On the eleventh Day of Christmas, My Beloved gave to me
Eleven paths to friend­ship
Ten ways you love me
Nine hours of sleeping
Eight gifts of bounty
Seven days a-​​helping
Six stolen kisses
Five looks of Love
Four calling friends
Three snow strolls
Two nestling hearts
And a day free of expectations.

Too often when people fall in love, their interest in their long-​​term friends falls away. Now, this is some­what under­stand­able, after all, the species has survived because of the power of infat­u­a­tion. Being swept away keeps us moving into marriage and family. But we are more than our hormones! And we need friends with whom to hang out, cele­brate and commiserate.

As you get ready to choose your atten­dants, there are many ways to think through who will stand with you as you step forward into your life. It’s true your BFF from kinder­garten prob­ably needs to be there. But what are the qual­i­ties that you and your beloved truly value in friends.

• List 11 ways you are a good friend. If your list isn’t as long as you’d like it to be, there’s some work for the new year! Being a good friend is a fairly funda­mental char­ac­ter­istic of being a good person, in the Wedding Priestess’ humble opinion.
• Then list 11 ways that friends support, chal­lenge, stim­u­late and amuse you.
• What are the most impor­tant char­ac­ter­is­tics to you?
• Then consider your friends in light of those char­ac­ter­is­tics. Who among them have been really good friends?
• Are they the same people you were consid­ering as atten­dants? Were there people missing from your atten­dant list?

Tip: It’s fine if you’ve already made your atten­dant choices and this list teaches you some­thing different. You now have the oppor­tu­nity to find other ways to weave these people into your lives. The success and health of your marriage is enhanced by being a member of a thriving, healthy commu­nity. So as the Girl Scout song says “Make new friends, but keep the old, One is silver and the other gold!)

On the tenth Day of Christmas, My Sweetpea gave to me
Ten ways you love me
Nine hours of sleeping
Eight gifts of bounty
Seven days a-​​helping
Six stolen kisses
Five looks of Love
Four calling friends
Three snow strolls
Two nestling hearts
And a day free of expectations.

What’s just as amazing as the love you have for your partner is the love he or she has for you. Tonight, I want you to sit down together. Light your advent candles if you still have them, or just light some candles! Bring 10 sheets of paper, or ten note cards apiece. Cuddle for a bit.

Then sit and list ten things about your that your partner loves and the ways he or she shows that love. Then read them aloud. Having trouble getting started? Write two. Read them aloud. Write 3 more. Read all five aloud. Write another 2. Read all seven. Another 2. Read nine. And then your last one. Read all ten. Each time you read, you rein­force the ways you are loved.

(if you really want to up the plea­sure, before you start, write on a piece of paper ten ways you love your partner. Don’t read these until after you’ve done your own assess­ments. It’s a thing of beauty to hear how well you are loved!)

Carry these cards with you. If you’re having trouble during the wedding plan­ning process. Stop and read them again. The more you know about how you are loved, the less easy it is to push it away. If it’s too hard to think of things, or it’s too hard to accept, then you may need to work through this. (If you really can’t think of ten ways your partner loves you and your partner can’t come up with ten ways, you may want to consider why you’re plan­ning a wedding!) It is a blessing to have someone love you. Honor that gift by taking it seri­ously and cher­ishing your lover for his or her gifts of love.

On the tenth Day of Christmas, My Sweetpea gave to me
Ten ways you love me
Nine hours of sleeping
Eight gifts of bounty
Seven days a-​​helping
Six stolen kisses
Five looks of Love
Four calling friends
Three snow strolls
Two nestling hearts
And a day free of expectations.

What’s just as amazing as the love you have for your partner is the love he or she has for you. Tonight, I want you to sit down together. Light your advent candles if you still have them, or just light some candles! Bring 10 sheets of paper, or ten note cards apiece. Cuddle for a bit.

Then sit and list ten things about your that your partner loves and the ways he or she shows that love. Then read them aloud. Having trouble getting started? Write two. Read them aloud. Write 3 more. Read all five aloud. Write another 2. Read all seven. Another 2. Read nine. And then your last one. Read all ten. Each time you read, you rein­force the ways you are loved.

(if you really want to up the plea­sure, before you start, write on a piece of paper ten ways you love your partner. