is usually the most important part of the holidays for me, I spend a lot of the year dreaming of and waiting for the opportunity to get into some of this stuff. I will say, though, not every one of them is created equal. Like Italian Christmas cookies, there are some that will blow you away and some that are good but not much to write home about.

Below you’ll find my personal rankings for all of the desserts you might see at the Italian market in your city or at the home of your Italian-American friend. Hopefully, it can help guide you to make the most delicious decisions this holiday season.

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11. Panforte

I know there’s technically no such thing as breakfast dessert, but when I think of Panforte, I don’t necessarily think about the sweet end cap at the end of an intense couple of hours of eating. Panforte, for all intents and purposes, is simply a spicy, chocolate fruit cake with very little flour so the emphasis is on the fruit. It’s delicious, there’s no doubt about that. But since it mostly contains dried figs and nuts, it just doesn’t feel like dessert.

10. Torrone

Torrone kind of falls into the same territory as Panforte to me but, in this case, it feels more like a little snack. Torrone is available all year round but since Christmastime has become a never ending parade of giving treats, it’s mostly gifted around this time of year. Torrone is a chewy, sweet, honey/vanilla-y nougat filled with nuts. Usually, it’s made with pistachios which are the most superior nut and the reason it’s ranked above Panforte. You can satisfy your sweet tooth with Torrone but it just doesn’t feel as celebratory as some of the others.

9. Tronchetto di Natale (Italian Yule Log Cake)

I don’t have much to say about this — but at least it actually makes sense as a dessert. Tronchetto di Natale is a Swiss roll cake shaped and decorated like a log you’d find in the middle of a wintry forest. It originated in France but was quickly adopted by almost all of the European countries. And I understand why — it is fun and festive. But I’ll be honest and tell you my family has only had a Tronchetto on our Christmas table twice because it’s just not a big thing. Tronchettos are prepared in the same way all the other ethnic whites do it, using vanilla genoise sponge and chocolate buttercream, with the added bonus of having a little espresso or Italian liqueur (like Amaretto) in there, too. It tastes good, but there’s a limit to how impressed I’ll be by a dessert they make on The Great British Bake Off every season.

8. Frittelle or Zeppole (Italian Doughnuts)

Listen, I’m absolutely not one to disparage fried dough. Fried dough, in any form, is just good. It really is. There’s something about fried dough that just hits every point of comfortability in your body. I know there’s a science behind it, but I honestly don’t care to know because it’ll take away the magic. I realize I’m saying all of this and still ranking this low but that’s just because it lacks imagination. Zeppoles are a yeasted dough fried in oil and then dragged through sugar before they cool. They’re satisfying but they’re just doughnuts.

7. Pandoro

Pandoro looks like Christmas, doesn’t it? Like what other time of year are you going to eat something that looks like this? And it’s quite good even if it commits the sin of being basic as hell. Pandoro is a sweet bread shaped like an eight-point star sprinkled with a healthy serving of icing sugar. But even though Pandoro seems very simple, it actually has a complicated history. It supposedly took an entire century to perfect the technique for making Pandoro, and they used to be reserved only for the aristocracy and ruling class in Italy. Since it’s no longer reserved for just the rich and ruling class, I kind of feel like eating it is taking part in a tradition of giving the big middle finger to people in power! A cool bonus to eating sugary sweet bread.

6. Chocolate Salami

Sounds insane that this exists, I know, but it does. It really does. Don’t worry, there is absolutely no meat in here. And honestly? It’s sooo good. It’s just chocolate bursting with cookies, nuts, a little port wine or Amaretto, and fruit covered in icing sugar and wrapped to look like a salami you’d get at the butcher. Chocolate salami can be bought but it’s really one of those things people make at home and give as a gift to their friends and other loved ones. Eating this kind of makes me feel like a joke because of the fact that my ancestors really said “Ok, let’s make a dessert that looks like cured meat,” but, trust me, it’s worth it.

5. Cannoli

Probably going to get a lot of shit for putting this at the midpoint of the rankings, and I don’t care. The thing about them is that even though they’re popular at this time of year, you can get them anytime. And there are more bad ones out there than good ones. Good cannolis — truly good ones — have the power to turn your entire week around. But bad ones have stale-tasting shells and dull, flavorless Cannoli cream filling. How people can fail so spectacularly at messing up some of the best ingredients in the world, I’ll never understand. So, here’s some advice: inquire about the origin of any cannolis you see floating around this season. If they’re from the grocery store chain in your city, skip them. If someone’s Nonna made them or they got them from the one Italian market in your city, eat as many as you possibly can.

4. Panettone

I get it if you’re thinking, “Why the hell is Panettone ranked higher than Cannoli?” Don’t worry, I have a good reason for it. What other time of year do you think it’s appropriate to eat Panettone? I’d argue none. Panettone is a cross between a sweet bread and a cake filled with dried fruits or chocolate chips, and it’s very similar to the Pandoro but, in my opinion, much, much better. Panettone has this special flavor that’s almost alcoholic because of the fermentation and proofing process of the dough that usually takes place over several days. Although I sometimes see these throughout the year, Panettone screams Christmas to me. Once those big yellow box displays start popping up at the grocery store, I know the holiday season has arrived.

3. Italian Cream Cake

Ok, y’all, now we are truly cookin’. I love Italian Cream Cake not only because of the flavor but also because it’s one of those magnificent immigrant concoctions that, strictly speaking, has no business being called Italian. Regardless, it’s still made its way into the hearts and minds — and onto the tables — of people across the country. Supposedly, Italian Cream Cake was created by an Italian baker who moved to the States and ended up in the South. And you can see the Southern influence all over the cake. Italian Cream Cake is basically like what if you replaced all the carrot in a carrot cake with coconut and pecans and then replaced all the spices with almond extract (or a little bit of bourbon if you’re really feeling it) then covered it in an almond extract flavored cream cheese icing. As a Real Italianx-American who was also raised in the South, this one really gets me.

2. Tiramisu

Make no mistake — Tiramisu is a god-tier dessert. The name literally translates to “pick me up,” which makes sense because a well-made tiramisu makes you feel like you’re floating in the clouds. Soft and almost cake-like cookies, mascarpone, espresso, and chocolate? I’m sorry but there just isn’t much competition. It would be number one if the dessert at number one didn’t exist…

1. Ricotta Cheesecake

A lot of people in my life think I don’t like cheesecake. But if they’d also grown up eating traditional Italian Ricotta Cheesecake, they’d get why I’m not rushing to eat some unfortunate substitute. You’re probably wondering how different it could be from regular cheesecake and trust me when I say, it’s worlds apart. Ricotta Cheesecake is fluffy and subtly sweet. There’s no crust on the bottom which really allows for the sweetened, whipped ricotta cheese and lemon zest to take center stage on your palate. The top of the cheesecake usually has this very thin layer of caramelization that adds a little roasted sweetness to the whole deal. You can technically have Ricotta Cheesecake all year long — and it’s easy to make! — but having it as the final treat of the season after a month of eating heavy sweet breads, chocolate desserts, cookies, and candies is really, really special.

Queer Mom Chronicles: Christmas With a Tween

By the time you all read this, my kiddo will be on his first trip without me. He’s going with his dad to visit his grandparents, and I’m having a lot of feelings I haven’t yet processed. He will be home right before Christmas, and I will be in absolute agony until he’s back under my roof.

I can’t believe it’s already Christmastime! How did we get here so fast? It feels like it was just summer, and now I’m sweeping up tree needles and trying to keep the dog from destroying the ornaments on the tree. Christmas is such a chaotic time of year if you’re a parent, especially if you’re the parent of a school aged kid. We had three end of semester performances (he killed it as always) and one mini class party. I made Rice Krispie Treats and baked chocolate chip cookies. I’ve bought all the gifts but haven’t wrapped them yet — there’s just a bunch of random boxes stashed all over my apartment.

Every year, it feels like the holidays sneak up on us faster and faster. I think it’s because my kid is getting older and time seems to be passing much more quickly. (It’s probably because I’m just so busy and overwhelmed I rarely know what day it is, but alas.)

Christmas is interesting with a big kid. My son is only 10 — he’s standing with one foot in being a kid and the other in being a tween. He’s still excited about picking out a Christmas tree and decorating it, but he tries to act too cool to watch Charlie Brown Christmas with me. His Christmas list is getting shorter in favor of one or two more expensive gifts. There was only one thing he really wanted for Christmas this year, a shed for his trains. I had to pick his brain for gifts his grandparents could get him, which has never happened before!

I work really hard to make sure my son gets whatever gifts he wants, because he’s such a good kid and he deserves it. When he was little, it was Thomas trains and LEGOs. I remember Christmas 2020, he wanted sets for LEGO Super Mario. We spent hours putting together Bowser’s Castle; it was over 1,000 pieces, and there are no paper instructions, only an app. Right before bedtime, my partner’s foot plowed through Bowser’s Castle, and we spent another handful of hours trying to put it back together. The following year, he put Bowser’s Airship together completely by himself. Last year, he wanted a Nintendo Switch, so my partner and I split the cost with his dad. To date, it’s the most expensive thing he’s ever asked for, but we both use it, so it was worth the cost.

Money has always been an issue for me — I was a single mom for the first six years, and I bought all of his gifts. I always made sure he got the things he repeatedly asked for, and if there were filler gifts, I would do my best. Luckily, I can also outsource gifts to his grandparents, who are always happy to spoil him the best they can. Usually he was asking for trains that cost $15, $20 bucks, so I could make my money stretch and get him enough so it looked like a lot. I’d get him a few small things that would be from Santa, like books or crayons or Play-Doh.

Once he was old enough to understand who Santa was, I decided that Santa wasn’t going to bring him big or expensive gifts. Part of it was selfish; I was working hard to make sure he had what he wanted, and I wanted credit for that. The other part of it was so that he wasn’t disappointed if Santa didn’t get him exactly what he wanted. I remember that there were years when my parents couldn’t afford the mountains of gifts I asked for, and it always made me sad when Santa brought me some shitty winter boots and my friend got Barbie’s DreamHouse. If I was going to disappoint my kid, I was going to own up to it. It also made Santa less important — he believed Santa brought boring gifts like books and went to his grandparents’ houses to pick up his gifts.

But just because he was largely uninterested in Santa doesn’t mean that we didn’t uphold all of the pomp and circumstance around Santa. We baked chocolate chip cookies in our pajamas before bedtime and then left Santa a cookie and a glass of water (I don’t drink milk, so I convinced him that it was important for Santa to stay hydrated) and a couple baby carrots for the reindeer. My boy would write a note for Santa, and then I’d tuck him into bed and watch The Holiday while I wrapped his presents. In the morning, the cookie and water and carrots would be gone, and he would be so happy.

In the last couple of years, he has still wanted to get in pajamas and make cookies and write the note and all that, but his belief in Santa was starting to wane. This year, I straight up asked him, “what’s the deal, do you still believe in Santa?” He thought for a second and said no, but then he asked “Can we still bake cookies?”

That interaction is what it’s like to have a 10-year-old in a nutshell. He may not believe in Santa anymore, because Santa is for little kids. But he’s not ready to give up the tradition of spending time with me in the kitchen, cracking eggs and stealing handfuls of chocolate chips while I mix the batter. There’s a constant battle of watching them grow up and wanting that, but then still seeing glimpses of them being little and wishing you could go back for just a second.

I wrote about this on Halloween, but I think it’s even more true right now. Santa is one of the last pieces of being a little kid, and when they give that up, it hurts a little bit. Of course I’m glad to not have to pretend Santa still exists, but if it meant that he was still my baby boy for a little bit longer, I’d suck it up. He’s growing up so fast y’all. There are no traces of baby fat in his cheeks anymore, and he’s wearing men’s shoes. I’ve gone from Mommy, to Mom to Bruh in what feels like five minutes. I give him a hard time about still playing with Thomas trains, but they’re one of the last hold-outs of his toddler years. One minute he’s watching old episodes of Peppa Pig, and then he’s asking me if I’ve seen the most recent episode of Family Guy. We only have one more year of elementary school; next year he’ll be 11. There’s already fine hair on his legs, and I have to keep haranguing him about remembering to wear deodorant. He still wants little kid bandages, but it’s because he slid across the asphalt playing soccer with his friends at recess.

