Although I was too young to remember, it is told that the number 143 was always present on the back of every envelope of every letter that my father mailed to my mother while serving in the army. It’s code for “I love you”. The number represents the letter count for each word.
It’s a number my family still uses in correspondence to one another and one I sign off with when e-mailing my husband at the firehouse or jotting a note to my kids. And, because of its special meaning to me, I had a rubber stamp made with the number to use on various pieces of my collage art.
The other day I found the exact numbers, all by themselves, laying in order at an antique store. Those numbers now greet my family as they enter our home.
I want to extend a sincere thanks to all Design Mom blog readers for following my Guest Mom posts this week. And an even bigger “thank you” to Gabrielle for the honor of posting them.
Please visit me on my blog Just Something I Made from time to time, I’d love to hear from you.
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that is lovely! I adore the number count thing. My parents always signed ILYTM on cards and such…I love you the most :)
Traditions are blessings for the future… loved yr posts :)
We have that same meaning connected to 1-4-3 at our home. It’s something my dad told me and it’s just kind of stuck. I like the way you’ve displayed this on your bookcase.
that’s a beautiful sentiment, and what a lucky find!!
thanks for your post, you’ve been wonderful!
What a lovely tradition to carry on! You’ve been a great guest host – thanks!
love the numbers. nice tradition.
What a beautiful tradition to carry on. Thanks for all your guest posts.
We use that too! My husband made it up for our family so that our son wouldn’t mind his dad and stepmom telling him he loved him at school, soccer, etc. Kyle added a “2″ on the end when he responded so now we say 143 and Kyle answers back 1432. It started when he was probably 6 or 7 and is still going strong after his 11th birthday.
sweet
That is such a great story!
I would like to borrow that idea for my family!
That’s so beautiful!ve
What a great idea. I might have to steal that one! We always use the 143 code. Fun to hear so many other do too!
I grew up with these numbers as well. We used to hold up the fingers 1 – 4- 3 to say “i love you” if we were somewhere where we couldn’t speak. I have a huge old gas station price sign with these numbers up on my wall. Never heard of any else who does this. Glad to hear it’s a bigger club than me and my family.