For a friend’s mother, choose the birthday message that matches how close you are to her. Respectful and brief suits a woman you have met a few times; warm and personal suits a friend’s mother you have known for years; openly loving suits only a mother figure. The most touching messages stay short and name one true detail.
Seventy messages for a friend’s mother follow, each tagged with the closeness tier it suits — along with salutations, sign-offs, guidance on what to avoid, and answers to the questions people ask most often.
Tier key: T1 barely met · T2 family friend · T3 long-standing friend’s mother · T4 mother figure.
How close are you to her?
Your birthday message to a friend’s mother should match the closeness you actually have with her, not the closeness you would like to have: brief and respectful if you have met her a few times, warm and personal if you have known her for years, and openly loving only if she has mothered you too.
Getting this wrong is the main way these messages go wrong. A short, plain message sent by someone who has spent years in her house reads as cold. A long, intimate message sent by someone she has met twice reads as strange. Pick the tier first, then the words.
The four tiers, and what each allows
Four relationship tiers cover almost every sender: barely met, family friend, long-standing friend’s mother, and mother figure.
| Tier | Who she is to you | Message band | Do not go past |
| T1 | You have met her a few times, or only know of her through your friend | Respectful, brief, no personal claims | No memories, no affection, no “like a mother” language. Add your name so she can place you |
| T2 | Family friend. You have been to the house and she has fed you | Warm and specific | No intimacy claims. Gratitude stays about her hospitality, not about your relationship |
| T3 | A long-standing friend’s mother. Years of contact, birthdays, family events | Affectionate and personal | Gratitude can be personal, but do not claim a family role she has not given you |
| T4 | She has looked after you in ways a parent would | Loving and longer, with thanks for her role in your life | She is still not your mother. Do not claim her as family unless she has made that clear |
The tier bands in that table are practical guidance drawn from how these messages are normally written, not a published standard — no major etiquette authority rules on this particular relationship, so nothing in the table should be cited as a rule.
Your tier is not a compliment you pay her — it is an honest description of what you two actually are. If you are unsure between two tiers, choose the lower one. A message that lands slightly understated is a small miss. A message that lands too familiar is memorable for the wrong reason.
Is it appropriate to wish your friend’s mother a happy birthday?
Wishing your friend’s mother a happy birthday is a normal, welcome gesture in most situations, and no formal etiquette rule covers the specific case, so the guidance here is social practice rather than an etiquette ruling.
Two conditions sit underneath that answer. She should be someone you have actually met, and the message should be proportionate to how well you know her. If you have never met her and your friend mentions her birthday, the better move is usually to pass a message through your friend rather than to contact her directly.
One honest limitation worth stating plainly: this is not an area where a published standard tells you what to do. General birthday etiquette guidance exists — Emily Post’s guidance on birthday parties and manners is a good example of it — but none of the major etiquette authorities rules on this particular relationship. So treat the guidance here as practical judgment, not as a rule you can cite.
The line you should not cross
A birthday message to a friend’s mother becomes too much when it claims a closeness you do not have, runs longer than the relationship, or stacks compliments without naming anything real.
Three signals that you have gone past the line:
- The message is longer than the relationship. A five-paragraph letter to someone you have met twice reads as intense. Length is a claim about intimacy.
- It uses family language she has not offered. “Thank you for raising me” belongs to a small number of people. From most senders it is an overreach.
- Every sentence is praise. Four compliments in a row, none of them specific, sounds copied or borrowed. One real detail does more work than three general ones.
The same three signals explain why a plainly worded message usually beats an elaborate one. If you remember one thing, make it this: specific and short reads as sincere, and general and long reads as borrowed.
If your message is for someone else entirely — a friend, a partner, a relative — the generic deep and meaningful birthday wishes format is the closer match, because the tier rules apply only to a friend’s mother.
How to build a message in four parts
A birthday message to a friend’s mother is built from four parts: a salutation, a birthday line, one specific detail about her, and a sign-off with your name.
The four-part shape is standard card-writing advice rather than a local convention: the published guidance on what to write in a birthday card follows the same outline of a salutation, the birthday wish itself, your positive wishes, and an appropriate sign-off. Keeping to it prevents the two commonest failures: a message that never actually says “happy birthday”, and a message that ends without saying who it is from.