My mother warned me that it goes by fast, but fuck. The constant back and forth of being the mom of a tween is breaking my heart. How can I be freaking out about puberty when the kid in question still sleeps with a bed full of Paw Patrol stuffies? I’m folding boxer-briefs, but right next to them are his little Minecraft undies. I can’t pick him up without feeling like I’m going to pass out, but he still grabs my face to give me a kiss on the cheek while we sit next to each other on the couch.
The magic of the holiday season just hits different when you’re a parent. I had stopped caring about Christmas, and then I had my son. And now I love sharing that magic with him. But pretty soon, it’s going to lose its shine for him, just like it did for me. I don’t think I’m ready, but if I’ve learned anything about being a parent, you’re never ready.

What are some of your holiday traditions? Matching pajamas? A special dinner? Tell me!

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Queer Mom Chronicles is a column where I examine all of the many facets of queer parenthood through my tired mom eyes. 

Tie-Dyed Christmas Cookies and Coquito

Welcome to the sapphic table, a series of (hopefully!) unfussy seasonal recipes for your farmers market, your CSA bounty — or your grocery store. Today we’re making soft baked Christmas cookies with tie-dyed frosting and coquito, a Puerto Rican coconut rum punch.

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My favorite holiday shirt started as a joke that I found online by one of those shops that stalks your Instagram. It’s one of those “designed to look vintage” thin, worn cotton shirts in a red color so pale it might as well be pink. In loopy, swirly 1950s-style font it reads “I Just Want to Watch Christmas Movies and Bake Cookies.”

I bought it right away because the algorithm will never be defeated. The truth is that baking Christmas cookies by well over the hundreds was my Christmas tradition for years, nearly a decade in fact. I’d test drive new recipes to launch in the months prior, and in the final week before the big holiday I’d narrow down to a half dozen finalists: peppermint brownies, cookie butter fudge, oversized cookies with sprinkles galore, delicate European varieties with subtle sweetness, you name it. Then I would find the cheesiest, cringiest Christmas rom-coms that Netflix could muster and I’d stay up all night getting to work.

I… do that less now. But there is always one cookie that I return to, a cookie that start to finish takes less than a movie to accomplish but the results are so impressive, so photo ready and will make everyone in your life light up with glee as they coo at the details, that it will appear as if you it took you all day to lovingly craft them. They will melt the instant they hit your tongue and remind you of those soft, brightly colored Lofthouse sugar cookies in every grocery store, but this time instead of a backtaste of slightly hard to place chemical coating your throat (hey no judgement said there at all, I love those cookies!) — you will only find the sweetness of vanilla.

This is, to me, the quintessential Christmas cookie. It’s the one my family asks for first every December. And then once I learned that for only one to two extra steps I could blow the decorations of those grocery store cookies out of the water by — gay gasp — TIE DYING THE COLORS?!? You cannot tell me that I’m not guest starring as a master chef on The Great British Bake-Off.

Funny enough, when I originally decided on this month’s recipe, it originally wasn’t about the Christmas cookies at all. I wanted to tell you about how long it took me to finally learn how to make coquito. Coquito is a delicious creamy coconut and cinnamon rum drink that is most often described as “Puerto Rican Eggnog” even though, confusingly, there are no eggs involved (I suppose its rare that eggnog these days has egg in it either? What’s the backstory on that?). Coquito and Puerto Rican Christmas are at this point, synonymous.

Are you really going to tell me that you don’t want melt in your mouth sugar cookies and cinnamon, coconut, and rum to wash it down with, right this very moment? Because I don’t believe you.

This specific Christmas cookie recipe with tie-dyed frosting is a Frankenstein of my creation from a few places. The cookie base comes from The Novice Chef’s Almond Meltaways (I substitute almond for vanilla here, since that’s what most people have on hand. That said if you have some almond extract on your shelf, feel free to switch it back! It’s delicious either way). The frosting recipe comes from Smitten Kitchen because Deb seems to be the only one who’s figured out how to make sugar cookie frosting hard enough to be able stack without making a mess, but soft enough to bite into without any distraction or teeth hurting. And finally, the “tie-dye” design originally caught me from Bon Appetite, though I streamlined the steps.

The Coquito recipe has existed in my notes app, tweaked and adjusted from year to year until I got it right, that I’m not sure of its origins? So we’ll just call it a “family recipe.”

Tie-Dyed Christmas Cookies and Coquito

Makes roughly 36 cookies, and I’m Puerto Rican — we only measure coquito in love

Ingredients for Christmas Cookies with Tie-Dyed Frosting

For the Cookies

1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
¾ cup granulated sugar
1 large egg
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon salt

For the Frosting

1 large egg white
1 1/4 cups powdered sugar
A few drops of vanilla extract
Two food colors (choosing contrasting colors for maximum visual impact)
Sprinkles, if you wish

Instructions for Christmas Cookies with Tie-Dyed Frosting

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Coat a baking sheet with nonstick spray or line it with parchment paper (in this instance, I recommend the parchment paper). Set aside.

In a stand mixer, beat butter and sugar for four minutes. Trust me on this! It will feel like a long time, but the extended mixing will ultimately make for melt in your mouth cookies.  The final mixture should be the texture of buttercream cake frosting. Add egg and vanilla extract, mixing briefly until combined.

Add flour, baking powder, and salt. Mix until combined. Now the texture should now be that of a soft dough.

On your prepared baking sheet, roll 1 tablespoon of dough at a time into small circle. Once all your balls have been made, lightly press into discs using the bottom of a cup.

Bake cookies for 8 minutes. These cookies will not look browned or cooked, but once again I am asking you to trust me that they are! Remember that we we soft, plush sugar cookies and a short baking time will help with that process! Remove cookies from oven and them rest on baking sheet for 5 minutes (this will allow them to use the residual heat to firm up and finish cooking). Then, remove off of cookie sheet to cool completely.

While your cookies cool, it’s time to make your frosting. Whisk egg white in a large bowl until it’s loose and frothy. Add 1 cup of powdered sugar, and whisk until smooth. Add vanilla extract and your last 1/4 cup of sugar — the frosting should be pretty stiff at this point, which is how you want it. This will allow it to harden on the cookie in a smooth sheet (which makes for easy stacking and packing!).

Split the frosting into three small bowls (you can just eyeball it, but save the slightly biggest amount to be left plain white).Take the two smaller amount bowls and, moving quickly, add in food coloring, start small and gradually add until the food coloring brightness is to your liking.

WHEW! Don’t give up! You’re almost there! Let’s assembly line! The frosting will continue to harden so, once again, moving efficiently is your key to success from here on out.

Put bowls of frosting next to cookies, and a flat even surface where the “dipped” cookies can eventually be placed (I just used my baking sheet). Get a small plate, this is where you will do your tie-dye.

Spoon roughly 1 slightly oversized teaspoon of white frosting into the center of your small plate. Drizzle 1 teaspoon of your first color, and 1 teaspoon of your second. You can drizzle in a loose pattern, but don’t go overboard, the cookie dipping process will do most of the work.

Gently press and slightly twirl the top of a cookie into frosting mixture (imagine a tie-dyed t-shirt as you go), then lift up and allow excess glaze to drip back onto the plate. Using a fork, pop any air bubbles on the cookie and swirl colors more if desired — but remember that less is often more!

Transfer cookie to your flat surface. Sprinkle with sprinkles (if using) while the frosting is still wet.

Repeat this process with 2 more cookies. The glaze will lose its swirly effect at this point, so add a fresh ½ teaspoon of each color into your dip mixture. Then start again with the next set of cookies.

If the colors in your mixing plate get too muddled, clean your plate entirely and repeat process, decorating cookies in batches of 3 until all cookies have been glazed. If frosting begins to stiffen too quickly while you’re still decorating, re-loosen with 1/4 teaspoon water at a time (a little goes a long way here) to thin the frosting until it’s back to its original texture.

Let sit cookies sit until the glaze hardens enough that you can tap it with your fingernail, then they are ready to be stored in an airtight container. Meanwhile, let’s make some coquito.

Ingredients for Coquito

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
15 ounce can cream of coconut (Yes in the can form is important, I grew up with Coco Lopez, if you don’t live in a Latine community you can usually find cream of coconut with liquor or piña colada mixes)
14 ounce can sweetened condensed milk
13.5 ounce can coconut milk
12 ounce can evaporated milk
RUM OPTIONS: You ultimately want equal parts dark and white rum, up to 2 and 1/2 cups total to taste (ie/ 1 and 1/4 cup white and 1 and 1/4 dark, see *note for non-alcoholic modifications)
Clean glass bottle, for storage

*Note: Did you want to make a non-alcoholic version? To make virgin coquito, replace the rums with either more coconut milk or half-coconut milk and half-coconut water (or even just regular water)

Instructions for Coquito

Add all the ingredients into a blender. Blend on low for 1 minute. Scrape down the sides of the blender, then blend for an additional 1 minute on medium speed.

Taste for rum, add more until it’s to your liking (after each addition, re-mix coquito either by hand whisking or 30 seconds in the blender on low).

When you’re happy with the taste, gently pour mixture into the glass bottle of your choice. Cap your bottle and refrigerate for at least four hours.

You can store coquito made in the fridge for anywhere between 4 to 8 weeks. It’s not common, but also not unheard of, for the coconut fat to sometimes solidify in the refrigerator. If this happens just remove the bottle of coquito from the fridge set it out on the counter for 10 to 15 minutes minutes before serving, that allows the coconut fat to soften as it warms back up.

Give the coquito bottle a brief shake before pouring to mix the spices that will have settled. Serve cold and poured over ice.

Join Me in Making DIY Holigay Soap

It’s the holigay season! It’s time to do cozy things and get gifts for your loved ones. I figured I would do you a solid and tackle both of those things in one fun post! Last month we made a variety of homey candles and this month we’re learning how to make DIY soap. Nothing is more queer than making your own soap with intention and love to give to your holiday office/school/local barista/Trader Joe’s crush.

Unlike my candle adventures, soap-making is very new to me and I’m still trying to figure out the best mixtures and methods. This guide does not include making soap from scratch. We have less than a week until Christmas so no one has the emotional effort left in them for that. Or, even if you do, you don’t have time to experiment with what works best. We want a quick, homemade, fairly inexpensive gift to have at our disposal for those office Christmas parties happening next week or your in-laws who say that don’t want anything. Let’s do it!

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How To Make Soap with An Aloe Soap Base

You’ll need to gather some ingredients from around the house, in addition to ordering some online.

The soap base and silicone molds create the foundation and personality of the soaps, so you’ll want to put some thought into what might work best for you. I decided to try an aloe base and an oatmeal base. The aloe will give the soap a translucent appearance and it will also have anti-inflammatory properties. The oatmeal will come out a creme color and will be more moisturizing. As for the molds, you can get a generic square or rectangle for pretty cheap. I decided to try a pack with the classic rectangle, a round flower design, and a rectangular wave-looking design. Soap is pretty easy to get out of silicone, so you won’t need to worry about the intricacy of the design as much as you would with, for example, resin.

Once you have your soap base and mold picked out, you’ll need your mix-ins ready to go. I am an essential oils hoarder, so I used a variety of little potions I have. A classic oil like lavender or eucalyptus will always be a big hit. Additionally, you can add other properties to give the soap texture or style. I have a collection of dried flowers I bought from Amazon just for craft making, so I paired the lavender flowers with the lavender scent. You can also use natural ingredients from around the house like lemon zest or whole oats. Many blogs online suggest using food coloring, but the thought of rubbing the chemicals into my hands repeatedly didn’t feel comfortable to me. I didn’t have any vibrant fruit on me, but if you have any type of berry you can blend that to a puree, strain it, and use a little bit in the soap to make a natural dye.

Melt the aloe soap base first. I melted mine over the stove on low heat, but you can also melt the base in sections in a microwave safe bowl.

Once the base melts down, you can either pour it into each individual mold and then mix in the scents and add-ons, or you can do it all in the pot. I chose to make each bar individually since I wanted to try different methods.

For the first three bars I decided to go out on a limb and combine tea tree essential oil with a little water and matcha powder to give it a naturally green hue. I’ll be honest, it didn’t turn out well. You’ll want to vigorously mix the matcha into the water, but even then the matcha can come out grainy and uneven. Use at your own risk.

For the other three bars I mixed a drop or two of lavender essential oil with a bit of water and dried lavender for each individual rectangle. I, then, poured the hot soap base into all of the molds, making sure to mix them each so the oils spread throughout the bar.

Now, just let it sit overnight so that it can harden and dry.

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How To Make Soap with An Oatmeal Soap Base

Melt the oatmeal soap base first. Once again, I melted mine over the stove on low heat, but you can also melt the base in sections in a microwave safe bowl. I used the oatmeal soap base and the two decorative molds.

