thank you, mom

When my older sister first started preschool, I was extremely jealous and couldn't understand why I had to wait a year to go. It just wasn't fair. My mother, as an elementary school reading teacher, decided that instead of listening to me whine, I could have some lessons of my own at home. I think she was also trying to smarten me up a bit...how did she know I'd be a slow learner who barely grasped the concept of long and short vowels? So, while my sister went down the street to preschool, my mom whipped out one of those black and white cow-printed composition books and put me to work. On each page she wrote one letter of the alphabet and I got to search through magazines for pictures that started with each letter. I still have the book to this day (see photo). It is hilarious to me what I came up with. Ss...stachyou (I was so close). I am pretty sure that my sisters and I learned to read faster than most other kids our age because my mom would give us fun little projects at home. Now I realize there may have been an ulterior motive....

My mom is also slightly obsessed with thank-you notes. This is not a bad thing. I secretly think she started us reading and writing early so that we would be able to properly thank people for any gifts we ever received. There is a Christmas tradition in our house to get a new set of thank-you cards in our stockings. When we were younger, we would groan, knowing that we'd have to sit down and write out thank-you's to Santa and all of our relatives for each and every present. I'm not gonna lie, it was torture to sit down for an hour or two writing thank-you's for the toys I would have rather been playing with. Now that I am older, I actually enjoy writing thank-you notes and truly appreciate receiving them. There's just something about getting a little note from someone saying that they appreciated your effort, your visit, or your gift to them. It only took me 20+ years, but lesson learned. Thank you, Mom.

I've recently designed a simple little thank-you note (more to come, I'm sure) to post in my Etsy Shop. Here's a little preview of it:

Thanks for reading!