One small correctness note that does more for your credibility than any amount of warmth: write friend’s mother with the possessive. The apostrophe-s is what marks the relationship in standard English, as the Cambridge Dictionary entry on the possessive ‘s sets out, and it is the difference between wishing a friend’s mother and seeming to wish a friend who happens to be a mother. On a text message nobody will notice. In a card from an adult, some people will.
How to open it
Use “Dear Mrs. [Last name]” if you have met your friend’s mother only a few times, her first name if you have known her for years, and no salutation at all in a text.
| Situation | Opening | Why |
| T1, card | “Dear Mrs. [Last name],” | Correct and unfailingly safe. Never assume a first name you have not been invited to use |
| T1, text | “Hi Mrs. [Last name],” or just start with “Happy birthday!” | Texts tolerate no salutation; a formal one can look stiff |
| T2, card | “Dear [First name],” | You have been in her house. The first name is expected |
| T3, card | “Dear [First name],” | Same, with more warmth allowed in the lines that follow |
| T4, card | “Dear [First name],” or “[First name],” | Formality here would read as distance |
| Any tier, text or DM | No salutation needed | Start with the birthday line. It reads as warmer, not ruder |
If you do not know how she prefers to be addressed, ask your friend. It takes one message and removes the whole problem.
How to close it
“Best,” “Warm wishes,” and your first name work at any level of closeness, while “With love,” belongs only in messages to a friend’s mother who has been a mother figure to you.
| Closing | Fits | Note |
| “Best,” / “All the best,” | T1 and T2 | Safe, warm enough, never presumptuous |
| “Warm wishes,” | Any tier | The most broadly useful closing for this relationship |
| “With love,” | T3 and T4 | Reads as genuine at T4 and as a small overreach at T1 |
| “Love,” | T4 only | Family language. Do not use it below T4 |
| “[Your first name]” alone | Texts and DMs, any tier | In a group card, sign your own name rather than the group’s |
Always sign with your name. A friend’s mother may know you well, and she may not know at a glance which of her child’s friends you are — especially in a group card or a message sent from a shared number.
If she writes back to thank you and you want to answer properly, note that thank-you notes to a friend’s mother follow a different structure from birthday messages, because the purpose is gratitude rather than celebration.
The one detail that makes it yours
One true detail separates a touching message from a copied one: something your friend’s mother did for you, something she is known for, or the way she treats people.
Three reliable sources of a detail:
- Something she did for you. She drove you home for years. She kept your favorite snack in the house. She remembered your exam dates.
- Something she is known for. Her cooking, her garden, the fact that nobody leaves her house hungry, the way she asks follow-up questions.
- How she treats people. The person in the room who notices when someone is left out and quietly fixes it.
Use exactly one. Two details dilute each other and start to sound like a list.
Here is the same content built twice at different tiers, using one slot per line:
T1 — you have met her a few times
Happy birthday, Mrs. [Last name]! Every time I’ve been over, you’ve made it seem normal to have one more person at the table. I hope you have a great day.
T3 — she is your closest friend’s mother
Happy birthday, [First name]! Thank you for the years of dinners and for always asking how my own family is doing. You’ve raised the friend I’ve leaned on since we were kids. I hope this year is a good one for you.
Same structure, same four parts, different claims — because the tiers are different.
Why shorter reads as more sincere
A message longer than the relationship reads as borrowed, which is why the most touching versions are usually short.
The instinct to add feeling by adding sentences tends to backfire, because length itself is a claim about closeness. People who write and study birthday messages professionally make the same point from the other direction: published card guidance recommends short messages when you are not close to the recipient, and saving longer writing for people you actually know well. Readers notice the mismatch more than senders expect.
Practical version: keep a text to one to three sentences and a card to four to six. If you find yourself writing a second paragraph at T2, you have probably drifted a tier.
Short messages for a text or DM
Short birthday messages for a friend’s mother work in a text or a DM, and each one is tagged with the tier of closeness it suits.
Tier key: T1 barely met · T2 family friend · T3 long-standing friend’s mother · T4 mother figure.