While the oatmeal bars melt down, prepare your mix-ins. I decided that all four of my wave-looking bars would be menthol-scented. I have an oil mix created for clogged sinuses, so this can be a fun gift to give during cold weather months. Two of my flowery round molds will be peppermint scented and the other two will have hints of lemon.

Similar to the water and oil technique I used for the aloe bars, I put a few drops of my scent into the base of the molds and mixed it with a little water. I poured it into the base, mixed it together, and let it sit overnight.

I, then, melted more blocks of oatmeal soap base and prepared my round soap molds. For two of the molds, I dropped in a hint of peppermint oil with some water, and for the other two molds I decided to be adventorous. I took some black unsweetened tea from our fridge and mixed it into the bottom of the mold with the lemon oil to create the effect of a warm cup tea. I also wanted to make sure I could visually tell each grouping of bars from each other.

Remember to use different utensils for bars with different scents so you don’t mix two scents together. I used chopsticks… it’s truly DIY in my home.

Now, you just let all of it set overnight! I let mine cool for about 9 hours before removing them from the molds, but they could’ve sit a few hours more.

In the end, the aloe texture came out slimier than I expected, but the oatmeal bars held their shape and texture almost perfectly! If I were to do this again, I would make them in larger batches where I mix the oils in with the soap base in the pot. I think mixing them in with the water individually left the bars slightly uncured.

All you need to do now is wrap it up to make it look like a little hallmark handmade present! I bought some rustic string from IKEA for about $3 and tried a few different yarn wraps. While this certainly doesn’t look perfect, it gives you that fireplace winter vibe that we’re craving. Another great option is finding cute fabric gift bags to pop them in.

Let me know in the comments if you have any tips or tricks. Happy soap making and happy holigays!

10 Budget Friendly Holigay Dates

It’s the most wonderful time of the year, even though my bank account would strongly disagree. It’s the perfect season for hopeless romantics like me because we get to watch all the cute Hallmark movies about meeting your dream partner and falling in love! The reality is, even if you do have the partner of your dreams, we can’t all vacation to a ski chalet to drink hot cocoa and enter their gingerbread house contest for a weekend. However, I am determined to bring the love-dovey season of lights and giving vibe to my dating life, so I came up with a few budget friendly or completely free Hallmark-adjacent options for us. Most of these holiday date ideas could be used with new-er partners or your long-time life partner. Happy dating!

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Go look at holiday lights in a wealthy neighborhood

If you already live in a neighborhood or complex that goes all-out with lights, then take a little intentional stroll around town to check out your neighbors’ hard work. If you don’t, or you just want to see some wild front-yard configurations, head to the nearest “nice” neighborhood with the large houses and watch the light show that one house does that’s always the absolute most. The fun part of this is making comments back and forth about what you would do differently, or how this one yard is your dream yard. Bring a warm beverage to-go for added enjoyment!

Visit an animal shelter

I only recently learned you can just show up to shelters during operating hours and look at all the cute animals. You can always say you’re looking to adopt (and then not), but I have not gone on this date, because I will indeed end up taking home an animal, which I guess would really elevate the date. Many shelters are having wild deals on adopting right now, so if there was ever a time to get a pet with your partner, maybe consider doing it now! However, do this at your own risk.

Make a TikTok together

Sometimes I roll my eyes at TikTok couples doing “couples challenges” or even just, I don’t know, being themselves on camera, but for a one or two-time thing this could be fun! It will vary depending on your interests, but you can search for couples’ videos in your TikTok search bar for inspiration. The most important part is to let yourselves have fun and be a little silly.

Attend a middle school/high school holiday concert

If you have children, this might already be an obligation (but still cute if you have an adult date to bring!). If you don’t, check out the calendars at your local high schools and middle schools for their winter events. Usually, the schools will put on a band or choir concert of some sort, and it’s often free to attend! You might be thinking (like I am right now) isn’t this kinda weird if you don’t have kids? I ran this by colleagues of mine of all different ages, who assured me it isn’t, especially since you’re supporting local community arts.

Build a non-traditional gingerbread house

You can build whatever type of house you want, but I think it’s much more exciting to choose something slightly questionable. The mystery and complexity of it all brings more excitement and laughter to the date! Target always has new versions of gingerbread houses on the shelves, like this football stadium or treehouse, but my personal favorite is this house Publix released of a Publix store.

Nighttime photoshoot

Pick out some cute outfits and find a spot that really illuminates after dark. This could be a Christmas market, a park, or even your own front yard. Have a little photo sesh where you each take photos of the other person doing various poses (silly or sexy)! The important part is hyping each other up like they’re the most fabulous model in the world.

Dinner and a movie, but better

Instead of going a move theater and paying for overpriced food, why not do this whole date but from the comfort of your own home! The added twist is that you’ll theme the food and/or drinks around the movie you choose. For example, you could watch Happiest Season and plan to make one of the many meals Harper’s family makes around the holidays. I’ll admit, some movies are much easier to theme than others (insert any straight Hallmark movie involving making cookies), but just have fun with it!

Cooking competition

No grocery shopping allowed! You and your partner go head-to-head in the kitchen using only what you already have to make the most festive, scrumptious dish you can think of before the timer goes off! If you’re more of a cooking person, stick to entrees, but if you both prefer baking, maybe choose something inspired by a certain theme or word. This date gets particularly fun and challenging when you’re near the end of your latest grocery shop and ingredients are limited.

Go to a hotel bar

You may not be able to go to a ski lodge for the holidays, but what you can do is find a hotel in the closest major city near you and go to their bar for drinks! This will give you the chance to look fancy and pretend you’re in that Hallmark movie without actually paying the price. Just get one round of drinks and split a dish to keep costs low. Typically, larger hotels will decorate for the holidays, so you may even have an opportunity for a few romantic photos.

No tech night

Choose one intentional night of the week and set a time frame where you both can’t use any type of technology. This includes phones, TVs, computers, etc. You might need to start off small with 30 minutes, but sometimes the most intimate moments can manifest if you spend three hours of uninterrupted quality time together. Some of the activities you could do in this tech free time could be stargazing, lightening a few candles and playing board games, going on a walk, cuddling and reminiscing about funny moments you’ve shared, or simply just sex.

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Do you have any holiday dates planned this month? Let us know what they are!

We Got High and Watched Hallmark Hanukkah Movie “Round and Round,” and Yes of Course the Sister Is a Lesbian

Welcome back to another edition of “I Got High and Watched” and this time… I have company! That’s right it’s Hanukkah and I’m having a Hanukkah party a.k.a. getting high and watching the new Hallmark movie Round and Round with fellow Senior Editor and fellow Jew Riese Bernard.

This is a pretty freewheeling conversation so I’m going to give you some plot help up top if you have yet to watch this cinematic achievement. First of all, this is a Groundhog’s Day, as in the main character, Rachel, must live the seventh night of Hanukkah again and again. Her boyfriend Adam cancels on Hanukkah the day of the party, claiming to be sick. Her new love interest is a nice Jewish boy named Zach who is into nerd stuff which comes in handy when trying to solve the timeloop. Oh and Rachel’s sister Shoshanna is gay and pregnant and married to a woman with dyed blonde hair named Bex.

ALSO Vic Michaelis who plays Rachel is nonbinary!! We didn’t learn this until after our discussion because they are giving the performance of a lifetime here as “straight cis women.” But worry not! We returned to excitedly discuss this revelation.

Okay then, eat some latkes, spin your magic dreidel, and join us as we watch Round and Round.

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Drew: Hi sorry! I was sorting DVDs and lost track of time.
Riese: That’s so on brand for you
Drew: One sec lemme have another hit lol
Okay ready??
Riese: I am!!!

Riese: Okay so we open on a Seventh Night of Hanukkah dance party for adult singles?
This is where Rachel’s parents met.
This is a wild concept for an event.
Drew: I thought you meant an 80s party was a wild concept for an event. And I was like, “no, this is a flashback.”
Riese: Is this what it was like to be an adult Jew in the 80s?
I was a child Jew in the 80s so we didn’t party like this
Drew: Cream cheese isn’t sexy. Is that a hot take?
Riese: I don’t think cream cheese is sexy so no

Riese: Okay so now we are in the present day and our protagonist Rachel overslept, but luckily her Mom called her to wish her a happy seventh night of Hanukkah so she woke up.
Does your mom call to wish you a happy 7th night of Hanukkah?
Drew: My mom does call me to wish me a Happy Hanukkah.
So on the seventh night she’ll be like, “Did you light the candles?”
And I’ll say, “No I just moved in. I don’t have a menorah yet.”
And she’ll say, “Oh.”
Riese: Yes, when my Mom asks me that I say “yes” even when I didn’t.

Drew: Wait is this movie gay or are we just doing this for fun?
Riese: Well, there is a small gay part.
But I fear it might be so small that in an hour and 20 minutes you will be cursing my name.
Drew: I spent my life with straight Jews I’m prepared.

Riese: Okay now they are at their local Jewish bakery, Goldberg’s.
Riese: I have to be honest it doesn’t feel very Jewish to me!
It’s very polished
Drew: No it doesn’t have jewish bakery vibes

Drew: Wait, is the man with the Christmas blazer playing his guitar in the train station singing an original song??
Wait
Her boyfriend is also at this train station?
Riese: Those donuts look good
Drew: Donuts!
Riese: Wait who is this other man

Drew: Who is this actor she just bumped into?
Riese:Well it’s not her boyfriend
Maybe it’s the Jewish boy of her dreams.

Riese: Ok so now we are meeting her Dad.
Riese: Her Dad was in Suits. Did you watch Suits?
Drew: I did not.
Riese: Ok well this guy playing the dad is like iconic in Suits.
Drew: Is her dad gay? Is everyone gay?

Riese: THE LESBIAN IS HERE
Drew: Oh okay this is the gay. I can tell because she has dyed blonde hair.
Riese: Yeah she is Rachel’s sister’s wife
Everyone is gay.

Riese: Drew…
Have I ever told you…
That I love you a latke?
Drew: I love you a latke too !!
Riese: Dad’s excited for the new condo ’cause they have a stream room where they can have a Shvitz! Ok horny jewish parents.
Drew: I do love the horny Jewish parent trope.
My friend Tirosh’s parents are like that IRL.

Riese: Ok I think this girl on the beanbag chair is also a lesbian

Drew: Rachel says “I thought I’d be writing the novels not covering them in red ink”
I thought I’d be making the Hanukkah movies with gay characters not watching them for a high review.
Life takes us fun places.
Riese: One day you will be making the Hanukkah movies with gay characters.
Drew: That sounded negative. I love this job. I’m high watching a movie for work.
Riese: That’s true not a bad gig.
Drew: I’m just salty because my very trans short keeps getting rejected from the big straight festivals and I’m about to turn 30 so I need to have a little crisis.
Riese: I did think, personally, that I too would be writing the novels by the age of 30
and yet I have done no such thing
Drew: I want to do this AND make movies
Riese: Same!! I want to do this AND write a novel.
Drew: I’ll never be too famous to not high watch a Hanukkah movie with you for this site.
Riese: THANK YOU DREW.
That means so much to me.
Drew: It’ll get even more clicks if I’m famous.
Imagine how fun it would be if you were doing this with like Desiree Akhavan right now.
Riese: I don’t know her though and I know you.
Drew: Right but I’d still be me.

Riese:  Honestly these parents are cool.
Even though they have glass vases of bath beads.
Drew: Is the drama that the lesbian sister is doing Hanukkah at her wife’s next year? There are eight nights. Split ’em, babe.
Riese: Yeah four and four.
Drew: Even if the other parents lived far you could do three and three with two days off for travel/recovery.
Riese: True, an easy split.

Riese: This is so quiet for a Jewish event!!!
Everybody should be screaming!
Drew: It’s true !
So much more screaming

Drew: Autostraddle writer Christina Tucker was just saying “there should be more romcoms about loneliness” and I think this is that.
She was saying that during While You Were Sleeping.
I was in Philly most of today.
Riese: Well that’s adorable

Drew: This actor playing Zach The Love Interest is in something.
Also I don’t know who he is or why he’s at this party.
He has Dungeons and Dragon dice! We had such a good piece about that this week.
Riese: We did!
It’s all connected.
Drew: Wait okay but who is this actor?
At first I thought he was one of the British men who has dirty gay sex in God’s Own Country. But it’s not.
Riese: I’ll look him up
Drew: I’ll have Elise do it. She’s next to me.
Oh Zach is at the party because he teaches art with Grandma Rosie.
Okay.
They’re not related
Thank god

Drew: I love this dad actor
Riese: Yeah he’s a star of Suits, Louis Litt!
Drew: He is?? Should I watch Suits? What’s it about?
Riese: Lawyers who have papers in manilla envelopes.

