Happy Mother’s Day!

Maybe I’m just a Mama’s Boy, but I think you’re all with me when I say that Mom’s pretty much the best person on Earth! Right? I mean, Dads are great too, but I think the bond and connection between mother and child is first and foremost—after all, Mom is the person who lugged you around for nine months before she even knew if you were cute or not (and she did most of it with a smile on her face)!

The whole concept of Mother’s Day seems so indispensable that one might assume the day has been celebrated since the dawn of time—But, as understandable as this notion is, this is not the case.

No, Mother’s Day finally saw its official beginning in 1914 despite the day’s history which goes way back before the Civil War! It’s thought to have started as a Christian celebration called “Mothering Sunday”. Although this celebration referred to the “Mother Church” that parishioners would attend on Mothering Sunday, it somehow evolved into a celebration for ACTUAL mothers!

Ann Reeves Jarvis played a key role in the day’s development as she started the “Mother’s Day Work Clubs” which taught local mothers proper childcare. She also started “Mother’s Friendship Day” in which mothers met peacefully with former soldiers of the Civil War after it had passed.

Other key roles in the evolution of Mother’s Day include Julia Howe. She wrote the “Mother’s Day Proclamation” and also petitioned to make June 2 “Mother’s Peace Day”. And a woman named Juliet Blakely started a local Mother’s Day in the 1870s.

It took all the way until 1908 when the daughter of Ann Reeves Jarvis, Anna Marie Jarvis set up her own Mother’s Day in tribute to her mother’s efforts with the Mother’s Day Work Clubs. When her holiday was a success after its first year, Jarvis spent the next six years lobbying to make Mother’s Day a national holiday.

It was President Woodrow Wilson who finally did something about it and announced the second Sunday in May National Mother’s Day, a thoughtful and considerate day to show our mothers our appreciation for them.

Make sure to let your mother know just what she means to you today. Thanks for reading!

- John

Hey, Truth-Tellers!

National Honesty Day is tomorrow and that’s the truth. It’s a day in which everybody is expected to be truthful in everything they say and do. Everyone is expected to answer any question that they are asked with complete honesty. It’s one day out of the year when everyone is supposed to make honesty their highest policy.

This day hasn’t been around for a very long time (relatively speaking). It’s been around for a little over twenty years. It was a day invented by a man known as M. Hirsh Goldberg. His purpose behind the day was to give a little more balance to the month of April.

Since the first of the month, April Fools, encourages pranking and falsehoods, he thought maybe the last day of the month can be about honesty—something a little less immoral.

Telling the truth is important (especially on National Honesty Day, but really just all the time). The things you say and do reflect who you are as a person and how everybody else sees you. That’s why honesty means so much to people. When you tell the truth, you reflect the things that have actually happened and people see that in you.

Remaining an honest person feels good too because there isn’t any added weight of something else constantly on your mind—the fact that you need to keep up with what you have people believing happened even though it didn’t happen. Lying just crowds and clouds your life up. Lying is WORK!

Spread the word about National Honesty Day to all your friends and family so they all know to celebrate the truth along with you tomorrow. While I certainly enjoy the antics of April Fool’s Day, I also like the idea of bookmarking the month with the flip-side.

That’s all for today, Folks. Till next time.

Hey, Readers!

If you’re reading this Blog post, it’s probably because you enjoy reading—that or it’s just written so well you simply can’t resist…but chances are you just like to read. Well, you’re not alone! People everywhere find great escape, great information, and great inspiration in the written word. It’s probably why libraries have technically been around since about 1200 B.C.

So what better time to celebrate your love for reading than all week long this week? After all, it IS National Library Week! Did you know that? Did you know that National Library Week even existed?—it’s okay if you didn’t, I didn’t and I LOVE to read!

But, believe it or not, it isn’t everybody that loves to read; research that was done in the 50’s showed that people were becoming interested in radio and television over reading. The American Library Association (ALA) grew concerned that with all their new media in entertainment, the American people were losing interest in reading.