T1 — you have met her a few times
- Happy birthday! Wishing you a wonderful day. — T1
- Happy birthday, Mrs. [Last name]. I hope you have a lovely day. — T1
- Happy birthday! It’s always good to see you. — T1
- Wishing you a very happy birthday and a good year ahead. — T1
- Happy birthday! Hope your day is full of the people you love. — T1
- Happy birthday! [Friend’s name] speaks so highly of you. — T1–T2
T2 — a family friend
- Happy birthday! Thank you for always making me feel welcome in your home. — T2
- Happy birthday! I still think about that dinner you made. Hope today is just as good. — T2
- Happy birthday! Thank you for looking out for me over the years. — T2
- Happy birthday! Your house is the one where everyone feels at home. — T2
- Happy birthday! [Friend] is lucky to have you, and so am I. — T2
- Happy birthday! Thanks for the rides, the food, and the advice. I remember all of it. — T2
T3 — a long-standing friend’s mother
- Happy birthday! Thank you for raising the person who has been my closest friend for years. — T3
- Happy birthday! You’re part of a lot of my good memories. Thank you for all of them. — T3
- Happy birthday! I’ve learned a lot from watching how you treat people. — T3
- Happy birthday! Thank you for every time you treated me like one of your own. — T3
- Happy birthday! Half my childhood happened at your kitchen table, and I’m grateful for it. — T3
- Happy birthday! You’ve always been the calm one when everyone else was panicking. — T3
T4 — she has been a mother figure to you
- Happy birthday! You’ve been a second mother to me, and I don’t say that lightly. — T4
- Happy birthday! Thank you for the advice over the years. It has mattered more than you know. — T4
- Happy birthday! You’ve taken care of me in ways I’ll never be able to repay. — T4
- Happy birthday! You’re one of the reasons I turned out okay. — T4
- Happy birthday! Thank you for being someone I can call when things go wrong. — T4
- Happy birthday! You’ve given me a place to land more than once. Thank you for that. — T4
One-liners that work without personal detail
Lines that need no memory and no inside knowledge — useful in a group chat, on a card you did not plan ahead for, or at T1, where a specific detail is not available to you.
- Happy birthday! Wishing you a wonderful year ahead. — T1
- Happy birthday! I hope today is a good one from start to finish. — T1
- Happy birthday! Wishing you a very happy day and a peaceful year. — T1
- Happy birthday! Wishing you health, happiness, and plenty of good days. — T1–T2
- Happy birthday! May the year ahead be kind to you. — T1–T2
- Happy birthday! Hope your day is full of the people you love most. — T1–T2
- Happy birthday! Wishing you a day that treats you as well as you treat everyone else. — T2
- Happy birthday! Here’s to a year of good news and easier days. — T2
Messages to write in a card
Card messages for a friend’s mother run four to six sentences and leave room for one specific memory.
A card gives you space that a text does not, and it is the right choice from T2 upward. Card-writing guides from greeting-card publishers work from exactly this premise, grouping birthday messages for friends and their families by who the recipient is and how close they are rather than offering one universal list. Keep the four-part structure, replace the general detail with a real one, and stop when you have said the thing you wanted to say.
Tier key: T1 barely met · T2 family friend · T3 long-standing friend’s mother · T4 mother figure.
T1 — you have met her a few times
Happy birthday, Mrs. [Last name]! I wanted to send a note rather than just a text, because you’ve been kind to me every time we’ve met. I hope this year brings you good health and an easy, happy time.
Happy birthday! I hope your day is full of the things you enjoy most. It has been a pleasure getting to know your family through [Friend]. Wishing you a wonderful year ahead.
T2 — a family friend
Happy birthday! Thank you for the way you’ve always welcomed me into your home. You never once made me feel like a guest who had overstayed. I hope today is full of the people who love you, and I hope the year ahead treats you well.
Happy birthday! I don’t think I’ve ever properly thanked you for how kind you were to me growing up. You fed me, drove me places, and never made me feel like a nuisance. I hope this birthday is as good as you’ve been to all of us.
Happy birthday! One of my favorite things about your house is that nobody ever wants to leave it. That’s you. Wishing you a day as warm and generous as you’ve always been to me.
Happy birthday! Thank you for the years of dinners, advice, and being genuinely glad to see me every time I turn up. I hope this year is kind to you, and I hope you get to do something you love today.
T3 — a long-standing friend’s mother
Happy birthday! Thank you for raising the friend I’ve leaned on for most of my life. Whatever good qualities [Friend] has, I’m fairly sure they came from you. I hope today is full of people who appreciate you as much as I do.