Drew: You know, a lot of Jewish dads, even the straight ones, tend to be a little fruity.
Riese: Yes Jewish dads are lazy femmes
Drew: Hahahaha.

Drew: Wow that is a beautiful dreidel that Grandma is giving to Rachel.
When is someone going to give me some fancy Jewish stuff?
Riese: I had a Jewish boyfriend who got me a Tiffany’s bracelet.
I think that’s fancy jewish stuff

Riese: Ok so I have a theory which is that I think maybe Hallmark Christmas movies can’t just become Hallmark Hanukkah movies.
Drew: No Hanukkah movies should be louder !!!
Riese: Right because like the culture of a Jewish family event is just not quite this.
There is not enough Jewish energy here.
Drew: My family gatherings are like straight Transparent.
Riese: Yes exactly.
Drew: Your mom is gay.
Riese: That’s true.
So my family gatherings are just Transparent.
But if Shelly was the only character.
Drew: Is the rest of your family as gay as the Transparent family?
Riese: No, just my mom and me. My brother is straight.
Drew: Good for him!

Riese: Omg a burning bush! i mean burning curtains!
Drew: Fire special effects!
Riese: Wow even the fire was quiet!!!

Drew: I want you to know I’m watching this on my new 4k TV.
As I’m sure it was intended to be watched.
Riese: You’re getting the full Hanukkah experience
Drew: AND the TV is on the credenza Elise just redid.
It was $20 from Out of the Closet and Elise redid it and it’s beautiful now.
Riese: Oh wow you’re experiencing the magic of the cinema.
You came to your own apartment for magic.
UH OH SHE WAKES UP AND IT’S THE SAME DAY

Drew: WAIT WHAT
It’s a Groundhog Day??????
Riese: Omg it’s like Groundhog’s Day but Seventh Night of Hanukkah
Drew: ITS A GROUNDHOG DAY????
Riese: Now I have another chance to understand the plot and why her boyfriend and also Zach were at the train station with the christmaz blazer singer.
Drew: Wow I am so happy it’s a groundhog day.

Drew: Her boyfriend Adam is bad.
I think if she tells off Adam and falls for Zach, then she’ll break this time loop
Riese: Or if she catches a jelly donut in her mouth
Drew: Can you imagine !
How did she drop the donuts again??
Riese: Just a Klutzy Kathy!!!!!!
Wait ok so just to be clear
Never mind I don’t understand.
Drew: It’s a Groundhog Day. Have you seen Groundhog’s Day?
Riese: I saw it in theaters Drew!
Drew: Omg
Riese: But where was her boyfriend? Was he lying about being sick?
Drew: He was lying !
Riese: How do we know he’s lying
Drew: Because he’s a jerk.
He said he was sick but was out on the town.
And then told the music man he had no change.
Riese: He does not love her a latke.
Drew: He does not. He abhorahs her.

Riese: I wish someone would tell me they were stuck in a timeloop.
I would be so excited if my friend was stuck in a time loop.
Drew: I would LOVE to be the sidekick in a body swap or groundhog day
Riese: I would have SUCH a good time.
I just read a time loop book: Before I Fall.
Drew: Oh I saw the movie adaptation of that!

Riese: Make out with Bex. There’s sexual tension
Drew: Wait so the lesbian with the dyed blonde hair is married to the sister?
Riese: Yes. Her name is Bex. The pregnant sister is Shoshanna. I looked it up.

Drew: Wow already a time loop days going by montage
Riese: I wish they’d bought a real 80s song.
I would love a right round baby right round
and round.
Drew: When they do comps like this though they get musicians to write them and it’s how up and coming musicians can make money.
So it’s good!
Riese: Oh that’s nice ok

Drew: This feels rushed.
Riese: Yeah it’s too early for a montage
We need to see her live through this day again one full time at least before a montage
Drew: This movie should be two hours not 80 minutes.
Movies should be longer
Riese: Yeah five hour movies.
Then it’s like $4 an hour.
Drew: Chantal Akerman was Jewish.
She made long movies
Riese: a two-hour movie is $10/hour, so better rate for a longer movie.

Drew: Oh wow they’re doing references.
It’s like Scream or in the body swap movie I wrote when my character mentions The Hot Chick.

Riese: Everybody’s hair is too gentile. Nobody has frizzy curls.
Drew: My mom and sister’s dream.

Riese: I wish my mom was making me latkes right now
Drew: Me too.

Riese: Wow her fate is to drop the donuts.
Drew: Devastating

Riese: This man should have glasses and curlier hair!!!!!
Drew: Idk he feels really Jewish to me.
Judaism can look like so much.
Riese: Yeah it really can.
It can look like me, even
But the actor playing Zach is named Bryan Greenberg so.
So he is for sure Jewish
Drew: That would’ve been my last name if my grandpa didn’t change it to avoid antisemitism
Riese: That’s so real.
Drew: Drew Greenberg is like… no thank you. But maybe that is internalized antisemitism
Riese: Probably.
Drew: I have a theory that I don’t want FFS because it feels weird to get rid of my nose.
I’m like who decides what is feminine? Why isn’t a big Jewish nose feminine?
Riese: Yeah I feel like I am not allowed to comment on this topic.
Drew: Lmao smart
Riese: So I am just nodding supportively and letting you know that I support you keeping your face or changing your face if that’s what you want.
Drew: My new plan is to find a doctor who will crush my jaw and forehead and cheeks and whatever but let me keep my crooked Jewish nose.
Riese: Well i bet you can find a Jewish doctor to do that.
Drew: Although Elise has pointed out that I only talk about wanting plastic surgery after I’ve recently visited my family. As long as Jewish families are on topic.

Drew: Wait, I love that Rachel writes fantasy and Zach loves fantasy. That’s sweet.
Riese: Yeah that is cute.

Drew: Wow they left the house.
Riese: They’re at Zach’s friends comic book shop! They invested in another set.

Riese: Do you know that they have a village?
Drew: On-set? Yeah video village
Riese: Hallmark.
Drew: Oh wait. Like a Hallmark village where they film all their movies?
Riese: Yeah I think I read that somewhere.

Riese: Who is that woman at the family Hanukkah party by the way? The British one.
Drew: I don’t know! I just asked Elise.
She didn’t know either.
Riese: Is she married to someone in Rachel’s family?
Drew: I think she’s a family friend
Riese: Oh ok like in The Bear.
Drew: Yes. Wow what a great episode.
Riese: Yeah I was just thinking about sitting there with my mouth open for an hour.
Drew: That’s more my family gatherings than this.
Riese: Yes 100%
Drew: Remember Russian Doll?
Great show. I think that’s my favorite groundhog day.
Riese: That was a great show.
Drew: Sweet birthday baby.
I turn 30 in two weeks. Soon I’m going to be the sweet birthday baby.
Riese: Well, i for one am so pleased that you are alive and thus experiencing birthdays of advanced age.

Riese: Is this a gay bar?
Drew: Anything can be a gay bar
Riese: Word
Drew: Depending on what you do in the bathrooms
Riese: Poppers or dreidel
Drew: Exactly

Drew: Wait, the boyfriend bailed on her to dance alone? He’s not even cheating??
Riese: Uh huh just to hang with his cool friends
Drew: Just bros being guys.

Riese: He probs has no idea that she has such a chill hanukkah house
nobody is going to lick their finger and wipe schmutz off his face at Rachel’s house
Drew: Yeah they seem like easy parents to meet
Riese: And her Dad was in Suits!

Riese: Is he sitting? Is he sitting down to break up with her?
Drew: I think he is.
Riese: Stand up!!!!
Get on your feet!
Get up and make it happen!!
Drew: I’ve never broken up with someone sitting down. Wait except my first serious girlfriend but then we got back together and then she broke up with me.
Riese: Were you both sitting? It’s just that she was standing up and he was sitting down.
Drew: The first time? Yes in Central Park. The second time idk I was in bed and she broke up with me via text message. She could’ve been standing.
Riese: Those sure are different approaches to a breakup.
Drew: Lmao yeah summed up our approaches to the relationship as well.

Drew: God this would be SO FUN!
Imagine you’re going to a hanukkah party.
And then you meet a pretty girl who is like “I’m in a groundhog day.”
Riese: Yes
Drew: And now you’re at a bar with her? Working through stuff.
Riese: Wait except how does that work because I am in the day with her
What happens to me
My consciousness has to be moving forward right
Drew: No
It’ll start over
Riese: Ugh I don’t know how to do a time loop  
Drew: I no longer want to be the sidekick. I want to be the love interest.
Anyway, the new guy is so much cuter.
Riese: Yeah. The boyfriend looks like he would’ve gone out with Samantha Jones for one date in 2003 because he had one (1) good quality.
Drew: Lol yes.

Riese: Is she gonna break groundhog curse by staying up late?
Drew: I have no idea where the movie is. Like if we’re midway. Or it’s almost done
Riese: Me neither.
Drew: I love bagels
Riese: Omg. We have 34 more minutes.
I love bagels too
Drew: Oh that’s not bad.
I was worried we were ten minutes in.
Riese: Yeah that felt possible.

Drew: This is working on me. Zach and Rachel have chemistry. He’s cute.
Riese: THEY MENTIONED PAPER GIRLS! Wow whomever wrote this screenplay likes a lot of cool things.
Drew: If I was stuck in a time loop I wouldn’t think time loop fictions would help.
Riese: I would. I read like 50 dystopian novels at the start of the pandemic
Drew: What did you learn?
Riese: I cured covid

Drew: She should try kissing Zach. Maybe that’ll do it.
Riese: Yeah that might help.
If Rachel was gay she could write for us.
“I Stole My Sister’s Wife While She Was Pregnant”
Drew: Bex can. “YNH: I Think My Sister-in-Law Is Flirting With Me (And Also Stuck In a Time Loop)”

Riese: What is Bex’s job?
Drew: Gay.
Riese: I think she works at REI

Drew: Don’t they have to get to the Hanukkah party at some point on this day?
In this version are the parents just alone?
Riese: Yeah but in time loops it’s ok to just let your Sims wander around the house one of the days.
Drew: I do think I’d do one crazy one. Or maybe I’d be scared it would stop
Riese: Right, what if you stopped on cocaine day
and blew a hole in your nose

Drew: Aw Zach loves Rachel’s book! He’s illustrating it!
This is nice.
Riese: Her book is a hit!
Drew: Imagine someone reading your book at a party.
And not in 3-6 months.

Riese: Ok Zach is a little gay.
Not like gay for men.
But like “dude that’s so gay.”
Drew: The best kind of straight guy
Riese: Yes he’s sensitive.
Drew: Someday he’ll be a vaguely gay straight Jewish dad.
Riese: Yes

Riese: Ugh those latkes look so good. I want a large cookie.
I realize we should be explaining more about what’s happening in the movie so people know what we are talking about
Drew: Nah they’ll get it. Our readers are sharp.

Riese: Her dad is lying on her bed in such a gay way
Bex is rubbing off on them
Drew: Oh Dad says there was another woman before her Mom!
Another woman!
Riese: He was dumped right before Halloween?
Drew: Devastating
Riese: He’d sworn off love by Hanukkah!!!
Like her dad, I always think about my moods vis a vis their distance from Hanukkah
Drew: Lmao
Also like her dad I think about my breakups in relation to halloween
Riese: They want her to step outside her comfort zone so i think she should go to belarus
Drew: I’ve never been!
Riese: Right i don’t think she has either
Drew: There are so many places I’ve never been

Drew: The lesbians really aren’t in this a lot
Riese: No this is two straight girls sitting on a bed talking about boys.
Drew: She’s not very close with her sister.
She’s closer with her cousin.
The straight/gay divide

Riese: She has to get the donuts home
Drew: To fix the time loop they need to eat a donut like lady and the tramp.
Riese: Oh good call.
This is a great set.
Drew: I love sets.
Riese: I love Disneyworld.

