The Art of Thank You Notes

As a child raised in the South, my mother instilled in me the principles of writing thank you notes in a timely matter. As a child, they were the bane of christmases and birthdays. Now, I do enjoy writing them and supporting the U.S. Postal Service. There really is nothing quite like receiving a handwritten note. Despite years (17 to be exact) of practice in the art of writing thank you notes, at times I find myself at a lost on how to approach writing a thank you for certain gifts. It is easy to thank someone for a watch or earrings, or even a gift card, but I often find it hard to write a thank you for cash or check.

I sometimes believe that it is tacky to just bluntly thank some for sending you cash. This might be a personal dilemma, but some others might feel the same way. I find it is easier to thank someone for money when I format it in something similar to this:
     Dear Aunt Jane,
        Thank you so much for the check/gift! I am using it in addition to other gifts to buy an Anne Klein watch (or other gift.) I have been saving for a while and this is exactly what I needed to get it. Thanks again for the gift.
     Love,
         Alexis

I find that as long as you mention what you are doing with the money, it lessons the tackiness of writing about money.

Blondies

Hey, y'all. A few months ago, I posted about making brownies. Over the past few months, I've started baking more and realized how much I really liked it. Last week I decided to try my hand at blondies.* Seeing as though I had never attempted these before, I decided it would be fun to make them. I got the recipe from here: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchens/blondies-recipe3/index.html

The first step was to mix some of the wet ingredients together:

Then, we mix the dry ingredients:

Then, of course, we beat the ingredients together:

Then, we add the chips.

After they cook and all, they looked suspiciously like cookie bars:

Now, the verdict:
I was a little worried about them, especially because I had not made them previously. Nonetheless, I ate them. I also gave them to several friends, who all agreed with me. They were extremely moist and incredibly soft. It was a problem for my whole family. They were gone in two days.

* I was watching Nancy Drew, which always inspires me to either bake blondies/lemon bars or buy loafers.