My mother recently died. Her funeral was yesterday, and we were lucky enough to receive many cards, some of which included money and/or donations to charities. We also received a few flower arrangements.
I’d like to write thank-yous. From what I gather on the interwebs, a thank-you for just showing up at the funeral or giving a card is not required. However, any cards that include money or donations and the flower arrangements should be thanked.
Fine. But how do I deal with the following?
gifts that are from multiple people. For example, one flower arrangement was from a a father and several adult children and their families. Do I need to send multiple cards? Send to the father only?
donations to charities. Do I let the charity write the thank-you? Do I?
And the one that’s REALLY confounding me:
Most of the cards don’t have address information. Some had checks, and I can get the address off the check. But what do I do with a $20 bill and a card that says “Al and Mary” and no other info? My mother had a lot of old friends who I don’t know, and my father doesn’t really remember (he’s old too, and his memory isn’t great.) Even if I DO figure out who the heck these people are, how do I find an address? It used to be easy; you could look in the phone book. Nowadays though, even old folks have cancelled their land lines.
Ugh. I hate this shit. If there’s one thing I’ve learned, from now on any cards/gifts I send will have my full name & address on them!
I think you’ll find people are pretty forgiving about thank you cards following funerals. They mostly understand the strain the family are under and that the persons doing the thanking may not be well known to them.
I’d thank the head of the family and include thanks to the family on the same card.
If they haven’t given you any address, I can only assume they are not expecting a thank you, or will come to the realization that they should have included their address…
The charities will send thankyous and tax receipts. Whether or not you also want to say thanks Is entirely up to you.
For Al and Mary, check your mother’s address book.
For flowers from extended families, send one card to the “head of the family” and address it to the group (“The Hofnagler family”). Acknowledge the group in your message.
IME, people do write thank you notes for gifts to charities.
Condolences on your loss. People realize that you’re grieving and don’t expect perfect behavior from you for a while.
Exactly this. After my mother died, I used her address book for several things surrounding her death and funeral, including looking up the address of someone who had sent a plant to the funeral home.
I like the address book idea… however I’m about 99% certain my mother doesn’t have one. She was the type of 80-year-old woman who got pissy when her old-lady friends wouldn’t communicate with her using text messages. Fairly certain she went paperless 10+ years ago. I’ll dig around, though.
Thanks for all the other suggestions, including the “don’t worry about the timing” bits. These last couple months have been… difficult.