Riese: These characters really do not understand how to do a time loop.
By this point Zach should’ve told her like one thing he’s never told anybody.
Drew: Right haha
Riese: It would make this so much easier.
Drew: This has had some good jokes.
I’m glad this is a groundhog day. I had no idea
Riese: I wish a mom or grandma would yell something embarrassing about one of their children so this would feel more authentically Jewish
maybe just one like, “you never call, you never write”

Riese: Did you have different themes for different nights of Hanukkah?
Drew: No! Themes?? Like under the sea?
Riese: Oh god that would’ve been epic but not like that.
Like one night was the night we had neighborhood Hanukkah and did a Secret Santa gift exchange, at the Tylers’ house, there were like five Jewish families on my block and all the kids were the same age.
Another night was the night we got calendars for the next year.
One night was when we gave presents to lower income people and did not get presents.
One night was clothes. One night was hand-made gifts for each other?
Drew: Oh yeah we had that more with Passover.
Different nights different traditions

Riese: The energy in the comic book shop guy’s van is Jewish I’m on board
literally!!!
Omg the bakery lady knows Rachel’s grandma!
I hope these old ladies hooked up on the kibbutz in college

Riese: Wow Zach and Rachel bumped into each other a tiny bit in the van and acted like they’d just accidentally conceived a child
Drew: That is how it’s done.
I appreciate that they kissed before the end. Sometimes they just do one kiss at the end.
Not enough.
Riese: Yeah it would’ve been better if they’d gone to a role-playing sex party but I’m glad that they kissed.

Drew: Once the boyfriend was dumped he showed up! Ego!
Riese: Do you love her a latke or no?
a question all Jews should ask themselves.

Drew: The boyfriend also seems gay.
Riese: Do you think we think everyone is gay because they are or because we are or because we are high or because of Jewish?
Drew: These are great questions.
I think I tend to think everyone is gay.
Because so many people around me are gay.
Riese: He seems so gay! Like he would be a hairdresser in another Christmas movie!
Drew: Good for him!

Drew: Zach doesn’t wanna be her “Timeloop Rebound”
Riese: That’s a good name for a movie
or a basketball team

Drew: Why are they being sad?
Riese: Yeah cut it out.
We didn’t make the oil burn for eight (8) nights just to have you standing there being sad.
are there candles that burn for 8 days
Drew: No you light new ones every night
Riese: Ok I know
But I mean
Is there a giant candle
That burns for 8 days
I am describing a lamp

Drew: Imagine being like “I can’t do timeloop with you anymore.”
Riese: I would never!!!!!
Oh now Zach’s got a yamaka on. Shit is getting serious.

Riese: Rachel should eat the driedel
Or stick it up her boyfriend’s butt
I bet that would break the time loop
It would break something
Drew: Grandma knows about the magic driedel?? She’s a witch!
Riese: Yeah grandma has powers.
Drew: That’s fun.
Riese: Do adults play dreidel?
Drew: If they’re young at heart.

please note that this next section is a major spoiler for “Round and Round” so if you want to watch it, stop reading now!!!

Drew: Did she break the loop??
Riese: SHE’S FREE! Like Willy.

Drew: Omg
Riese: Wow the dad from Suits knew about the dreidel ALL THIS TIME
omg everyone in the family has found their soulmate on seventh night of hanukkah time loop

Drew: Now THIS is a twist
Riese: This is like Gone Girl level twist
SHOW US THE MOVIE OF BEX AND SHOSHANNA GROUNDHOG DAY
Drew: I WANT
I love that the message is “true love takes time” instead of “love at first sight.”
That’s nice
Riese: Yes that is nice.
Why are santas
She couldn’t take the risk of letting her true self shine.
Chutzpah!
Turtlenecks
Oh now she can choose who to time loop!
I hope she chooses you.
Drew: What lesson would I be learning?
Or is it soulmate specific.
I don’t think I believe in soulmates
Riese: Hmmm hard to say
Drew: Also does the magic dreidel only match Jews together?
Riese: Yes, it’s an arm of the state.
Birthright time loop.
Drew: Horror movie where I’m trying to stay with Elise but the magic dreidel is being weird about bloodlines.

Riese: Omg a flashback montage! Wow, I love cinema.
Drew: He’s remembering everything that happened in all the other versions of this day!!
Riese: I’m so happy for this girl and her not-Jewish hair.
Drew: Wow some actual good kissing.
Riese: Omg all of the elderly people are watching them kiss i love it

Drew: What is this jacket on Bex??
Riese: Everybody’s in their Sabbath Best
Drew: Wait I just realized… per family tradition someday that little kid is going to be terrorized by the magic dreidel.

Drew: Wow and that’s the end of the movie. We did it.
Riese: We fixed the time loop!

24 hours later…

Drew: The lead of Round and Round is nonbinary??
Riese: qwhaaattt
I didn’t even know they were queer!
Drew: Yes !!!
An ACTOR
We believed they were just RACHEL
Riese: ER Fightmaster follows them on insta?? Wow they really are gay.
Drew: We need to add this to the convo.
Riese: Yes. No wonder they had so much chemistry with Bex.

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Round and Round is available on the Hallmark Channel.

How To Romanticize Being Solo for the Holidays

feature image photo by HollenderX2 via Getty Images

In the past, even though I might have avoided many major holidays with my family, I at least often had a queer partner who had vaguely similar experiences with the holidays, who was somewhat equally interested in carving out our own space. Similarly, as a witch and pagan of 20+ years, I’ve also always held in some ways to the reconstructed vestiges of Yule traditions that, if anything, make the consumerism and exploitation and waste of the Christmas season in the U.S. look like a pile of hot, plastic garbage. So, then, being in a situation where I am not spending the Christmas holiday with a partner or with family, where I’m going it solo, shouldn’t be that hard, right?

Nope, actually. Going it solo for Christmas is turning out to be annoyingly emotional. Something having to do with my inner child, probably. (I’m asking Krampus to come get my inner child I think. I’ve had it with this weepy little thing.) However, what’s helped immensely has been romanticizing the whole affair. If left unchecked, I can tend toward a sloppy kind of bachelorism, toward eating whatever I have on hand, not decorating, not doing anything special. But, no, this year, I do want to make sure I have as nice of a Yule (and Christmas) season as is possible, by romanticizing my solo experience of the holigay. And if I’m doing that, you can, too.

Shifting Your Attitude

On “Thanksgiving,” I called my family because my grandpa would be in the same room as everyone else, and my sister took on the job of carrying the video call around on her phone so I could say hello to everyone. In a less-than-ten-minute call, I immediately received a guilt-tripping from my dad, in front of everyone. I told a friend about this, to which he threw his hands up in the air, equally frustrated with his own family shit, and said, “And then they wonder why you don’t visit for the holidays!”

In sessions with my therapist, in talks with queer and trans friends, there are few things thornier or more fraught than the topic of family, of getting along with them and spending time with them, being various levels of out or not with them, of what we give up of ourselves, our self-respect, our political values when we bend and contort ourselves to spend time with our blood connections. My therapist has said something really useful to me, which is that I need to work on disappointing people, that not being further injured by my family is perhaps actually important to my mental health.

If you’re taking a break from holigays with family, or it’s not an option, or you’re finding you’re single or that your partner(s) are busy or with their given families and you don’t have anything with friends planned, either, and you don’t have children — that’s okay! You are neither Scrooge nor are you “The Little Match Girl.” (What is wrong with Hans Christian Andersen? I mean, I know he was often being a dramatic queen, but this story wrecked three-year-old me!) You are just you, and you are enough, and you don’t owe anyone your time around the holidays. You are perfectly capable of romanticizing your life for a little period in December.

A Little Decor Goes a Long Way

This year, I went to Lowe’s and got a tree. A worker at this particular Lowe’s, in fact, once refused service to my ex-girlfriend and me. He was an angry-looking skinhead type. Anyway, once I got help from a couple of alt-looking people at customer service, they sent me back to the tree area where I played “Alt Right or Just Alternative” with the dude putting a fresh cut on my cheap little tree. Based on the way he just grunted at me and my prior experiences with the store…might have to go with the former. Did I want to go to a family-owned lot? Yes. Did I run out of time and energy and also need things from Lowe’s for working on my house? Also, yes.

But I got a tree! A wee little tree! And I put it in the tree stand I thrifted, and it’s now standing up in my living room, drinking water and shedding pine needles and smelling good and everything. I’m planning to make some dried orange garlands and some witchy little decorations out of sticks and brush, and with a few twinkling lights, I’m sure it’s going to make the room that much more charming.

You don’t have to go all out, but if you tidy up and make or put up even just one or two decorations to serve as focal points, I can guarantee you’ll feel both more in charge of your own experience and like the nights are a little less dark. And perhaps the nights are also less dark because you’ve got sparkly lights. Who’s to say?

Food Is Important

Now, I don’t think you have to go all out and get real expensive with things, but I do think a little intentionality with your grocery shopping this time of year can go a long way when it comes to making things romantic. Buy a pomegranate and add the seeds to a plate of cheese and crackers. Try a few new recipes. Make sure when you’re serving food for yourself, your plating is pleasant on the eye and you feel like your own aesthetic sensibilities are worth taking a few extra moments. Even pausing to sprinkle a few raisins and some cinnamon on your oatmeal in a way that looks cute this time of year will make you feel more like things are special, and like you, loved one, are special, too.

So Are Your Favorite Holiday Specials

Am I going to arrange a time to watch The Muppet Christmas Carol with my sister over video call sometime this year? Absolutely. You can also return to your favorites! There are no rules! It’s whatever you want to watch. Watch all the Bob’s Burgers or Star Trek Christmas episodes or unearth whatever cursed Christmas special you vaguely remember from your childhood and want to see. YouTube remains a wild place. Is there a movie that gives you weird feelings that you want to avoid? Forget it ever existed! This is about you and whatever is going to make you smile during a night in when you’re eating the aforementioned “nice food.”

Remember You’re Not Alone In This

Lots of people are hanging out solo this year, too! I know many “liberal” families have decided they’re going to accept the gays now, but certainly not everyone has that when it comes to family. Some people have abusive parents who they’ve gone no contact with or myriad other reasons for not spending time with families this season. Lots of people are also single or solo poly with no plans for the holiday itself, and that can mean feeling a bit sidelined when it comes to such a nuclear-family-oriented celebration.

Put Events on Your Calendar

That said, queers have always found a way. If you’re looking for someplace to go on Christmas itself, I’d check local queer orgs and, also, if you feel comfortable going to a bar, gay bars. Some of the older ones will have holiday parties on Christmas because they’ve operated through times where no one was going back to their families.

Aside from the day itself, the holiday season is absolutely CHOCK FULL OF EVENTS. In Pittsburgh where I live, there are queer holiday craft markets and pictures with Krampus at a brewery and drag shows and so on. I’ve already noted several upcoming events and reached out to folks I knew would be around to see if they want to go with me. Be on the lookout, make sure you’re following local businesses on Instagram, and ask around to find out what other people are up to!

Even in rural areas without queer-specific programming, you can certainly find a holiday market where you can get some hot apple cider and walk around. Christmas villages are popping up everywhere. If you start digging, you’re sure to find local listicles talking about where you can go to witness an annual gingerbread house contest or see a choir perform.

Finally, COVID is still very much a thing, but I have a very Romantic suggestion for you if you need outdoor activities and live in a cold area, and that is finding out if there is a local temporary ice skating rink anywhere. Where I’m at, they freeze one up downtown, and surrounding it is a winter market with gift and hot cocoa vendors, etc. Even if you don’t want to skate, you can head down, wander around, grab a hot drink, and watch small children run around and scream.

The important thing is to find something to do, and then to get out there and do it! Even if it feels cheesy, it’s important to break routine and get out. Plus, a lot of these things are free or cheap because they’re hoping to sell gifts, so if you’re not buying, you can go and mostly enjoy the atmosphere.

Find the Lights. Literally.

There are a lot of options for this! Everyone from local theme parks to botanic gardens to downtown shop displays is lit up this time of year. No matter what you choose, getting around some sparkle, maybe pulling your inner child out of Krampus’ sack for a peek at some holiday lights, is going to make you feel like the center of your own magical holiday journey.

You can go for a paid route, where depending on where you’re going and what the other activities are, your costs will vary. This could include theme park tickets, for example, or it might be a drink at a ridiculously decorated bar, or it might be paying for one of those light shows you drive through. Or, on the low cost to free end, you can find a good neighborhood (even your own) to walk around in the evening and just ogle everyone’s decor. Get weird! Watch someone’s inflatable snowman move for a while. They put it out there. Don’t they want people to look? You can repeat this evening walk technique as many times as you need to in order to feel Romantic. It also works in a rural setting, but this time, with looking at the natural world, the sparkle of moonlight on ice, perhaps, and reveling in nature’s mystery and the changing seasons.

