Thankful Box: Free Template

About this time of year I remind you to get working on a Thanksgiving Journal to pass around your holiday table. But this year I thought a remake of the Father’s Day message box into a Thankful Box might be nice. Guests can each receive a note card to write on and tuck into the box. This might be better received than passing a book as guests may be apt to write more if they know their thoughts aren’t being passed around all day.

For this template I used images from two very old trade cards in my ephemera stash.

Click on the images below to download the box template and note cards. Print to cardstock. Assemble the box using the directions found in the original message box post.

Print multiples of the cards if needed, trim and share with your family and other guests. Make extra sets to share with friends or as a host gift. (If you make and use one I would love to see photos!)

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143

In my very first year of blogging I was completely honored as a Guest Mom on one of the coolest, most fabulous & popular blogs, DesignMom, by Gabrielle Blair. I thought it would be fun to share them again. This post was written a few years before texting was used in our family and “143” became a commonly-known text sentiment for many.

143 – By Guest Mom Cathe Holden

September 3, 2008

Although I was too young to remember, it is told that the number 143 was always present on the back of every envelope of every letter that my father mailed to my mother while serving in the army. It’s code for “I love you”. The number represents the letter count for each word.

It’s a number my family still uses in correspondence to one another and one I sign off with when e-mailing my husband at the firehouse or jotting a note to my kids. And, because of its special meaning to me, I had a rubber stamp made with the number to use on various pieces of my collage art.

The other day I found the exact numbers, all by themselves, laying in order at an antique store. Those numbers now greet my family as they enter our home.

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Budget Birthdays

In my very first year of blogging I was completely honored as a Guest Mom on one of the coolest, most fabulous & popular blogs, DesignMom, by Gabrielle Blair. I thought it would be fun to share those past posts over the next few days.

Budget Birthdays – By Guest Mom Cathe Holden

August 26, 2008

When I was a kid, we didn’t have a party for every birthday. We did, however, get to choose what was for dinner. Boy have times changed.

Money was very tight when my kids were little. You know how the saying goes, “Necessity is the mother of invention.” Turns out to be a wonderful concept as it put my creativity into overdrive and my kids always had more fun when we created an event rather than simply hosting one.

When my son, Bennett, turned 3, (he’s now 13!) (no, he’s now 16!)we held a birthday parade. At that time, we lived in a track-house neighborhood, which made for the best of parade routes. We invited guests to bring their bikes, wagons, skates and baby-doll strollers. We tied balloons to everything that moved. One mom pulled the wagon with the “Happy 3rd Birthday” sandwich-board that hid the boom-box blasting parade music. (As official parade director, I’m somewhere in the back.) We circled the hood to find neighbors coming out onto their porches and into their yards to wave us by. You’ve never seen a prouder group of tiny people. No one seemed to care that it was raining on our parade. Soon enough we were home for cake, ice cream and presents before everyone left happy and ready for a nap.

Homemade Invitations: $5. Balloons: $25. Cake & Ice Cream: $20. A birthday we’ll never forget: Priceless.

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