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As my children will tell you, good manners and etiquette are something that I have very strong feelings about. Believe me, I am not an expert but I was taught at a very young age that there are definitely things you do and things you don’t do! I was surprised one evening when my son-in-law called me and said he had a question for “Mrs. Etiquette”! At first I thought it was funny but as I thought about it that really wasn’t a bad thing. He had a situation he was confronted with and wanted to ask my opinion as to what was the appropriate way to deal with it.

I am surprised that many things like manners and good etiquette seem to have taken a back seat in our lives. Teaching good manners to our children should be started at an early age and it should begin at home. It is our responsibility to teach our children because as they get older, if they have not learned good manners as children, how can we expect them to be polite adults. Let’s face it, children are a reflection of us whether we like it or not. Things like saying “Hello” to adults, not interrupting, saying excuse me, please and thank you... all of these things should just become second mature with our children.

It is sad to say but many adults don’t show very good manners sometimes. Case in point... we hosted a large party at a restaurant this past weekend. The invitation was followed at the end with RSVP, Regrets Only. Now, I thought that it was common knowledge that under those circumstances, if you could not attend you would call the host to let him know. Obviously, I was wrong. Based on the number of calls we received, we confirmed, with the restaurant, a number that would attend and ultimately ended up paying for people that did not respond and just did not come. RSVP is an extremely important lesson to teach your children but remember, you must lead by example!

When good manners become second nature to your children it is a lovely thing to behold and, trust me, others will notice!

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