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No matter what, I know that you’ve got this. A huge part of romanticizing your life while going it solo during the holidays is being intentional and not letting time slip by you. Make plans for yourself because you’re important! Sending you so much love!

The Limits and Possibilities of an Anti-Zionist Hanukkah

Feature image by Natalia Ganelin via Getty Images

To agonize over the meaning of Hanukkah for the first time this year is to buy into the big lie being peddled by the Israeli government, the American government, and Zionists around the world that violence in Palestine began on October 7.

Growing up, Judaism and Jewish tradition were told to me through the lens of a victim complex. I was taught Jews were the chosen people — biblically chosen to be in covenant with God — and felt confused why God’s chosen people always seemed trapped in the book of Job. From the Passover story to the Purim story to the Hanukkah story to more contemporary examples like Russian pogroms and the Holocaust, it seemed like everyone always wanted to kill the Jews. And yet, we triumphed and lived on.

The violence of these stories and historical fact were not ignored, but they were simplified for a child’s consumption into tales of victory. Even as we learned of the six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust, we were also fed a narrative of Hitler’s failures and of the allied powers of the U.S., France, and Great Britain winning a noble war against fascism.

It’s fitting that the six-pointed star associated with Judaism is named the Star of David, because so many of our stories are told through a David and Goliath framing. The Jewish people suffer, and then, against all odds, we survive — we win. Pay no attention to the nuance of these stories and historical moments. Pay no attention to the rest of the Torah that documents David’s horrific violence once he was declared King.

I reconnected with my Jewish faith in my early twenties when I realized the oversimplified Judaism of my childhood was, actually, counter to the fundamentals of Jewish teaching. My temple’s approach to Reform Judaism was not increased inclusivity, but rather a reduction of Judaism to simple traditions and community based on bloodline. That didn’t have to be the case.

Especially once I came out, I found Jewish community where people leaned toward the questioning of the Jewish religion. My Hebrew school curiosities that had been written off as precocious annoyance turned out to be a fundamental part of my religion. For me, and so many Jewish people, the lack of certainty, the encouragement of complex discussion, is what connects us to our faith.

On Friday night — Shabbat, the second night of Hanukkah, and the 36 year anniversary of the First Intifada — I entered into one of these complicated Jewish spaces with a sigh of relief. Making Mensches and Kolot Anti-Zionist Minyan hosted an anti-Zionist Hanukkah Shabbat in Manhattan. Over a hundred people — Jewish and otherwise — gathered for a potluck and a ritual.

Since the Hamas attack on October 7 and the resulting increase in Israeli violence against Palestinians, my relationship to Judaism has felt fraught. I can remind myself the Israeli government does not represent all Judaism, but it’s difficult to hold onto that fact when I’ve spent the last two months having upsetting conversations with Jewish family — even more upsetting than ones I’d already been having with them about Israel for nearly a decade. It’s difficult to hold onto Judaism’s separation from Israel when the United States government is funding Israel’s genocide of Palestinians under the guise of fighting antisemitism.

I’ve been inspired by the actions of Jewish organizers over the last two months. I’ve also grown frustrated with the limits of Jewish identity as an authority in opposition to genocide. Yes, I feel an obligation to speak out against the Israeli government when my religion is their excuse for violence. But I also feel an obligation to speak out against the Israeli government simply as a human being. Furthermore, I don’t think Jewish voices should be centered in a moment when Palestinians are being murdered. I understand it strategically, but I still find it grotesque — especially as the weeks drag on, the violence increases, and the same circuitous debates continue.

At the event on Friday, one of the leaders, Elana Lipkin, began by discussing the Hanukkah story as one that can be particularly challenging for anti-Zionist Jews, because it is celebrated by many as a tale of Jewish people reclaiming Israeli land. But, Lipkin suggested, it can just as easily be celebrated as a tale of any resistance movement fighting back against colonial oppression. Religion and religious texts often act as Rorschach tests: People choose an interpretation that connects with their values.

What strikes me most about this obvious reframe is the decentering of Jewish people as uniquely oppressed. It’s possible — nay, necessary — to honor the realities of antisemitism in history and in the present without pretending as if we’re alone in our experiences of oppression. It’s also important to acknowledge that a group being oppressed does not mean it can’t also be an oppressor.

What would Judaism look like without self-victimization? It would mean moving beyond the idea of us as a chosen people — chosen for misery or chosen for greatness — and looking to these stories for inspiration of resistance. Not a uniquely Jewish resistance but a resistance we can support and encourage from any oppressed people. It would also mean an admission of the possibility that Jewish people can act as oppressors, whether we’re talking about the Israeli occupation of Palestine or the bigotry held by Jewish Americans who have run toward assimilation and white supremacy.

To gather for an anti-Zionist Jewish celebration is to do so for ourselves. It’s to create a space where we’re free to practice our traditions away from those in our larger community who are using these same traditions as an excuse for violence. But its importance for fighting the ongoing violence shouldn’t be overstated. Lipkin said, “Tonight we rest and heal. Tomorrow the struggle continues.” I appreciated this acknowledgment that we were gathered to celebrate Hanukkah. The anti-Zionism of the event didn’t mean we were doing anything in the struggle other than taking a moment to relax and reflect, a moment that in itself is a privilege.

After the Shabbat prayers, but before the Hanukkah songs, we split into small discussion groups to talk of questions ranging from what brought us to this space to how the fight for liberation can be made sustainable. There is value to intracommunity discussion that does not center itself. We gather not only to celebrate our Jewish holidays but so we can discuss difficult topics outside of the public sphere.

Jewish people who have lost or weakened relationships with family due to conversations about Israel may have experienced and be experiencing grief — it is not a grief equal to those who have lost family at the hands of the Israeli government. As human beings, we likely mourn the immense loss of life we’re witnessing from afar, but that mourning should not pull focus from those in mourning for their loved ones. This Shabbat was a space for that lesser grief, that lesser mourning. It’s important to find that in friends and in community so we’re better equipped to fight for other oppressed people without falling into the belief that our feelings, as Jews, as Americans, are somehow most important.

The most impactful moment of the night was a speech given before the Mourner’s Kaddish. The speaker raised the point that in Jewish tradition we sit shiva for the first seven days after a death to provide support to those who are most grieving. To say the Mourner’s Kaddish for the lives lost in Palestine, when their loved ones were not given time to grieve, when they weren’t allowed to practice their own mourning rituals in a time of peace, when the violence continues even as we gather, is a grossly insufficient use of our own traditions.

And yet, after this powerful speech concluded, we said the Mourner’s Kaddish. Because it was Shabbat. Because that is our tradition. Because people in the room were grieving their own losses. Because Judaism is about holding multiple truths at once. Because we were grieving. Because we are grieving.

Quiz: Which Gay Holiday Archetype Are You?

Hello and happy holigays!!! Here I am with another one of my quizzes that seeks to peer into the innermost corners of your soul. Are you a Hot Cocoa Mommi, a Fire Pit Butch, a Chaos Elf? We’re here to find out which gay holiday archetype that I made up fits you best. If you’re looking for additional holigay quiz fun, might I suggest my 2021 quiz that features ENTIRELY MADE UP HALLMARK LESBIAN MOVIES? I’m still very proud of that one.

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Holigay Gift Guide: Things Marketed To My Former Gender That I Actually Want

I originally set out on a mission to prove to the world (you, Autostraddle reader) that gender is in fact not binary and marketing departments don’t have to be so gender-obsessed when they curate holiday gift guides. I thought I would galvanize Big Marketing into releasing lists of dope gifts without once mentioning the gender of its intended recipient. I fear I may have done the opposite.

After wading through over 20 list guides designed for women this holiday season, I came to a disappointing conclusion: I don’t want any of that shit. They may as well have been called “72 Things to Gift Your Female So She’ll Forget You Liked That One Girl’s Beach Selfie in August,” “45 Ways to Use Consumerism to Get Laid this Christmas,” or “60 Gifts to Make Sure Your Girl Looks like All of Your Bros’ Girls in 2024.” Seriously, are women even contributing to these lists or is it just men rubbing their greedy paws together, scheming the new model of Girlfriend for the next year to come?

If this endeavor accomplished anything, it was affirming my gender as a trans dude and reminding me to noodle a little longer on what I’m doing about that fact (I’m busy, okay!?). I spent hours scouring these lists — most of which were the same items over and over again — and had a very hard time finding things I’d actually want. This was the case for me when I was a girl; every year my mom or a boyfriend would ask what I wanted, and every year I’d close my eyes and throw a dart at one of these lists.

I was always bad at being a girl but now, with inflation, fast fashion, and heightened capitalism…I am so glad I figured out I was trans years ago. I’d be cozied up on Long Island with a ring on my finger, a baby in my belly, 14 matcha whisks, and a seltzer maker to boot.

Despite all this, I managed to pick out 10 items I actually would want from the many women’s gift guides of 2023. Enjoy!

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CE CRAFT Smells Like Travis Kelce Candle ($22)

Listen, I know who this candle is marketed for. My argument here is why wouldn’t I want my home to smell like a 6”5 well-groomed NFL player the entire world is obsessed with right now?

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Cloud Slippers ($24)

I’m going to be so honest: I happen to know a guy who owns these, and he’s really cool. So I figured if I got them, I’d also be really cool.

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Dagne Dover Toiletry Bag ($65)

My current toiletry situation is kind of just throw-my-face-wash-in-my-Carhartt-backpack so really, anything other than that would be great. Plus, my girlfriend thinks this is sexy.

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Anastasia Beverly Hills Brow Wiz Pencil ($25)

Until I start testosterone, I’m going to have to get creative with how I take my eyebrows to Michael Imperioli-level bushy. Full disclosure: When I was a teenage girl, I used to get my eyebrows waxed at Anastasia’s in New Jersey.

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Quince Carry-On Hardshell Suitcase ($130)

I feel like it’s obvious that hardshell suitcases are for guys and softshell suitcases are for girls. Who do I call about this?

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TUSHY Classic 3.0 ($99)

I’m getting top surgery at the end of January, and my girlfriend and I aren’t quite at the “Wipe My Ass For Me” level of our relationship.

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POW Wonder Matcha ($35)

Now, I did my due diligence and went through all of the men’s gift guides, and not one had psychedelics included. Instead, they had more manly drugs like an 8-ball of cocaine and a case of Whipits.

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Williams Sonoma Le Creuset Fondue Pot ($380)

The only text accompanying this one was “Girl Dinner!” which feels like a huge missed opportunity to pander to the fantasy football jocks and game night nerds who will undoubtedly be serving queso every Wednesday night.

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Theragun Mini ($160)

Going to use this bad boy when I strain my muscles doing MAN things like baking all day long and doing multiple loads of laundry in NYC. And not…for…anything…else.

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LEGO Icons Orchid ($40)

Finally, a LEGO set for girls!

Holigay Gift Guide: Goblin Mode

Some of us never left “goblin mode” behind in 2022, when it arose via a doctored headline featuring the appropriately bisexual Julia Fox. Goblin mode, at its heart, is about shirking societal expectations and disobeying authority. The goblin is not straight, does not dream of labor, and likes what they like without apology. Sometimes this looks like wrapping themselves in a burrito of blankets and sleeping all day, and sometimes it looks like thoughtfully caring for their space and filling it with crafts. And listen, I’m not going to stereotype myself and other queers by saying that we’re goblins. But we’re often kinda goblins. We have executive dysfunction and seasonal depression! We need to decompress! We don’t necessarily WANT to socialize! But we love you. We do.

So, below, we have gifts for those in your life going goblin mode this season or all seasons, presents for the filthy gremlins you picked up on your quest, and offerings for the absolute trolls who are near and dear to your heart.

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Goblin Gifts Under $30

First of all, I have it on good authority that part of going goblin mode can involve this thing called Squishmallows. There is an endless array of these little guys, each with their own story. Your dear goblin may enjoy this mushroom in a scarf, just as a thought! And what is a gremlin, a goblin, a troll if they aren’t causing chaos? They may reject labels, but I think they’ll make an exception for the Autostraddle Gay Chaos socks. Plus, it’s accurate! Speaking of gay chaos, your goblin is either a) consistently dehydrated or b) something known as a Beverage Goblin, or one who drinks at least three different beverages (one for caffeination, one for hydration, one for fun) at once! If you’re lucky enough to get some one-on-one time with the goblin, then there is nothing that communicates the feelings of coziness and moistness simultaneously like this lightly competitive yet soothing game where you collect mushrooms in the forest and cook them in a cast iron pan to earn points.

