This mermaid blanket would be just the thing when binge-watching H2O: Just Add Water or Mako Mermaids. Available in blue or pink from Firebox. (via Laughing Squid) Read the rest

All you knitters or crocheters, this one's for you: temperature blankets. 

The basic idea is that, every single day for an entire year, you'll stitch up a new row (or square or circle or other shape). The color you choose is determined by the outside temperature. 

When I first came across one on Instagram, I thought it was something pregnant women did to kill time while waiting for baby to arrive. I thought these soon-to-be-moms were measuring their internal body temperature not the one outside. I can see now that I made it too complicated, and weird. To be fair, the crocheter of the one I saw had described it as her "daughter's temperature blanket."

Anyway, it's a super cool and simple idea. And it leaves plenty of room for creativity.

Most people start them at the beginning of the year, but you seem like a rebel to me. Start one today. Read the rest

Snuggie, a specialist warming item designed to allow docile and nearly immobile United States citizens to consume chips while bundled in a blanket and watching Oprah, sued the US government and won. Seems the feds wanted to designate the Snuggie as "apparel" because it reminds them of priest's robes, and shockingly tax it more than a mere "blanket."

Via WaPo:

That was enough to convince the Hawthorne, N.Y.-based Allstar Marketing Group, which makes the Snuggie, to take the U.S. government to the United States Court of International Trade for categorizing the Snuggie as apparel, similar to a “priestly garment.” The judge sided with Snuggie last month, saying that the product was a blanket, not clothing, in part due to its lack of closures in the back. Allstar Marketing declined to comment on the case.

The Snuggie case and others like it show how companies may go to great lengths to avoid the barriers governments impose on imported products. President Trump has argued for even stiffer tariffs on products from countries that refuse to negotiate better terms of trade with the United States, like Mexico and China. He has also backed away from free trade deals that would slash tariffs among many countries, and expressed a desire for negotiating deals with countries one-on-one.