As my husband and I were finishing dinner the other evening, he asked me to read the bill for him. The restaurant, dimly lit, made it difficult for him to see it.  I sighed, pulled my glasses out of my purse, and looked at it.

“It’s $45.00,” I said. This wasn’t bad as far as I was concerned since we each had had two beverages and shared an appetizer along with an entre apiece.

My husband opened his wallet, removed his credit card and handed both the bill and the card to the server as she walked by.

When the server returned with his credit card and the check, my husband again asked me if I would write in the tip amount and total. I complied and in the process asked rather sarcastically,

“Would you like me to sign it for you too? I could, you know. I know how to sign your name exactly as you do.  Nobody would ever know.  I just have to make the ‘G’ look like an ‘L’ and write Lary …. I know your ATM pin number too, you know.  If I wanted, I could clean you out.”

I like to tease my husband about this kind of stuff, because he once was married to a woman who did just that while he was on active duty and deployed overseas. When we married 14 years ago, we were sure to keep a few financial things separate.  However, as time has gone on, we have mixed more and more of our assets together.  I know it is mean to tease him, but sometimes he is so “tease-able” about this issue that I have to admit I get a little passive aggressive pleasure out of watching him squirm.  Not a great quality of mine, I know.

“No, that’s okay,” was his response. “Besides, you can’t make the ‘C’ for our last name like I do.”

“Do you really think that?” I asked him. “I’ll just write your signature onto this piece of scrap paper and we will compare the two.”

Upon comparison, the two were similar, but my duplication of his signature in no way looked just like his. You could definitely tell which was counterfeit.

“I have told you the story about my dad being a forger, haven’t I?” I asked him.

I had, but I will retell it for you.

Both of my parents were born in the late 1920’s to early 1930’s. They both came of age and married each other in the early 1950’s, so you could say they were the typical 1950’s and 1960’s couple.  My dad went to work every day, came home, and in the summer time worked in the garden.  My mother stayed home with us kids most of the time.  There was a brief period when my sister and I were very young that Mom worked at the soda counter in a local drug store. That didn’t last very long. It was just to help make ends meet while my father was laid off from his job at the steel mill in Youngstown, Ohio.  He soon found a job again with the water company, and my mom quit hers.  My mother especially, they both believed certain things were a “man or woman’s” role.  Earning a living was a “man’s” job, and staying home and running the house was the “woman’s.” My mom eventually did go to work when both my sister and I were in high school, but she made sure her friends and family knew it was because she WANTED to go to work and not because she HAD to.  She was always sure to let my father know that he was the MAN of the house.  She strived to never do or say anything to make him feel otherwise.

My father did nothing other than going to work every day, and working in his garden when weather permitted. The routine, mundane household chores were up to my mother.  Dad’s philosophy was, “Why should I have to do that stuff when I got three women living in this house?”  The three women were first my mother, and then eventually my older sister and me.  My sister and I were also his reasoning for never getting my mother a dishwasher until we were both grown and out of the house.  He believe he and my mother had brought two perfectly good ones into the world.

That was my father and by the values of those times, he was a good one. He went to work every day, handed his paycheck over to his wife, and let her manage everything relating to home and children and finances the way she thought best.  He could do that because my mother could be trusted, and she was good with money.  My father loved us. He would do anything for us.  We knew that then; we know that now.  He proved it daily.

My mother was of the opinion that a woman should make her man feel like a man as much as possible. Mother did everything for Dad. From ironing his boxer shorts to pressing his hankies, she did it all. To prove even further that my father was the MAN of the house, the KING of his castle, the HEAD of his household, everything was always in my father’s name even though everything was in joint ownership with my mother.  The car title was in dad’s name only, but it was their car.  The telephone and utility bills were in my dad’s name only, but Mom always made sure she paid them on time. Their personal checking account…that was different…it was in both their names.

I mentioned earlier that my father went to work, and on paydays, he handed his check over to my mother. But, he didn’t sign it.  He didn’t need to.   I told you Mother did EVERYTHING for Dad.  Whenever she deposited his paycheck to their personal checking, she always signed it for him… with his name, not hers.  Whenever she wrote a personal check against their jointly owned checking account, she always signed his name, not hers.  You know, you gotta make a man feel like a man!  (I say with a bit of sarcasm.)

Mom always kept some cash stashed away in a drawer for day-to-day expenses. My father knew this, so when he needed or wanted money, he went to the stash and took what he wanted.  After all, he had earned it.  There were no questions from my mother, no arguments.  As long as there was money to pay the bills, take care of the family, and save a little, Mom never said much.

One time my mother wrote a check for me to pay my college tuition, and she signed my father’s name.

“Mom, you can’t do that! Why don’t you sign your own name?  Aren’t you on the account?”

“Of course, I’m on the account. But I sign your dad’s name,” she admitted.

“Mom, that’s illegal!” I exclaimed.

“Tell your father to have me arrested,” she chuckled. “Let me tell you something,” she schooled me.  “If I wanted to, I could have cleaned your father out financially years ago, and he knows it. If your father ever went to the bank and signed his own name, they would arrest HIM for forging his signature.”

WHA….????????

God bless my mother and father! My father was the KING of his castle.  My mother?  She was NOT his minion!  They were married for over 50 years.  Maybe the rest of us could learn something from all of this.

Today I am sharing a card that I made using some of my favorite Christmas colors; blue and silver.

I love the way this turned out!  Some things you need to know about when making this card. I used silver embossing powder on the doily. I had to versa mark quite a bit of the doily in order to get all of the lacy edge covered.  You might even have to versa mark and add embossing powder several times to get it completely covered. I’ve seen this done before, but never tried it myself.  Another thing you need to know is I embossed the stamped image of the ornament in silver powder as well.  I did the center and the holly leaves and berries twice, cut and punched each out,  and attached them using  dimensionals to add depth.

Hope you enjoyed your visit today.  Until next time…

Happy Stamping!