Whenever you feel out-of-order, disappointed, or depressed you can counteract that state-of-being by doing something in the opposite spirit. And what’s more opposite of stuckness and depression than CELEBRATION!? In this blog, I am sharing easy-to-plan and execute ideas to add more celebration to your life and lift your spirits.

Birthday parties and holidays get all the attention.

But there’s a lot more to celebrate than the passing of time!

I hope these forthcoming ideas opens your eyes to the abundance of things to celebrate!

Meaningful celebration is pretty easy to plan and execute. Just a little forethought and organized supplies make it easy to step into festivity!

Celebrate Love

In my view, the most important thing to celebrate is love! It’s the most powerful force on earth. Love is worth celebrating and keeping fueled

In the midst of “life- interrupted”, you can still swing a date night to give attention to your love.

Date nights don’t have to involve fancy clothes, elaborate plans, or big restaurant bills.

The other evening, I asked Trevor for a date. He lit a bonfire on our hillside and we sat in the moonlight looking out over our property and just talked. It was a lovely variation to the family bonfire we often enjoy on our back patio. One-on-one time is good way to keep the love tank full.

Here are some more thoughtful, low-cost ideas for at home dates with your love:

• Organize a morning coffee tray for two on the front porch
• Set up a picnic in the back yard
• Climb up in the attic or barn loft for a change of scene
• Set up a scavenger hunt, ending in tree grove or gazebo or hot tub
• Plan a vow renewal celebration
• Create a “questions” game to get to know each other even more

These simple celebrations take hardly any time to organize. Start practicing celebrating love and I bet you’ll see it grow!

Celebrate Family

Family Fun

Of course, every member of your family has a birthday each year, and we all have rhythms of how we celebrate birthdays.

But, don’t wait for once a year to celebrate the people you love the most!

Calendar everyone’s birthday, and then create a rotating schedule of celebration so everyone gets a few special days per year!

You can celebrate family members because they did something special, or just because! To mark their special day:

• Make them their favorite foods
• Invite them to choose an all-family activity
• Adorn them with a crown or badge
• Write “what I like about you” notes and read them aloud

Marvelous Mom

Besides rotating celebrating family members, don’t forget to honor Mom on an ongoing basis.

Moms are the glue of the family and culture-keepers of the home. Moms invest most of their life majoring in everyone else, so it’s nice to return the favor and focus on them a few times a year.

Mother’s Day is a great time to celebrate Mom, but don’t limit yourself to that day!

You can truly celebrate mom by learning about her – it’s a sign that you care about her beyond the sandwiches she customizes to your specifications.

Here are some ideas to celebrate mom:

• I found little notebook “Your Mother’s Story – Mom I want to know everything about you…” This is a handsome notebook for your mother to capture her memories and life stories. It’s something the whole family will enjoy for years to come.
• Buy mom a book that she can audio record her voice reading. Then, anyone can hear the comfort of mom’s voice for years to come!
• Hire a personal historian to capture her story

As you can see, with just a little planning ahead, you can make your family members and your mom feel seen and special.

Celebrate Achievements

I’ve found that I’ve really had to work at celebrating my accomplishments. I’m such a responsible, work-before-play kinda gal that as soon as I accomplish one thing, I’m onto the other with zero fanfare.

I’m personally trying to slow down in my life and reflect on what I HAVE accomplished to take my laser focus OFF what is still to be done!

Look back and look ahead to celebrate achievements, both big and small.

One major life accomplishment is academic progression. Graduation season is coming up and even if you can’t plan a party, you can create an epic photo album for the grad in your life. Just dropping a card in the mail means a lot, too!

But don’t just celebrate those big moments like graduation. Rejoice your personal progress, which is often much greater and more impactful than publicly-celebrated events.

You can celebrate less visible, but important landmarks, too, like finishing an online course or the annual deep cleaning of the house. Give yourself rewards for things kind of things that you’ve previously not given yourself ANY credit for, and you’ll begin to train yourself to SEE your time and effort investments pay off.

Here’s an important – albeit invisible – accomplishment to celebrate: getting out of debt! You can even commemorate your progress by establishing mid-way benchmarks along the way to the BIG goal, and celebrating them when you hit those targets.

Make Any Day Special

Take some time to organize your party supplies so that you can easily make any day special!

I have two dedicated cabinets in my office to my celebration and party goods. I love hospitality and these cabinets include the following materials:

• Paper plates and cups
• Patterned napkins
• Party utensils
• Banners and décor
• Streamers and crepe paper
• Party hats and crowns

In my garage, I have dedicated additional space to household décor that I blend into my party planning:

• Lanterns
• Candles
• Signage
• Décor
• Florals
• Vessels
• Banners
• Fabric
• Party Tablecloths

Be on the lookout for ways to convert a ho-hum day into something spectacular. Cultivating a spirit of celebration is an intentional practice of honoring people and moments. We deposit a sense of value when we MAKE the time and effort to invest in fun; and along the way we make wonderful memories!

• Get out the streamers & balloons and decorate someone’s room
• Celebrate Christmas in the summer
• Haul out the themed party materials and host a luau or 70s party “just because”
• Convene the neighbors in a cul-de-sac tailgater
• Celebrate like a kid:
  • Grab the bubbles and sidewalk chalk and have a driveway party
  • Break out the glow sticks and have a nighttime game of hide-and-seek or capture the flag

Celebration Planning

Organizing celebration is as easy as getting out your planner.

CALENDAR

I recommend calendaring all things worth celebrating. From birthdays to holidays, fill your calendar with all the standard stuff.

Then, look at all the dates you have previously overlooked:

• Tax Day. Schedule a celebration to commemorate filing on time.
• Flag Day – fly Old Glory or stake your grass or adorn your porch with the red, white, and blue
• Small Business Saturday – organize a “cash mob” for some of your favorite mom-and-pop shops
• You get the idea…start getting creative with otherwise non-celebrated days

DATE BOOK

My mother in law used to keep a datebookjust for birthdays. It was not a year-specific journal, but month/date book. She would record a person’s birthday, their date of birth if known, and other details on that person for annual reference.

You can create your own datebook, or blend annual birthdays into your electronic calendar as a recurrent appointment.

GIFT LOG

You can use a gift logto record gifts given and received if your celebrations involve gifts.

This is very helpful for me, as I like to look back and see what I’ve given so I don’t repeat. Seeing the list of what I’ve given inspires me to “up” my creativity each year.

Having something to look forward to breaks distressing cycles. And celebration is a marvelous tool to move your (and your family’s) needle from an empty to a full tank. Lift your spirits by building in some MORE celebration to your daily life!

Here’s to life reclamation through celebration!

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