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Goblin Gifts $31-$50

We started to get into this with the squishmallows, but a goblin is aggressive about their coziness, fiercely protective of their lair, and maybe even in need of some sensory aids. You could get them a weighted blanket, literally be a hero. Or what about a bed tray? If you want to be extra cute, you could turn the bed tray into a whole gift situation by adding some of their favorite snacks, maybe the tumbler, too. Finally, they’re not always reading or watching while cozy. Often, you’ll find a goblin crafting or taking up a new hobby here and there until they’ve accrued a whole library of hobby supplies. So, why not a self-contained project? This kit contains everything a goblin needs to crochet cacti friends. They get an activity…and then some pretty cute decor!

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Goblin Gifts $50+

If you want them to up their game in the bedroom, you can gift your goblin who’s already rotting in bed a reading pillow! Also great for gaming, crocheting, scheming comfortably. And if you thought that first sentence there was going to be sexual, why not get a vibrator that looks like a cute lil monster…for your cute lil monster? Lastly, a goblin is a deep, emotional being at times, too. Like ogres and onions, they have layers. And did you, my friend with excellent taste, know that you can sign someone up to receive a new book of poetry every month from Bluestockings Collective? Because you can! And just because you can, means that maybe you should.

37 Christmas Movies With Lesbian, Bisexual, Queer or Trans Characters

Lesbian Christmas movies: the final frontier. In a Christmas Movie landscape dominated by heterosexual workaholic girl-bosses returning to their hometowns in power suits and falling for heterosexual males who do artisan/manual labor, for many years nary a lesbian or bisexual woman, let alone a non-binary person, dared to make an appearance. It’s usually been hard to find any LGBTQ+ Christmas movies at all, but in recent years gay men have been emerging out of the corners into the Christmas spotlight in droves and also, occasionally, a wee lesbian, queer or trans woman or a non-binary person has earned a few minutes under the mistletoe. In 2020, Clea Duvall’s Happiest Season starring Kristen Stewart broke records for Hulu and Netflix’s A New York Christmas Wedding delivered a Black queer love story that was regarded as both “howlingly bad” and “a must-watch.” In 2021, we apparently went mainstream enough to warrant a few moments in the Lifetime and Hallmark spotlight. What’s next in the world of Lesbian Christmas Movies??! Hopefully the lesbian Christmas movie I am writing with my girlfriend! One can only hope, dream and ask Santa for tips!

This list is in chronological order and includes films with LGBTQ+ women and/or non-binary characters, even minor queer characters because yes we are that desperate. It does not include short films that are under 30 minutes, but there are three films that hover in that space between “short” and “feature length.”

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Friends & Family Christmas

dir. Anne Wheeler, 2023 // hallmark tv movie

Humberly Gonzalez and Ali Liebert star in the Hallmark Channel’s very first lesbian Christmas movie. In which photographer Dani (Humberly Gonzalez), overwhelmed by Christmas events and a surprise visit from her parents, asks lawyer Amelia (Liebert) to be her fake girlfriend. If you’ve read any lesbian romance novels, then you are well aware that what begins as a pretend relationship always ends with something more! Stream “Friends and Family Christmas” on Hallmark.

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Exmas

dir. Jonah Fiengold, 2023 // prime video tv movie

After their son, Graham (some man) cancels his plans to come home for Christmas, the Stroop family goes ahead and invites his ex Ali (Leighton Meester) to their Minnesota family Christmas celebration. Then, of course, Graham shows up after all and all hell breaks loose! More importantly, Graham’s sister Mindy is the best character in the film because she is a lesbian. Unfortunately she is not the main character. Exmas is streaming on Prime Video / Freevee.

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A Holiday I Do

dir. Paul and Alicia Schnieder, 2023 // web release

Our friends at lesbian film/TV company Tello debuted this film which answers the question “what happens when a single mom and a country girl fall for her ex-husband’s beautiful and sophisticated wedding planner?” The answer is; “she’ll need some Christmas magic to fix the chaos that ensues.” Drew got high and watched this movie for you and had a pretty nice time. There are a lot of horses and Rivkah Reyes is hot. Stream Holiday I Do on tello..

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It’s a Wonderful Knife

dir. Tyler MacIntyre, 2023 

This “queer Christmas slasher” with loads of LGBTQ+ characters, including a Cool Lesbian Aunt played by scream queen Katharine Isabelle, centers on Winnie (Jane Widdop, Yellowjackets), who saves her town from a psychotic killer on Christmas Eve only to be depressed and suicidal a year later. Then she is drawn into a parallel universe where she learns that without her, things would suck a lot more, and also now the killer is back and she’s gotta team up with the (queer) town misfit Bernie (Jess McLeod) to ID him and get back to real life. According to Kayla, the film contains “a queer love story that’s stocking stuffer candy sweet if not as developed or sharp as I tend to prefer my queer relationships on-screen.” It’s a Wonderful Knife is streaming on Shudder.

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The Christmas Clapback

dir. Robin Givens, 2022 // BET+ tv movie 

It’s the Miles sisters’ first Christmas without their mother, which means they’ve gotta win their town’s annual Christmas Church Cook-Off in her honor — but when social media influencer Aaliyah (Kara Royster) moves in next door, she poses a formidable challenge to the Miles’ crown. She also develops a romantic spark with Tisha (Porscha Coleman), a single mother of a college-age son who’s been out of the dating game for a minute, and their story is actually really cute! The Christmas Clapback is streaming on BET+ or through your cable provider.

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Merry & Gay

dir. Christin Baker, 2022 // web-release

Becca Winters (Dia Frampton) has just finished her starring run in a popular Broadway musical and is heading home for the holidays, where her meddling mother TIlly (Hayat Nesheiwat) and her best friend Lucille (Janet Ivy) are planning more than just Christmas dinner: they wanna reignite the high school romance between Lucille’s non-binary kid Sam (Andi René Christensen) and Becca. Sam is bartending at their family’s bar, Sheridan’s, and is initially wary of the girl who hurt them three years ago. But it doesn’t take much to warm her right back up! Merry & Gay is streaming on Diva Box TV and tello.

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Something From Tiffany’s

dir. Daryl Wein, 2022 // prime video tv movie

This Christmas rom-com starring queer actress Shay Mitchell and the beloved Zoey Deutch asks the age-old question, “what if two men were at Tiffany’s at the same time and their packages got mixed up and the wrong man went home with an engagement ring?” Most importantly for our purposes here, Zoey Deutch’s Rachel owns a bakery with her best friend, Terri, a lesbian played by Twenties‘ Jojo T. Gibbs. We also are gifted with a few brief glimpses into Terri’s marriage with Sophia (Batwoman‘s Javica Leslie) and well, honestly, the movie is pretty okay! Something from Tiffany’s is streaming on Prime Video.

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Looking for Her

Dir. Alexandra Swarens, 2022 // tv movie

Taylor’s taken a lot of space from her family so she’s quite surprised when they insist she come home for Christmas and bring her girlfriend, Jess — but Taylor can’t muster up the courage to tell them that she and Jess broke up. Instead, she hires an out-of-work actor to pose as her girlfriend and join her for an extended improv exercise with her family. Sort of like The Proposal but low-budget and gay and the family has a much smaller house. Looking for Her is streaming on Tubi.

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Under the Christmas Tree

dir. Lisa Rose Snow, 2021 // lifetime tv movie

Under the Christmas Tree is famously Lifetime’s first-ever lesbian Christmas movie! Elise Bauman is marketing whiz Alma Beltran, who crosses paths with a Christmas Tree Salesperson (?) Charlie while on the hunt for the prefect tree for the Maine Governor’s Holiday Celebration right in Alma’s backyard. What begins with sparring leads to sparking and romance with the help of Ricki Lake, the town’s pâtissière extraordinaire, who is an inspirational figure to all. Under the Christmas Tree is streaming on Hulu.

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Picture Perfect Holiday

dir. J.E. Logan, 2021 // lifetime tv movie

Fashion photographer Gaby Jones (Tatyana Ali)’s shot at her dream magazine job is in doubt when her editor suggests she’s not ready for the position — but she could mayhaps improve her chances by attending a Christmas Photography Retreat in a Cute Christmasy Town in the Forest. A little snafu at the cabin reservation desk leads her to have an unexpected hot photographer roommate. This is all very cute and well and good but the unexpected situation of interest to us here is that her lesbian photographer friend from NYU, Dani (played by Paula Andrea Placido of The L Word: Generation Q and Hacks), is also at the retreat with her partner, Amelia (Rivkah Reyes), and both lesbians are trying to plan the perfect proposal.  While they’re not the central focus of the film, Dani and Amelia get a surprisingly significant amount of screentime! Picture Perfect Holiday is streaming on Lifetime.

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Christmas is Cancelled

dir. Prarthana Mohan, 2021 // prime video tv movie

Emma (Hayley Orrantia) and her Dad (Dermot Mulroney) have lots of beloved Christmas traditions that improve their holiday disposition despite the absence of her mother. But this year she’s in for a nasty surprise: her Dad is dating her high school nemesis, Mona from Pretty Little Liars! Luckily she has a queer BFF, Charlyne (played by non-binary actor Emilie Modaff) to help ease the pain of this terrifying blow. Christmas is Cancelled is streaming on Prime Video.

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An Unexpected Christmas 

dir. Michael Robinson, 2021 // hallmark tv movie

Jamie brings his pal Emily home for the holidays to pretend like they are legitimately dating which is fine or whatever, what’s more important is that Jamies’ sister, Becca (Alison Wandzura), is a divorced lesbian and single Mom, thus putting the “lesbian” into this Christmas movie. “She’s able to halt Jamie’s incessant whining with her wry verbal smackdowns!” writes Heather Hogan. “She’s got her own subplot and is more than just a sounding board for the main characters! And she has one scene with Jamie that actually made me laugh out loud for real!” An Unexpected Christmas is streaming on Hallmark.

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Christmas at the Ranch

dir. Christin Baker, 2021 // web-release

Heather writes that Christmas at the Ranch is a “horse girl holigay rom-com that feels like fan fiction in the way all the best Hallmark Christmas movies do.” In this actual lesbian Christmas movie, workaholic Haley (Laur Allen) goes home for Christmas, finds out her Meemaw is in debt and also meets the new horse-hand, Kate (Amanda Righetti). Between Haley’s money smarts and Kate’s horsey skills, perhaps this ranch can be saved and also lesbian love. Christmas at the Ranch is streaming on Tubi.

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You Make It Feel Like Christmas

dir. Lisa France, 2021 // lifetime tv movie

Emma (Mary Antonini) and her BFF Liz (Nadine Pinette) own an “artisanal Christmas ornament store” and when a big-time design guru (???!) falls for Emma’s art, she’s gotta cancel her trip home for Christmas. This is a big bummer for her Dad ’cause Mom died literally last year and he is sad and lonely. Emma’s ex, Aaron, is home from Army visiting with Emma’s Dad and when he finds out Emma’s not coming home, he grabs his cousin Sarah (Solange Sookram) and heads into the city to bring her back! This is relevant to you because aforementioned Liz has a thrilling romantic spark with recently mentioned Sarah, who of course runs a soup kitchen. You Make it Feel Like Christmas is streaming on Lifetime.

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Every Time a Bell Rings

dir. Maclain Nelson, 2021 // hallmark tv movie

Three estranged sisters come together in their Mississippi hometown to see their Mom and fulfill their father’s dying wish: a Christmas scavenger hunt to find a prized family heirloom. AND IN THE PROCESS THEY ALSO FIND EACH OTHER. Queer actress Ali Liebert plays the lesbian sister, who is making a website for her family woodshop following the closure of her own business in Boston. She meets a girl and they flirt throughout the film, which honestly is terrible but YMMV! Every Time a Bell Rings is streaming on Hallmark.

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Silent Night

dir. Camille Griffin, 2021 

This “ambitious but muddled mix of Christmas comedy and apocalyptic drama” centers on a family in a posh English country estate who’ve gathered for the hoilday as a giant toxic cloud sweeps across our wretched neglected planet with the intent of killing everybody! Amongst these humans are Bella (Lucy Punch) and her girlfriend Alex (Kirby Howell-Baptiste). Queer actress Lily-Rose Depp is also featured as the much younger girlfriend of a doctor who is friends with the family. Silent Night is streaming on AMC+

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The Magical Christmas Tree

dir. Scott Hillman, 2021

Picture this: you’re a park ranger and a young person in a suit arrives in your parking lot carrying an axe. You approach them. What is your first question? If you said “what are your pronouns?” you’d be correct!!! This is one of many magical moments in low-budget indie flick The Magical Christmas Tree. (The second question is “I’m wondering what you’re doing with that axe,” obviously.) Pace is an accountant in Los Angeles with a mean boss who is visited off-screen by the ghosts of Christmas past and decides to throw a holiday celebration after all, thus requiring Pace to drive into the mountains to find the perfect tee. As their journey progresses, they find a non-binary elf named Buddy and romance ensues! The Magical Christmas Tree is streaming on Tubi.