Happy birthday! I have known your family for a long time now, and you’ve been part of almost every good memory in it. Thank you for the years of patience, food, and advice. I hope this year is a generous one for you.
Happy birthday! You’ve always been the person in the room who notices when someone is uncomfortable and quietly fixes it. I’ve watched you do it my whole life. I hope today you get looked after the way you look after everyone else.
Happy birthday! Growing up, your house was the one place where nobody had to perform. That was your doing. Thank you for it, and I hope this birthday is exactly as peaceful or as loud as you want it to be.
T4 — she has been a mother figure to you
Happy birthday! You have been a second mother to me, and I want you to know that it was not a small thing. You listened, you fed me, you corrected me when I needed it, and you never made me feel like a visitor. I hope this year gives back to you some of what you’ve given out. Happy birthday, and thank you.
Happy birthday! There were moments in my life when I needed an adult and you were the one who was there. I don’t think you know how much that mattered. I hope today is full of the people who love you — and I hope you know that includes me.
Longer messages for a friend’s mother you know well
Longer birthday messages for a friend’s mother suit senders in the closest tier, where four to eight sentences read as a letter rather than a text.
The relationship this tier describes has a name in card-writing terms: publishers treat “like a mom” messages as their own category, separate from messages to a mother, which is a useful confirmation that the closeness you are writing from is a recognised thing and not an exaggeration. Use these only at T3 and T4, and only if the details in them are true for you.
Tier key: T3 long-standing friend’s mother · T4 mother figure.
T3 — a long-standing friend’s mother
Happy birthday! I’ve known your family for a long time, and a lot of my favorite memories involve your kitchen. You were always the adult who made time for whoever walked in, even when you had your own things going on. Thank you for that, and for raising the friend I’ve relied on for years. I hope this year is calm, healthy, and full of good news. Happy birthday.
Happy birthday! I wanted to write something longer than a text, because you deserve more than two lines. Thank you for the years of being welcoming, for the meals, and for never once making me feel like I was in the way. I’ve always known that the person my friend became had a lot to do with you. I hope this year brings you good health and a lot of reasons to be proud.
Happy birthday! You’ve been part of my life since I was young enough to be dropped off at your house, and you’ve treated me like a person the whole time, which matters more than you might think. You asked real questions, you remembered things, and you kept an eye on all of us without making a fuss about it. I hope today is full of the people you love.
Happy birthday! Thank you for the years of support. I know I was not always easy to have around, and you never made me feel like a problem. You’ve been kind in ways that were small to you and large to me, and I’ve remembered most of them. I hope this year brings you health, a bit of rest, and more good days than bad.
Happy birthday! I’ve known you long enough to have watched a lot of good things happen in your family, and you’ve been at the center of most of them. Thank you for the years of welcome and for always making room for one more person at the table. I hope today is exactly what you want it to be, and I hope the year ahead is a good one.
Happy birthday! Thank you for the way you’ve always treated me, which has been better than I probably deserved at times. You’ve been generous with your time and your patience. I hope today is full of the people who matter to you, and I hope the year ahead is generous in return.
T4 — she has been a mother figure to you
Happy birthday! You’ve been a second mother to me for years now, and I don’t want to let this one pass without saying so properly. You gave me advice when I asked for it and when I didn’t. You made room for me at your table more times than I can count. Whatever I’ve managed to get right as an adult, some of it came from watching you. I hope this year takes care of you the way you’ve taken care of everyone else.
Happy birthday! I’ve been trying to work out how to say this without sounding over the top, so I’ll say it plainly: you have been one of the most reliable adults in my life, and I’m grateful. You’re the person I called when I didn’t know what to do, and you never made me feel stupid for asking. I hope this birthday is a good one, and I hope you get to spend it with people who appreciate you as much as I do.
Happy birthday! You taught me a few things without ever sitting me down to teach them, mostly by example and by being patient with a group of teenagers who did not deserve it. Thank you for the food, the rides, the late-night conversations, and the general keeping-an-eye-out. I hope this year is kind to you.
Happy birthday! I don’t usually write long messages, but this one is worth the extra lines. You’ve been a mother figure to me in the years when I needed one, and I’m not sure how different things would have gone without that. You gave advice that turned out to be right more often than I admitted at the time. I hope this year gives you good health and a lot of peace.
Light, funny, and faith-framed options
Humour and faith-framed blessings are registers you choose, not defaults: humour suits tiers two to four, and faith language should be included only if she uses it herself.
