Tuesday, January 15, 2013

My Take On Thank You Notes



Today I realized it has been exactly one month since my baby shower. I figured that now was the best time to write my thank you notes while I'm still anxiously awaiting the arrival of my little girl and while I still have a free moment. As I started collecting all of the things I needed to write my thank yous, I wondered what the proper time frame for sending them out was. Was I already late? Still within the window? I decided to do some research as part of my journey to domestic bliss.

It was hard to find a definitive answer about the time frame for sending out baby shower thank yous. In general, it seems that thank you notes should be sent out within one or two weeks of receiving the gift. Personally, I think that time frame seems a little short, but maybe that's because I'm already well outside of it. Four weeks feels like an acceptable amount of time. Four weeks gives a person time to enjoy their gifts and gives them time to recover from the party that they may have had. I certainly don't want people stressing out about having to get thank yous out right away when I give them a present.

Anything longer than four weeks may be pushing it, but it seems that the rule "better late than never" applies to thank yous. I have to admit, I agree with that. If someone has generously spent their time and money to give me a gift, really the least I can do it write a little, personal note to show my gratitude. Back in September, I went out of my way to pick up a gift off a friend's wedding registry. Having never received a thank you note, I still wouldn't mind if I got one now, even though it's been over three months. It is something the perfectionist in me took notice of without even meaning to, but it is also something the imperfectionist in me understands and forgives. Do you remember when people don't send you a thank you note?

Moving past the time frame, the way I see it, the task of sending out thank yous is a two part task. There's the addressing of the envelopes and then there's the actually writing inside the card. Let's break it down.

While doing my research I saw many complaints about addressing the envelopes. Many times people suggested having guests fill out their own envelopes at the baby shower, giving the mom-to-be one less thing to do. While I've been asked to do this before, I'm not a big fan of this approach. It just seems to me that this wouldn't fall into the "proper etiquette" category. And more than that, presumably you just mailed invitations to all of these people. Here's my suggestion: Use your online address book to make address labels. Provide the host of your baby shower with one copy for invitations (something I'm sure she'd appreciate) and print off a second copy to use for your thank yous. It takes no time at all! (Every Christmas, I use this same approach. I create my labels by doing a mail merge in Microsoft Word. Our Christmas cards = domestic bliss. So why not take what works and apply it here?) I have heard the argument that it's impersonal not to hand-write the envelopes, but I think as long as you're handwriting something personal on the inside of the card, the envelope doesn't really matter. People are just going to recycle it anyway.

Now, the second part, writing the message on the inside of the card, that's the part that I find daunting. I never know exactly what to write. It's best to keep it simple, but specific. You should thank the gift-giver for their specific present, and if possible, say how you're going to use it or what you already used it for. One suggestion I came across in my research was to write in the voice as the baby. While I think it's sort of sweet, it also sounds a little bit crazy. If you're going to do that, I would say at least wait until the baby is born. My favorite tip is this: type out your message first, and then hand-write it. This may sound a little more time-consuming, but it really isn't. You can probably type a lot faster than you can write, and you can edit what you say a lot easier. It's also great for spell checking! Decide what you want to say and then quickly copy it down into the actual card.

And there you have it, my take on thank you notes! I would love to hear your thoughts on the subject, too. Comment below.

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