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O Night Divine

dir. Luca Guadagnino, 2021 // web-release

This tight, atmospheric and precise Christmas indie (it’s about an hour long) from Call Me By Your Name’s Luca Guadagnino stars John C. Reilly as a Santa Claus-ish character resting for a night at a fancy ski resort where a few interconnecting stories are at play. One of them involves the hotel’s overseer, Babette (Hailey Gates) and her apparently tortured romance with her ex-girlfriend, Julia (Francesca Figus), who works at a hotel boutique. O Night Divine is streaming on Zara’s YouTube channel.

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The Happiest Season

dir. Clea Duvall, 2020

The pitch for this film seemed fantastical from the outset — Kristen Stewart was starring in a lesbian Christmas rom-com made by Clea Duvall? REALLY?!?! Indeed, at the end of a year full of broken dreams (2020), Hulu brought Happiest Season to us all in December. Stewart plays Abby, who gives in to the Christmas spirit she usually resists by heading home to spend the holidays with her girlfriend Harper (Mackenzie Davis), who informs her en route that she’s not exactly out to her family. The winning cast includes Dan Levy as Abby’s best friend, Aubrey Plaza as Harper’s ex-girlfriend and Alison Brie as Harper’s uptight sister. The Happiest Season is streaming on Hulu.

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A New York Christmas Wedding 

dir. Otoja Abit, 2020 

This wacky trip of a lesbian Christmas movie sees Jenny (Nia Fairweather), nervous about her engagement to her fiancé, David, when a guardian angel Azraael (Cooper Koch) shows up to give her a vision into the future she could’ve lived but did not — in which she ended up with her childhood best friend, Gabrielle (Adriana DeMeo). “Instead of some far-off Snow White Christmas Village, it’s an queer Afro-Latina looking for love in a very not whitewashed New York,” wrote Carmen in her review. A New York Christmas Wedding is streaming on Tubi and Freevee.

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Christmas With the Darlings

dir. Catherine Cyran, 2020 // hallmark tv movie

Jessica (Katrina Law), finds herself in co-charge of orchestrating a perfect New England Christmas for the recently orphaned nieces and nephew of her CEO, who’s away on business and otherwise would be shipping the kiddos back to boarding school. Her help in this mission is Max, the kids’ other uncle, who is not very paternal. Most important to all of us here today is that Jessica’s BFF, Zoe (Morgana Wyllie), is a lesbian, and she has herself a little romantic subplot with a HOT BARISTA. Christmas With the Darlings is streaming on Hallmark.

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The Christmas Lottery 

dir. Tamika Miller, 2020 // BET tv movie

“After being estranged for nearly three years, the Davenport sisters — Diedre (Asia’h Epperson), Tammy (Candiace Dillard) and Nicole (Brave Williams) — reunite at the family home, just in time for Christmas. But it’s not the holiday spirit that brings everyone home, it’s the promise of collecting a share of their parents’ lottery winnings…which they can only get if they repair the relationships between them. That’s easier said than done, though: Diedre carries some serious emotional scars over having sacrificed so much for sisters when they couldn’t even be bothered to attend her wedding to her wife, Belinda. But all the work on repairing their relationships might be for naught when the winning lottery ticket turns up missing.” — Natalie. The Christmas Lottery is streaming on BET.

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Last Christmas 

dir. Paul Feig, 2019

The lesbian character in Last Christmas is so incredibly minor that if you only half-watched this movie, you could miss her entirely! Directed by Paul Feig (The Office, Bridesmaids), Last Christmas is the story of aspiring singer Kate Andrich (Emilia Clarke), who works at a year-round Christmas store owned by “Santa” (Michelle Yeoh) in London and feels suffocated by her depressed mother, Petra (Emma Thompson), who dotes on her but ignores her sister, Marta (Lydia Leonard), a very successful lawyer who is gay but fears coming out to her parents. Kate meets a hottie named Tom (Henry Golding) and their romance is central to this movie that is brimming with talented actors and yet none of them can transcend the absolutely absurd plot! Also there are cameos from Patti LuPone and Sue Perkins? Last Christmas is available for rent on RedBox.

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Ghosting: The Spirit of Christmas 

dir. Theresa Bennett, 2019 // freeform tv movie

This genuinely adorable Freeform Christmas flick stars Aisha Dee as Jess, who unfortunately dies right after a great first date with Ben (Kendrick Sampson), but then finds herself still hanging out as a ghost! This is great news for her lesbian best friend, Kara (Kimiko Glen) and for Ben — at least at first. It’s a weird little plot that somehow works, but what works best for me personally is the romance between Kara and Ben’s sister, Mae (Jazz Raycole). Plus I mean, it’s Aisha Dee and Kimiko Glen! A treat! Ghosting: The Spirit of Christmas is streaming on Freeform.

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Season of Love

dir. Christin Baker, 2019 // web-release

Another entry in the “intersecting stories” Christmas film genre but this time it’s “intersecting LESBIAN stories.” There’s Sue (Dominique Provost-Chalkley), a musician and Janey (Janelle Marie), her formerly-long distance girlfriend. Kenna (a deaf character played by a deaf actress, Sandra Mae Frank!), who is opening a brewery and Lou (Jessica Clark), a welder she hired for the project. And finally, Iris (Emily Goss) and Mardou (Laur Allen) — Iris is set to marry Mardou’s brother, but he leaves her alone at the altar. “The movie has everything you could want from a cheesy holiday movie,” wrote Valerie in her “Season of Love” review. “Mistletoe mishaps, zero-stakes drama, happily ever afters.” You can rent Season of Love on Tello.

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Let it Snow

dir. Luke Snellin, 2019 // netflix tv movie

This decent rom-com promises less wholesome activity than your typical Christmas film, weaving together stories from an intersecting group of teenagers in Laurel, Illinois on a very snowy Christmas Eve. One of these little stories involves Dorrie (played by non-binary actor Liv Hewson of “Yellowjackets”), a lesbian who works at Waffle Town and is having a secret affair with a cheerleader. So you know, come for the lesbian, stay for Joan Cusack driving a truck wrapped in tin foil. Let it Snow is streaming on Netflix.

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City of Trees 

dir. Alexandra Swarens, 2019

Ainsley (Alexandra Swarens), a somewhat aimless twentysomething, returns from Los Angeles to her small hometown for the holidays and finds herself facing some unexpected lingering trauma in this lesbian Christmas movie. Sophie (Olivia Buckle), a popular cheerleader from Ainsley’s high school, has changed since Ainsley last saw her and is even friends with Ainsley’s Mom — but it’s hard for Ainsley to see past the girls they once were. As Sophie and Ainsley keep being in the same place at the same time, a romance begins to spark! City of Trees is streaming on YouTube.

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Life Size 2

dir. Steven K. Tsuchida, 2018

Life-Size 2 follows Grace, a twenty-something former socialite at the helm of Marathon Toys, erstwhile manufacturer of Eve Dolls, now that her mother’s been sent to jail. Tyra Banks returns as Grace’s favorite childhood toy Eve, here to usher her through the new slings and arrows of her life. Heather refrained from spoilers in her review because “you deserve to experience the absolute ecstasy of watching Tyra Banks commit to the bananapants wide-eyed wonder of this role again, without being spoiled on all the Easter Eggs.” That said, the queerness of the lead character is very much not central or even center-adjacent to anything that happens in the film but you know we took what we could get in 2018.

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Anna and the Apocalypse

dir. John McPhail, 2017

What says “the spirit of Christmas” more than a zombie apocalypse movie musical?? Nothing, that’s what. And that’s exactly what Anna and the Apocalypse is. Starring queer Dickinson actress Ella Hunt, and featuring a prominent lesbian character Steph played by queer actor Sarah Swire, the movie is a bloody romp. While sometimes the big picture metaphor gets a little muddy, it boils down to encouraging you to live in the moment and appreciate what you have because you never know when a deadly pandemic will break out and separate you from the people you love the most. The music is a delight, and Ella Hunt is phenomenally talented, and the movie is campy and fun and may or may not make you cry just a little. Tis the season for watching teens bash zombies over the head with giant candy canes!  — Valerie Anne. Anna and the Apocalypse is streaming on Tubi.

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We Need a Little Christmas 

dir. Noble Julz and Onyx Keesha, 2017 // web-release

This very low-budget holiday flick (at times it’s hard to hear the dialogue) follows a group of Atlanta-based queer friends who share a cabin for Christmas: Smith and her wife Chris, their children, her best friends Lindsay and Brighton, and her new coworker, Angel. There’s also a lot of Christianity in this film. We Need a Little Christmas is notable for being focused entirely on a group of Black lesbians, which is a rare treat! You can rent We Need a Little Christmas on LesFlicks.

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Carol 

dir. Todd Haynes, 2015

Have you heard about the movie Carol, it’s about this woman Carol? Played by Cate Blanchett? I believe she has an affectionate “affair” with Therese, who has a stupid boyfriend and wants to be a photographer. Waterloo is involved. So is Sarah Paulson. We have written no less than 63 posts about this film right here on this website!

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Tangerine

dir. Sean Baker, 2015

This is not a lesbian Christmas movie, but it is a Christmas-adjacent movie about two trans women sex workers of color and this queer list felt incomplete without making note of it. Sin-Dee (Kitana Kiki Rodriguez) and Alexandra (Mya Taylor) get out of jail and right back into their chaotic Los Angeles existence on Christmas Eve. Alexandra’s prepping for an upcoming performance and Sin-Dee is prepping to cause a bit of drama regarding her boyfriend, Chester, cheating on her. Naming it the #2 best Christmas movie of all time, Vulture writes that in a list primarily occupied by “prosperous white families,” Tangerine serves as “a corrective to that tradition: “It’s a film as vital, alive, and in touch with the holiday as more traditional entries — an invitation to other filmmakers to redefine what a Christmas movie can be, and as much a story about the importance of human kindness as the one that tops the list.”

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Everybody’s Fine

dir. Kirk Jones, 2009

When Frank Goode’s children all cancel their plans to come home for Christmas, Frank hits the road on his own, planning to visit each of his kids, which will of course entail finding out WHO THEY TRULY ARE. For example Rosie (Drew Barrymore), who picks him up in a limo takes him to her fancy alleged apartment where he meets her “friend” Jill (Kate Moennig)— but it’s all a show! Because also, she’s bisexual! The Christmas element of this film is pretty light, as is the queerness, but it has its moments and it’s always fun to see queer actresses playing queer roles.

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Rent 

dir. Chris Columbus, 2005

While not strictly a Christmas movie, the beloved film adaptation of the Broadway musical does open and close on Christmas Eve in a very deliberate way, and it’s chock-full of LGBTQ stories and characters. Set in the Lower East Side in the late ’80s amid the growing HIV/AIDS crisis, lesbian couple Maureen (Idina Menzel) and Joanne (Traci Thoms) and their legendary “Take Me or Leave Me” made this film a notable root for theater kids all over the world. How could a night so frozen be so scalding hot? There’s only one way to find out and that way is “watching this movie” and maybe also listening to the original Broadway cast recording! Rent is streaming on HBO Max. 

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8 Women

dir. François Ozon, 2002

This French dark comedy musical centers a family of eccentric women and their employees after their family patriarch is found dead in the isolated cottage where they’ve chosen to spend a very snowy Christmas. One by one each woman finds her situation under scrutiny. “This movie feels gay and then it gets explicitly gay and then it gets explicitly gayer,” writes Drew Gregory. “By the end it’s unclear if anyone is straight!”

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Female Trouble

dir. John Waters, 1974

While technically not a lesbian movie or a Christmas movie, this John Waters masterpiece demands inclusion due to its iconic Christmas scene and iconic lesbian characters. Of course, the Christmas scene is Divine’s tantrum about not receiving cha cha heels. And the lesbianism is found most prominently in Edith Massey’s Aunt Ida. “The world of the heterosexual is sick and boring,” she says and truer words have never been committed to screen. Christmas movies are traditionally wholesome so if you’re looking for some queer counterprogramming, look no further than the Pope of Trash himself — trash that’s now available on the prestigious Criterion Collection.  — Drew Gregory