A Funny

I was driving behind a car with a pink ribbon magnet. (This is not the funny part.) The pink ribbon, of course, for breast cancer awareness. (Again, not to the funny part yet.) The words on the ribbon . . . SAVE THE TA-TAs!

Don't know what

to say, but I gotta say something because I haven't reported in for a week. Too many things going on around here, I guess. We did have a big week- a new dog (arrived last Sunday), toddler beds for the two year olds (set up on Monday), regularly schedule gymnastic classes for the younger three, the weekly basketball practice on Tuesday with game day on Saturday for the oldest, hosting a "cocktail party" for the recruits for Rob's department at work, and -of course- all the cleaning, planning, shopping, food prep, and then cleaning again that goes along with hosting a party, and keeping up with life in general. I have already started doing some planning for the summer Vacation Bible School program at church, so I often find myself paging through the manuals or on-line hunting for decorating ideas, craft options, bulk pricing on certain items, etc.

Going with the topic of food prep, it often seems like extra cooking projects come in groups around here. For example, this past Friday I took a meal to a family in the athletic dept. in which the mom has a broken arm so wives have been taking turns helping out by bringing them dinner. (As a side, this is the family that inspired my thankfulness the no one in our family has food allergies. In preparing for this family, it had to be something that met a no salt and no dairy restriction- a bit difficult in my opinion.) We had the party Saturday. I made a small contribution to a church luncheon today (nothing big or difficult- just remembering to take it was the hardest part!) On Wednesday, I am preparing lunch for the teachers at the kids' school.

So, nothing exciting to say here today, but that is all that I have to say because I actually sat down with the computer to do some VBS work, but felt like I really needed to make a report of some sort. Signing off in Oklahoma,

Live Commercial

"Green works- cleans up tough messes!" is what my 4 year old tells me. I do actually use this product, but I don't think she knew that. When she saw me break out a new bottle today, she told me again, "Green works- cleans up tough messes". I said, "Really?" Enthusiastically, "Yes,(short pause) at least that's what the tv at Grandma's house tells me. You should use it with your Sham-Wow, Mom, and get things really clean!"

Yes, I use Green Works for some cleaning, and I do own the 'as seen on tv' Sham-Wow product. I got them for Christmas (another story in itself) and am very excited about them! Anyway, we might get this house cleaned up sometime, because I tell you, there are some tough messes around.

Oops!

The link from the previous post was not sufficient, so I will have to look into that. Until then, a little synopsis of the story . . . 40 years ago a white fireman rescued a black baby girl from a burning building and resuscitated her. Just this week, they were reunited as the now 40-year old woman was finally able to track him down to say "thank you".

What a Reunion!

On the topic of thank yous, I thought this article was pretty special. What a significant thank you that occurred yesterday between these two people with a special past.

Thank You Notes

I really like thank you notes. I enjoy sending them. I enjoy receiving them. I tend to send them whether I was able to thank the gift giver in person or not (I think that may be one of the indicators of the appropriateness of sending or not sending). I also think it is nice to send a thank you when people are generous with other things besides gifts, such as their time, kindness, or helpfulness.

Regrettably, I have not been doing as well as I would like with sending thank you notes over the last year or so. Some of you may be thinking up excuses for me in your mind like I am busy or have more important things to worry about, but I don't want to use excuses. Sending thank yous are important to me, yet I have not been giving them the attention they deserve. I feel terrible about many thank yous that should have been sent months ago for people who worked with me on church projects, some gift givers that have not been adequately thanked, etc.

I know there are etiquette rules about thank you notes- appropriate timing, wording suggestions, when you don't have to send them, etc. What is the etiquette for sending late thank yous? Is it better than sending no thank you? I don't know! I am sure I can find something about this on-line or in a book, but do I really want to go by someone else's rules -or what I think is important?

One of my dilemnas now is that we are going to be recruiting helpers for this year's Vacation Bible School soon, and the people that helped me last year are some of the people that I would have liked to send thank you notes to. Does it look like I am sucking up at the last minute to try to get them to say yes if I send a note now? Do I combine the two with a note saying how important they were last year and recruit at the same time?

One of Rob's coworkers really has it going on with thank you notes . . . and, to be honest, I am jealous! She was the only one (that I know of) that gave him a written thank you note for the Christmas gift he gave to all his employees. As a side note, the gifts he bought were with his/our money rather than from his work budget, so he signed all of the gifts with both of our names. Not only did this coworker write the thank you, she even addressed it to both of us. Just a week or so after the first thank you (which she sent in a very timely manner), she sent another thank you for something else he had done for her. I provide a picture here of her second thank you because not only was it super cute (see the cute danglies!) and include a personal note (not pictured) she added great notes on the envelope and top flap of the card. Very thoughtful and impressive; she gets an A+ in my book!




One last comment on thank you notes, I read The Last Lecture over Christmas break. (I highly recommned, by the way.) The author was also strongly in favor of thank you notes and had a good outlook about them, so make sure to pay special attention to that chapter when you read the book.

Well, that is all for now on thank you notes. I wish I knew where to go from here. It might be one of those things I just need to make the commitment to doing better again and start now without trying to catch up. (sigh)

So many things

going around in my head to share and not enough time to share it. I don't even know where to begin. Funny things, cute photos, inspiring stories, venting my grumps, . . . so . . . where to get started today?

I'll share (what I think) is a funny "kid speak" moment. Our six and four year olds are riding in the van with me. Four year old is quizzing six year old on words to spell out of the book she is reading. He is doing well, but she stumps him a bit with the word cherries; he just adds an -s at the end of cherry instead of "changing the -y to -i and adding -es". After she (somewhat smugly, I must say) informs him that he didn't get that one quite right, I give him an example of a word using this rule that I know he knows -the word baby/babies. He nods his understanding, and the ever chatty (still smug) little sister says, "That's right, Robbie. You know 'cherries' just like 'appletizers'!"

WHAT?! Poor me, who tries to be non-judgemental when these type of misconceptions of children come out, cannot help but to laugh. Not only did her example include something that isn't really a word, it wasn't even an example of what we were talking about! Of course, in her mind, it all made perfect sense.