Tier key: T2 family friend · T3 long-standing friend’s mother · T4 mother figure.
Light and funny
- Happy birthday! Thanks for letting me eat your food for all these years. That generosity deserves its own cake. — T2
- Happy birthday! Your kids turned out well, which I’m choosing to believe is your doing rather than luck. — T3
- Happy birthday! I still haven’t worked out how your house always smells good. Happy to keep investigating. — T2
- Happy birthday! You raised at least one excellent person, and I’ve been living off that friendship for years. — T3
- Happy birthday! I was going to write something poetic, but you’d see through it in about five seconds. — T2–T3
- Happy birthday! If the cake is anything like the food at your house, I’m showing up early. — T2
- Happy birthday! Being the calm one in this family is a full-time job, and you’ve done it brilliantly. — T3
- Happy birthday! I asked [Friend] what to get you and got no useful information, so here’s a message instead. — T2
Two rules for the funny option. Keep the joke on the situation rather than on her, and do not joke about age, appearance, or how much her family puts her through. Those four jokes are the ones people remember unkindly.
Faith-framed
- Happy birthday! May God bless you with good health and a peaceful year. — T2–T4
- Happy birthday! Praying this year brings you joy and keeps you and your family well. — T2–T4
- Happy birthday! May you be surrounded by the people you love and blessed in the year ahead. — T2–T4
- Happy birthday! Wishing you a year of health, happiness, and plenty of answered prayers. — T2–T4
- Happy birthday! May the year ahead bring you every good thing you’ve prayed for. — T2–T4
- Happy birthday! Grateful for you, and praying this birthday is the start of a very good year. — T2–T4
- Happy birthday! May your faith keep you steady and this year treat you kindly. — T2–T4
- Happy birthday! Blessings to you today and through the year ahead. — T2–T4
Faith language is easier to get wrong than to get right. Use it when you know how she talks about her own faith, and leave it out when you do not — a secular message is never an insult, while a mismatched blessing can land oddly. If you want to say something warm without naming a tradition, “wishing you a year of health and peace” does the job.
What not to say
Avoid age jokes, comments about appearance or weight, references to illness or bereavement, and gratitude that implies a closeness you do not have.
Specific things to leave out, and why each one is a risk:
- Anything about her age. Birthday templates lean on age jokes heavily and most of them land badly. She has heard the joke before, and it is the one category where a stranger’s comment can genuinely sting.
- Comments about appearance or weight. Even compliments land unpredictably here, and a comment on weight is never the compliment the sender thinks it is.
- Health, illness, or anyone who has died. Not even kindly, and not as a small aside. A birthday message is the wrong container for heavy news, and if she has lost someone recently you may not know.
- Thanks for things your friend did. It is an easy slip when you are close to the friend rather than to her, and it makes the message read as a template with the wrong name in it.
- Anything about her children’s shortcomings. Even as a joke, and especially if your friend is the one who told you about them.
The same message, before and after
Seeing the correction is easier than reading the rule. Both versions below are for the same sender, who has been to the house a few times and likes this woman genuinely.
Before — the version that over-claims:
Happy birthday! You’ve been like a second mother to me and I’m so grateful for everything you’ve done. You have the biggest heart of anyone I know, and I hope you know how much you mean to me and my whole family.
After — the same warmth, at the tier the sender actually occupies:
Happy birthday! Thank you for always making room for me at your table. I hope today is a good one.
What changed: the first version claims a mother-like closeness the sender has not earned, names nothing specific, and stacks three general compliments. The second makes one true claim the sender can stand behind and stops. It is shorter, and it is more likely to be believed.
How and when to send it
Send a text on the day if you are in tier 1 or tier 2 — she is someone you have met a few times, or a family friend — and send a card or make a call if you are close to her; if the day has passed, send a short message without a long apology.
| Channel | Who it suits | Length | Notes |
| Text or DM | Tier 1 and tier 2 (met a few times; family friend) | 1–3 sentences | Send it earlier in the day rather than late at night. Do not worry about being first |
| Card | Tier 2 to tier 4, and the strongest choice for tier 3 | 4–6 sentences | The one channel where a shared memory has room to breathe |
| Phone call | Tier 3 and tier 4 | A few minutes | Right if you would normally talk to her. Do not call to read a message aloud |
| Group card | Tier 2 to tier 4 | One short line | Sign your own name. An unsigned line in a card is a missed opportunity |
| Public post | Tier 3 and tier 4, with care | One line | Private is safer at tier 1 and tier 2. Some people do not want their birthday discussed publicly |
The general social convention, as published commentary on birthday greetings in the social-media era puts it, is that the channel should signal how close the relationship is: closer relationships deserve more effort than a public post, and social media should sit alongside private contact rather than replace it. That is a fair summary of how birthday greetings are handled now. When in doubt, a private message beats a public one.
