Watching Rachael Ray

Love. Love. LOVE that skirt! Thumbs up, style team! It’s the season of Re-Gifting, you know, and one of the viewers takes the idea of re-gifting to a whole new level - one year he got a $4 bottle of wine, and regifted it to his buddy, a wine expert - by changing the label. AND he got away with it! Tsk tsk tsk! If that’s not enough, there’s two re-gifters in the front row. One says one person’s trash is another persons treasure. All the gifts she’s been given that she doesn’t use, she saves to re-gift. She headed a candle in her pile that she hands to her friend’s birthday dinner - and they opened it in front of the co-worker who had given it to her! It turns out, her best friend had given the candle to her co-worker, and then her co-worker gave it to HER, and she turned around and gave it back to her best friend! Kaaaaaarma! The viewer says if you re-gift - MAKE NOTES! That way you won’t get caught regifting to the person who gave it to you.

And then there’s the Rooster Lamp. Andrea says she won’t regift unless she uses something first, but she always re-gifts. Rachael is speechless. Bright it home. Use it. Then pass it on?! Oh. My. The perfect gift to give, she says as she wags her finger at them - give charity donations in a friends name instead. Ha!

Next up - it’s Mary Steenburgen, who is married to Ted Danson (Lucky woman!) and has a Holiday Movie coming up - Four Christmases. She brings a gift - but says Rachael better not regift it! Ha! It’s a beautiful throw from her store, Rooms & Gardens. Mary admits to regifting Wine, because everyone comes over bearing wine, and she can’t drink red wine, and Ted can’t drink enough of it, so she passes it on. We also have two more seasons to Curb Your Enthusiasm to look forward too, as well. Mary calls it a traffic accident waiting to happen. You bring your own wardrobe, they don’t get paid, and there’s no script. They say things like “You’re having a party. GO!” and it’s all about improvising, which she LOVES.

One of her favorite films she’s done was Stepbrothers with Will Ferrel, because she has a sense of humor like a 12 year old boy. (ME TOO!) She says Will is hysterical, but he’s really so normal and sane. He’s not ‘on’ all the time like others, he can be really quiet.. then one thing comes out and they’re all on the floor laughing. She’s got good tummy muscles from simply trying not to laugh at work. She’s a notorious giggle “I’ve ruined so many takes in my career it’s pathetic!”

She also has a line of soy candles, Nell’s Compass, which she developed to benefit Heifer International - they give people pairs of animals, and teach them to care and raise them, and then as they breed, they pass them along to others so it goes full circle.

Who discovered Mary? Jack Nicolson! She was a waitress, and was in an improve group, doing comedy for cab fare. She thought it might be what she did forever. She went to a casting meeting, and an inner voice said turn around, don’t leave… they were casting something but only famous people or gorgeous models. Mary managed to ask to see the script. She read it over, and heard a voice asking if she was waiting to see him - and it was Jack Nicholson. He called her back to read, and the rest is history. Click here for more backstage with Mary!

Check out Rach’s Yum-O! Holiday Cards too!

We stop off in the kitchen for a quicky Oven-baked Buffalo Blue Cheese Chicken Nuggets, it’s time for the next guess - NASCAR champ, Jimmie Johnson! Rachel tells him he’s a sharp dressed man, and he gives his wife all the credit. Big congrats for Jimmie for the big win - the third consecutive NASCAR Sprint Cup Title, something that hasn’t been done in 30 years. He says it hasn’t really set in just yet. It took a lot of hard work, and he has all the confidence in his team to be able to do it next year for number 4.

When asked if he’s helping decorate the new house, is he part of the process? He says that there was a process that phased him right out, because he just wasn’t much help. He’s happy with a recliner in front of a tv - and his wife hid it in “Some cabinet looking thing”. The best gift he’s ever gotten was the car that he ever wanted. And yes, he’s been pulled over for speeding. He has an excuse for it though… “I was just on the race track at 200 miles an hour and my eyes are off, I’m sorry.” It worked!

Then, Gretta is on hand with some Holiday Shopping Tips - in an advice booth, like Lucy from Peanuts. Ha! (The Dove scented water for teenage girls instead of perfume? GENIUS! I’m so using that one!)

Then it’s dinner time with Cauliflower-Chedder Soup with Ham and Spice Mustard Pinwheel Dippers.