Fancy Fridays

Tintype by Margaret Muza

Thaddeus, age 4, is the dapper host of something special called “Fancy Fridays”.

What makes Fancy Fridays fancy is a few things:

1. CANDLES.  You light a candle and then turn the dimmer part of the light switch down lower, and the dining room gets darker, but not too dark so you can still see your Mom and Dad.

2. TABLECLOTH.  This is really the most important thing.  The tablecloth is the thing you put under your dishes, and its job is to cover up your regular old table so that it can turn fancy.

3. FRENCH MUSIC.  It’s a lady singing and it sounds pretty.  It’s ok that you don’t understand the words because that’s part of what makes it fancy.

4. FOOD.  You eat dinner with your family on Fancy Fridays.  It’s usually soup and other stuff.

5. TALKING.  The other most important thing about Fancy Fridays is that you ask everyone questions and you use your polite manners to listen to their answers.  The best question of all is, “What was your favorite part about today?”

So, let’s make this a real Fancy Friday.

We light our candle.

We turn down the light switch.

We spread a tablecloth under all the dishes.

We turn on the music of the lady singing with the French words.

And we ask Thaddeus what the very best part of today was.

He thinks very hard about his whole entire day.

We wait with our polite manners, listening quietly.

And then he remembers his grandma and decides.

“Putting up ornaments with Miele.”

Grandmas everywhere have been through enough Fridays to know that any moment with a boy like this one is fancy enough.