Gifts and gardens: D.C. area blogs

Good afternoon. Hope reentry wasn't too bad for you today. Despite Sunday night's Comcast outage, D.C. area bloggers were hard at work. Lots of interesting posts today.

Interested in theater management? THEARC is offering free workshops Tuesday on directing, lighting and other technical aspects of theater production. Congress Heights on the Rise has details.

The Downtown Holiday Market opens this Friday in Penn Quarter. If you're tired of the mall or of chain stores, here's your chance to score unique handcrafted jewelry, toys, artwork and more. There will also be food and other festivities. Penn Quarter Living has more details.

Looking for more holiday gift ideas? The Capitol Fashionista offers 25 gifts each under $25.

Washington Gardener offers a new entry in their ongoing series of profiles of community gardens around the D.C. area. Featured spots include Temple Gardens and Kalorama Community Garden. Did you know that Kalorama means "beautify view" in Greek?

The holiday season is a time celebration and a time of sharing. Rockville Central offers two easy ways you can help others this season.

That's it for now. Thanks for reading and have a great rest of the day. Know of a great blog that I should highlight? Send me an e-mail at aratanil@washpost.com.