Timing. Send it during the day rather than at midnight, and do not worry about beating her family to it. If you will see her at a celebration, a message beforehand still lands well — being remembered twice is not a problem.
If you have missed the day. Say happy birthday, keep the apology to a clause, and move on: “Happy belated birthday! I hope you had a wonderful day — sorry I’m late with this.” Long explanations make the sender feel better and the recipient feel obliged to reassure them.
Sending it to her or through your friend. If you do not have her number or address, or you have never met her, pass the message to your friend to relay and keep it simple. Making an effort to find her contact details is more forward than the gesture warrants.
If you want to send something with it. A card or flowers are proportionate gestures if you are close to her; a gift is closer to a family occasion. Gift and card ideas for a friend’s mother sit outside the wording question, since they involve prices and delivery rather than the message itself.
Questions people ask about wishing a friend’s mother
Seven questions come up most often about wishing a friend’s mother happy birthday, and the answers below cover how to address her, whether to route the message through your friend, and what to do if you have never met her.
How do you address your friend’s mother in a birthday message?
Address your friend’s mother as “Mrs. [Last name]” in a card if you have met her a few times or are unsure, and by her first name once you have been in her home and she has introduced herself that way. In a text, no salutation is fine — starting with “Happy birthday!” is normal and reads as warm rather than rude. If you genuinely do not know, ask your friend; it takes one message to remove the guesswork.
How do you wish your friend’s mother happy birthday if you have never met her?
Wish a friend’s mother you have never met through your friend rather than directly, and keep the wording simple and warm. A short line sent via your friend — “please tell your mom happy birthday from me” — is appropriate and welcome. Contacting someone you have never met, to send a personal message, is more forward than the situation calls for.
Should you send the message to her or through your friend?
Send the message directly to your friend’s mother when you already have a way to contact her and you have spent real time in her home; send it through your friend when you have never met her, do not have her number, or know her only slightly. The deciding question is not how much you like her but how much contact you actually have.
Is a text enough?
A text is enough at tier 1 and tier 2, and it is the normal channel for those tiers. A text becomes a small miss when you are at tier 3 or tier 4 and you would normally speak or write to her, because the channel then signals less effort than the relationship carries. In that case, send the text on the day and follow it with a card or a call.
What do you say if you missed her birthday?
Say happy birthday, admit the lateness in one short clause, and do not build the message around an apology. “Happy belated birthday! I hope it was a wonderful day — I’m sorry this is late.” A lengthy explanation makes the recipient manage your guilt, which is the opposite of the point of the message.
Can you use these birthday wishes for a best friend’s mom?
Birthday wishes for a best friend’s mom work the same way, and that relationship usually sits at tier 3 or tier 4, where the more personal messages belong. The tier matters more than the label: a best friend’s mother you see twice a year is a tier 2 situation in practice, however close you are to the friend. Choose the tier you actually live in, not the one the friendship implies. Two neighbouring cases are different and have their own pages: if the birthday belongs to the friend herself rather than her mother, birthday wishes for a friend who is a mother is the right match, and if it belongs to your own mother’s friend, so is birthday wishes for your mom’s friend.
What is a good birthday prayer for a friend’s mother?
A good birthday prayer for a friend’s mother is short, warm, and specific to her rather than to the occasion: “Happy birthday! May God bless you with good health and a peaceful year.” Keep it to one or two lines, use it only if you know she speaks about her faith herself, and pair it with a sincere line of thanks. If you are unsure of her tradition, a blessing that avoids naming one — “may this year bring you health and peace” — is always safe.
All seventy messages here are original and free to use, adapt, and sign as your own. The message structure follows published card-writing guidance, and the closeness tiers are this page’s practical guidance rather than a published standard.
Written by [author name] · Updated [month, year].
