Category Archives: Celebrating the Seasons

Start to Develop your Holiday Traditions

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Here’s a great way to start figuring out what really matters to you in your life. If you do the work for the holi­days, you’ll have a head­start when you start plan­ning your wedding. What? You didn’t know you get to have your wedding be about your values? Now you do!

Before you start making a lot of holiday plans that you might get stuck in forever, why not figure out what makes each of you and both of you happy about the holidays?

  1. What do you like to do? What are your favorite holiday memo­ries? How can you repeat them?
  2. What do you care about? From cookies, to caroling to volun­teering? What do the holi­days say to you?
  3. Who do you want to spend time with? Are holi­days about friends? family? people in need? You get to choose!
  4. What holiday tradi­tions would you like to estab­lish in your own home? When you’re newly engaged or newly married, it can be easily assumed that you’ll go to other people’s houses. That may not be the only way you want to have the holidays.

Tip: Talking about these things and plan­ning ahead will serve you in very good stead in  the years to come. It will also estab­lish a pattern of discerning what really matters to you which will be great for the wedding and for your life. Why not have your­selves a happy little holiday season?

No, Really, Carry a Fan, Not a Bouquet at Your Winter Wedding!

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I’d done some research about fans for my column over on Examiner.com (you can find this by scrolling down and checking out the right hand column). I’d started thinking about fans as some­thing to carry at winter weddings when flowers are, shall we say, scarce!

There are lots of fun things to do with fans. Victo­rian women (of the leisure class, which would leave a lot of us without a feather to flutter) had an entire language of fans. It doesn’t seem like a bad idea to exca­vate some of the language of flir­ta­tion to start having more fun in your play life with your partner.

I’d seen some fairly jeweled and orna­mental fans and admired them. But now I’m totally in love. Isn’t this gorgeous? Wouldn’t it have looked fabu­lous against my black velvet wedding dress? How about against your white satin one? Flowers, they’re so summer!

you can find lots of fun ways to use this over at http://handfanpro.com

Tip: Go ahead and play at your wedding. Look your best and have a good time.

In Great Gratitude: Happy Thanksgiving

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Last night on Face­book I noticed one of “my” brides cele­brating her husband, with whom she was happily keeping promises. I got the goofiest smile on my face.

Just so you know, there is no greater joy than your success as indi­vid­uals, as couples and as fami­lies. Thank you for letting me play a role in cele­brating your lives.

Tip: Let’s hear it for Love and its infi­nite power to change things. And let’s hear it for the daily grat­i­tude that keeps our hearts overflowing.

Give up the Holidays Fraught with Tension

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Are you dreading the thanks­giving dinner with all the family dynamics?

Why?

It’s just food and family. There’s nothing more wonderful.

If there’s too much tension going on, dial it back. Dial back your expec­ta­tions of the meal, dial back everyone’s contributions.

Are you prone to the “if i don’t have this side-​​dish, it’s not Thanks­giving” syndrome? Remember that you can make side dishes another day. You can visit other fami­lies another weekend. Don’t consign thanksgiving/​Thanksgiving to a single date. Eat and be happy with the people you love. And if you can’t be there, set up the camera and skype. Let your fami­lies be together, wher­ever they are!

Tip: consider making Thanks­giving a cele­bra­tion for which you are grateful. Beau­tiful table settings, family recipes, family time — these are not things we have too much of in our lives. So instead of thinking about the possible horrors, move into pollyanna mode (anyone remember who she was?) and start being grateful. Have a blessed day, my friends! (and here’s a NY Times article about what you can learn from Turkey Day at home.)