i went with my mother and sister to michael's arts and crafts store in everett this morning. before we got there, we made a quick stop at the christmas tree shop at the assembly square mall to look for a battery-free flashlight. i thought it'd be a crazy rush of last minute shoppers but the mood was actually pretty relaxed. at michael's i was looking for some photo frames. i ended up getting a bunch of 11x14 and 9x12 frames that were on sale (more on that later). i had a sense that on the last day before christmas there'd be more shopping so i wasn't surprised when we paid visits to the nearby bed, bath & beyond as well as target. at BB&B i got a rubber padding for my large kitchen rug and from target i stocked up on some candy.

in the evening i went home to my parents for dinner again, this time scallion pancakes and hot & sour soup. after dinner i helped my father fix a broken light socket in the basement. since they're not working tomorrow, my parents let me borrow the car to drive back to cambridge.

tonight i realized the frames i got were all in the wrong size. i want to print out some digital photos for framing, but i didn't realize prints come in only so many sizes. and of those sizes, many require some level of cropping which means i'll lose some photo content. originally i wanted the photos to bleed all the way to the edge with no matting, but now it looks to be unavoidable. to be honest, i know nothing about properly framing a photo, since i rarely ever print my images. i think i might go with the 5x7 approach (30-80¢/photo) inside of the 9x12 frame with matting. funny thing is matting costs more than the frame itself (i might look into cutting my own though). i'm probably also keep the 11x14 frames and get some photos blown up to that size ($7/photo).