Today is my sweet sister-in-law Amanda’s birthday. I wont tell you how old she is but i will say she is gorgeous and still in her twenties which entitles me to be bitter on at least a couple of levels.

 A few weeks ago i spent a rainy evening wandering my local card shop in search of the perfect birthday card for her, but what i discovered is the greeting card industry distributes some SERIOUSLY disturbing messages in this particular genre.

One card read:

“An idiot made us sisters, God made us friends.”

Amazing. Because clearly nothing says i love you like insulting her husband AND your own brother in one fell swoop.

Then there was the entire section of “poetic” style cards all of which seemed as though they could have been written by a sociopathic kindergartner:

“You have a heart, you sometimes forgive, Sometimes thinking of others, by the way that you live”

Seriously? You SOMETIMES forgive? SOMETIMES think of others? So basically what I’m saying is 50% of the time you’re pretty decent, but the other half i think you’re a grudge-holding, selfish no good and i cant believe my brother married you.  Its truly heartwarming, isn’t it?

And of course I cant leave out the entire grouping of cards that all looked as though they were quilted, emblazoned with doves and might possibly have been made entirely from the country curtains that formerly graced my mother’s living room picture window circa 1984.

But here was by far the most terrible and my personal favorite:

“From the day I met you I knew you were trouble
between you and your mother my misery is double
you treat my brother  like a piece of poo
If there’s a worst sister in law in the world its definitely you
You’re heinous and rude disrespectful and ill
I wish I were done with your sorry dumb tail
But you married my brother Whether i liked it or not
But don’t take it out on me you miserable goat.”

TADA!!!! Now THAT is a winner!!! If you actually gave this to your sister in law and she didn’t run you over with her car after Thanksgiving dinner then you didn’t do something right. Hallmark, have you officially lost your ever-lovin’ minds???

And so dear Amanda, as you can see i was left with no choice but to simply write my own words of greeting card perfection. I’ll keep it short and sweet just like you:

“I loved you first just because you made my brother happy. But now, i simply cant imagine a world….or my family….without you in it.  I imagine you’re the sum total of all the wishes Kent made on blown out birthday candles and falling stars combined and I hope this is the start of your best year yet. I love you, Amanda. Happy Birthday.”

Tags: Amanda, bad poetry, Birthday, funny cards, Hallmark, Sister in Law

This entry was posted on Friday, November 6th, 2009 at 5:16 pm and is filed under Daily Dose of Mo. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.