What better thing to do on a lazy Saturday afternoon then doing some fun linking around (nope, I’m not out there battling other holiday shoppers – yet)? And it’s such holiday fun!

Holiday Card Exchange. Haley, at The Life (and Lies) of an Inanimate Flying Object is holding a Holiday Card swap. You fill out her form, and on the 10th she’ll send you an email with someone’s snail mail – you’ll get a surprise holiday card from someone, and you’ll get to send a surprise holiday card out. It’s a lovely idea – I’ve signed up!

Exchange cards with me! Speaking of which, I love sending and receiving holiday cards. If you’re a regular reader here, and would like to exchange holiday or Christmas cards with me, email me and we can exchange addresses!

Christmas on the iPhone. Are you an iPhone user? The AppventCalendar offers up an iPhone game a day up until December 22 – you only have 24 hours, though, to download that day’s game for free.

Handmade holiday giveway. The Handmade Holiday Gift Guide Giveaway: This is one amazing giveaway. A group of Etsy sellers have put together an incredible package of goodies from their various shops. Three winners will split the prize package. Last day to enter is January 6, and all you have to do is leave a comment telling “about one handmade gift that you are giving to someone this year. It doesn’t need to be handmade by you, but handmade by someone, not a big company.” Me? Ward and I are going to be trying our hand at food gifts this year – maybe even truffles!

And my own giveaway. Of course, there’s also my December giftaway. Enter now if you haven’t yet!

The Dewey Tree. Lisa, at OnlinePublicist, is hosting The Dewey Tree donation project. Lisa notes, “It’s a little bit The Giving Tree, a little bit Dewey, a little bit charity.” I’d love to participate, if I can find a Canadian charity that accepts book donations (our local library and all its branches doesn’t accept book donations, unfortunately). You can find a great list of places that accept book donations at the American Library Association’s list of book donation bookmarks at delicious.

Recycled Magazine Gift Bows. One of my favorite weekly links round-ups is Janel’s Jumblicious posts at Janel’s Jumble. It’s a great list of food and craft links and I always find something interesting there. In this Jumblicious post a while back, I discovered this great post on how to make a gift bow from a recycled magazine. I haven’t tried it yet, but I really hope I’ll be able to set an afternoon aside to have some fun with this. (It will also make me feel a tad better about my magazine addiction.)

What fun links have you discovered this week? Anything interesting for the holidays? I always love this time of year – people always post such fun holiday-related stuff!

I’ve been dipping into my Google Reader today in between doing some marking up on an assignment, and came across the Bridget Zinn Auction through Meg Cabot’s blog.

Bridget is a young librarian who discovered this past February that she has cancer. The Bridget Zinn auction site features books donated by many people, in order to raise funds for Bridget’s medical expenses. Several authors have donated signed copies of their works, too.

I haven’t had a chance yet to go through the posts, but plan to go through the site later tonight when I’ve finished my deadline. Each item up for bid is listed as a post, and you can make your bid by commenting on individual posts.

It’s all for such a good cause, and just glancing through a few posts I see several things I’d like to bid on.

I’m so excited – it feels like my birthday today!

I just went to the library to pick up some more holds that had come in, and discovered The Language of Bees, by Laurie R. King, waiting for me!

I’m super-thrilled about this. I had been downright envious when I was over at Bookish Ruth’s the other day and discovered that the book has just been released (and lucky Ruth was already curling up with her own copy of it).

And now it’s here, right here in my house!

And then, wandering around the library (because who ever pops into the library for “just a sec”, right?") I discovered The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, by Alan Bradley, in the “New in Books” display.

I had just blogged about adding this title to my TBR pile in my Friday Finds post this morning!

So I’m on a roll, right? Absolutely. Because when I got home from the library just now, I discovered an email from EcoSalon.com, letting me know that I’ve won this Buddha Bowl in their Mother’s Day giveaway. It’s kind of bookish news since I usually drink tea when I’m reading.

Now I’m off to curl up in a comfy corner and read …

This week I thought I’d focus on giveaways, because I seem to have come across a ton of them for some reason. Here’s the list of great book giveaways I’ve come across this week – I haven’t entered all of them, but there are definitely some for which I’m keeping my fingers (and toes) crossed!

(Note: while I don’t normally set my links to other book bloggers to open up in new windows, I’ve done so in this post, on the assumption that you might want to keep this page open so you can check out more of the giveaways.)

From Fantasy Book Critics:

Signed Copy of Drood plus Bonus Copy of Terror (ends Feb 10) – open only to North American residents

Set of T.A. Pratt’s Marla Mason novels (ends Feb 24) – open to anyone

Signed Set of Two Books by Mark Henry (ends Feb 24) – open to anyone

Set of Carrie Vaughn’s Kitty Norville novels (ends Mar 1) – open only to North American residents

Set of Three Books by Chris Roberson (ends Mar 2) – open to anyone

Set of Mike Carey’s Felix Castor Novels (ends Mar 5) – open only to those outside the U.S.

Signed copy of Eric Nylund’s Mortal Coils (ends Mar 3) – open only to North American residents

From She is Too Fond of Books: Do I Disturb the Universe memoir giveaway (ends Feb 13) – open to US and Canada

From Stone Soup: Book of Your Choice giveaway (ends around noon, Feb 8) – open to anyone

From Book Dads: Queen Vernita’s Visitors by Dawn Menge giveaway (ends Feb 15) – open to US and Canada

From Enroute to Life: The Terror, by Dan Simmons, giveaway (ends Feb 17) – open to US and Canada

From S. Krishna’s Books: Midori by Moonlight by Wendy Tokunaga giveaway (ends Feb 8) – open to US and Canada (Note: I want to win this one!!)

From Lesa’s Book Critiques: Eleven Love Titles from Hachette Group giveaway (ends Feb 14) – open to US and Canada

From Kathy at Bermudaonion: Five Copies of The Terror by Dan Simmons (ends Feb 17) – open to US and Canada

And there’s also my own giveaway of five copies of My Little Red Book, by Rachel Kauder Nalebuff, hosted at my personal/creativity blog – this one ends Feb 12, and is open to US and Canada.