Sampler

On Dec. 4, 1831, 10-year-old Mary Pets put the last of hundreds and hundreds of elegant stitches in a sampler she made for "her dear parents" while a pupil at the School for Colored Girls of the Oblate Sisters of Providence. Mary Pets' sampler is still in the archives of the Oblate Sisters, at their mother house west of Arbutus, the oldest in the Sisters' collection definitely made by one of their students. The only older sampler known to be by an Oblate pupil is in the Maryland Historical Society.

Come holiday time, a few familiar titles pop up again and again. A Christmas Carol. The Gift of the Magi. Anything involving the names Santa Claus or Rudolph. This year, though, local theaters are presenting a few unconventional twists on the usual seasonal themes, from a transvestite reindeer to a Carol about the writer instead of his famous characters. A Dickens of a Carol by Kimberley Lynne is a family-oriented play highlighting Charles Dickens' experience composing his famous work A Christmas Carol.

Approaching Hong Kong by air in the daytime is unforgettable. The city looks like a forest of Erector-set towers gleaming against dark hills. The parade of nearly identical skyscrapers, honeycombed with windows, seems endless. It's Manhattan on steroids. An East-West trading center since the mid-19th century, Hong Kong remains a major international crossroads -- but a troubled one. Much of its elite class fled before the British territory reverted to Chinese control in 1997. The ensuing Asian recession, plus competition from China's booming Guangdong province, has sapped some of its economic strength.

Reggae on the sound system, butterfly decorations, a radiator painted purple and yellow, softly turning ceiling fans, a friendly staff: The Yabba Pot restaurant in lower Charles Village offers no stress. And no meat. The long list of selections changes daily at the vegetarian and vegan restaurant, where bumper stickers calling for peace grace the walls. To avoid tough decisions, I ordered the sampler ($10.50), which offered no less than 12 choices, including veggie lo mein (chewy in a good way)

The Wearable Art Club will hold its first meeting today, at Seminole Sampler, a quilting supply store in Catonsville. Art to wear runs the gamut from clothes to jewelry and purses, crafted or decorated in creative ways. Techniques can include beading, dyeing, patchwork, free-motion embroidery, batik and collage. Joan Fox, co-chairwoman of the club, became interested in wearable art about a year ago. She began by learning quilting, with an eye to making interesting clothes. "I had this idea of using fabric as an artistic medium instead of paint, " she said.

Parties to attend, presents to wrap, cookies to bake. Who has time to shop? There's an abundance of catalog and Internet retailers standing ready to ship your gift selections to almost anywhere. Here are a few tasty items we found: Pleasing those cocoa lovers Lands' End offers more than turtlenecks and chinos. The company also has a selection of food items for giving and entertaining. Send warm greetings to someone on your list with the Hot Cocoa Lover's Gift Set. The package includes cocoa mix, marshmallows, chocolate-covered graham crackers and peppermint stick stirrers.

An interview with Rita Snyder, founding member of the Sampler Book Club. How did your club get started? We started in August of 1997. All of our kids went to the same nursery school. ... We had eight members. A few have moved on, but we've replaced them. We decided to stick with eight because we did not want it to be too large. We had decided to name the club Sampler because we were not going to be hard and fast about what we read. We really like to read a variety of different things. We each take turns choosing the book.

New oil surfaces There's new French olive oil in town, straight from the fields of Provence. Les Moulins Dores comes in seven varieties, and is distinguished by low acidity levels and delicate, nuanced flavors. The oils are available at Graul's Markets and Eddie's of Roland Park. A 16.9-ounce bottle sells for about $25. Or order online from zShops at Amazon.com. State seafood sampler If you have friends or family longing for the good tastes of Maryland, Easton's Tidewater Inn and Conference Center has the perfect gift - a care package of seafood available for overnight delivery throughout the continental United States.

WESTTOWN, Pa. - The first year, teacher Shannon Almquist thought she had just lucked out with a spectacular class. But when success repeated itself the second year, then the third, she quit worrying. Fourth-graders really did enjoy needlework, boys included. Recently, when Almquist stood before her 19 girls and boys, she smiled. "You are going to make an heirloom," she announced. "One day, when you're very old, someone will go through the attic and find it and say, `What's this?'" For the second time in more than 200 years, stitching samplers is becoming a tradition at the Westtown School.

The lighting is dim, the music New Age. The business at hand hardly seems the stuff of local government. Aromatherapy. Sea-salt scrubs. Reflexology. Bikini waxes. The Columbia Association, which runs the Day Spa at Columbia Gym, isn't technically a government, though it often acts like one. It charges an annual property assessment. It participates in the Sister Cities exchange program. For years, it ran a bus service. Add to that municipal-sounding mix a day spa. It opened in December 1998 and is on track to make its first profit in the fiscal year that ends April 30. Day spas have popped up all over the country during the past decade, a trend that industry experts say has been driven by baby boomers with the means and inclination to pamper themselves.