manners MATTER
The Thank
You Note…
A Sealed
Treasure
Karen La Corte is an etiquette
and manners expert trained
and certified by the Emily Post
Institute in Vermont. She has
been teaching etiquette and
manners to children and adults
for over thirty years. She is also
a certified image and fashion
consultant. Karen is happy
to answer any personal eti-
quette or image questions you
may have by emailing her at
karen@marxtowing.com
E
xpressing your appreciation for an act
of kindness and sending a thank you
note is a custom most folks practice.
It is considered good manners whenever you
receive a gift, have a service performed for you, or
appreciate the efforts someone has gone through
to do something extraordinary for you, to send an
appropriate thank you note.
Here’s where it gets tricky. We are living in
a digital relationship society where texting and
emailing are daily habits. It is convenient, free and
easy to thank someone by text or to send a quick
email expressing your appreciation. Pressing the
“Send” button doesn’t require choosing stationery,
purchasing a postage stamp, or taking the added
minute or two it would take to add our quirky
handwriting reflecting our lovely personality.
Have we lost our sincerity and personal touch
by relying on our phones and computers to
express our thanks? Is correspondence through
social media personal enough? Although we live in
a fast-paced world where scheduling private time
for ourselves is becoming more and more difficult,
the handwritten thank you note is, and hopefully
will always be, the most gracious medium for
showing our sincere appreciation.
Lizzie Post, great-great-granddaughter of Emily
has a solution for this new-age predicament. If
it feels natural, go ahead and text or email an
acknowledgement of the gift right away. Keep
it short and simple like, “Your gift just arrived!
So excited to open it!” Save the more technical
verbiage for your proper note to follow. (“I can’t
wait to share this fabulous bottle of wine! It’s
one of my favorites!”) I don’t know anyone who
wouldn’t want to be thanked twice for their gift,
do you?
I have listed some examples of when you
would send a note for gifts or a service.
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BY KAREN LA CORTE
Wedding and Engagement
Baby Gifts
Shower (both wedding and baby)
Birthday
Graduation
Get Well
Holiday Gifts
Hospitality (dinner or a stay over)
Sympathy/Funeral (flowers, masses,
donations, food)
Folks Who Do Kindnesses for You
Business (a lunch, a raise, a new client)
Donations to Charities
A Referral
Volunteerism
An Interview
GILROY • MORGAN HILL • SAN MARTIN
JULY / AUGUST 2016
A thank you note should be written as soon
as possible. That way the excitement of the gift
is fresh in the mind of both the giver and the
receiver. I don’t know about you, but if too
much time passes, I can’t remember if I received
the note or not! Notes should be a reflection of
your personality and should be at least three
sentences. Contrary to popular myth, the happy
couple does not have a year’s grace period in
which to write their notes. All thank you notes
should be written within three months of the
receipt of the wedding gift.
Kids need to send thank you notes too! I
love to receive notes written by the children
themselves. Misspelled words, pictures, and
their adorable uneven printing makes me smile.
However, if your child is not old enough,
you can write the note for them. You can
then have your child personalize the note by
adding stickers, a drawing, or an attempt to sign
(scribble) their own name.
There are times when a note just isn’t enough.
I have listed some tasteful and practical gift ideas.
These can be ordered and delivered, or given
upon arrival to a dinner or event.
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Flowers
Wine
A Gift Basket
A Box of Chocolates – candied apples or
chocolate-dipped strawberries work too
Baked Goods – cookies, cakes or a
homemade pie
Candles – can be scented or fragrance free
Coffee – a bag or gift card of the recipients
favorite brand
Gift Cards
Something Seasonal – like a Christmas
ornament or autumn wreath
Popcorn – a variety of flavors available –
and everyone loves popcorn
Good manners are about more than fulfilling
bare-minimum social obligations. They are an
opportunity for us to connect to the people in our
lives in a meaningful way. Pulling out pen and
paper is a way to distinguish yourself and let your
personality be reflected. When I get a handwritten
letter, I’m so excited to open it. There is simply
nothing as personal as a handwritten note. In a
stack of junk mail and bills, it’s a treasure in a
sealed packet.
In the age of instant everything, a hand-
written note is still something worth waiting
for. Make someone’s day!
gmhtoday.com