That’s why, in 1958, the ALA sponsored not just a day but an entire week of national observance for National Library Week. The library is a really great place to go. You can find books on pretty much every thinkable topic so no matter what your interests, the library has got something for you.

Interested in summer camp? Look up a book about that and you can learn ways of optimizing your child’s summer camp experience! If you’re at the library then your kid should be too. Libraries excel in their youth section and kids tend to love their libraries. Make sure you’re getting the most out of your public library and brush up on your reading skills this National Library Week!

Reading is incredibly good for our brains and is often times a great way to spend your leisure time. So check out some interesting books this week at your library and have fun reading!

Hey, April Foolers.

I’m sure you all expected us to have a bunch of office pranks to post about for today, but I thought it might be more conducive to learning if I gave a light overview concerning the history of this auspicious day. So let’s take a journey back in time to discover the origin of this intriguing holiday and the reasons behind its strange celebrations.

To understand this holiday we must travel back all the way to the early medieval times, when dragons still weren’t real but very much so believed in. Originally a Christian Feast Day, April Fools’ or the Feast of Fools was not so widespread back then.

In fact its celebration was confined to the limits of the small English town of Chumpsterburg. This town’s April 1st celebrations can be traced all the way back to the year 200, when the townsfolk received their first king ever, King Jacob of Prankston, France.

During a time of such extremes in social status, worlds collided: the rich and the poor, the royalty and the commoners, the educated and the superstitious. Upon King Jacob’s arrival, the first day of April was declared April Fools’ Day, often referred to in ancient texts as Festivus Follis or Follis Diem.

The shenanigans that the upper class would pull over on the commoners were typically harmless, innocent jokes that never amounted to more than a laugh. Never—until one year in the sixth century, that is, in which a group of soldiers on night watch went door-to-door the morning of April 1st, telling the townspeople that a dragon had been spotted.

This sparked mass panic and lead to the unexpected evacuation of the townsfolk. Thus the celebration of April Fools’ Day was spread across the land. Meanwhile, in Chumpsterburg, the holiday was banned and replaced as March 32nd instead until the villages’ prompt collapse.

Click here to read more information about this interesting holiday and Happy April Fools’ Day!

Happy St. Patty’s Day!

There’s a little Irish in everybody on St. Patty’s Day! While people in the United States (along with many other places like Canada, Britain, New Zealand, and more) prove year after year that you don’t HAVE TO be Irish in order to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, it’s likely that much of the purpose behind today’s celebration is a complete mystery to most of the world (including the Irish).

Feast your eyes on these informational tidbits that you probably aren’t aware of concerning St. Patrick’s Day!

First, let’s start with the basic history behind today. A Christian holiday, St. Patty’s was created not only to celebrate Irish culture, but to memorialize St. Patrick who brought the teachings of Christianity to Ireland. St. Patrick died over 1500 years ago, sometime in the early 6th century. By the 7th century, he was recognized as the patron saint of Ireland!

Most people would probably say that green was Ireland’s color since…ALWAYS, right?

But that’s actually wrong! Ancient flags have shown us that a light shade of blue used to be the national Irish color. Good ol’ green didn’t come around for the Irish until the very end of the 18th century! So what was it that made Ireland see their own, true color?

Well, the shamrock was used by St. Patrick while he was spreading Christianity across the land. He used the three leaves of the clover to symbolize the Holy Trinity. During the Irish Rebellion in 1798, it was used again as a symbol of patriotism. They called it the “wearing of the green” and it slowly developed into a regular custom.

It didn’t take long for the green to catch on, covering whole uniforms in the color of the clover. Not to mention that the verdant, green fields of Ireland already brought the color to mind. It seemed like an obvious switch to be made.

So whether you make some corned beef and cabbage or dress up entirely in green, it’s good to feel a little Irish today—even if you’re not!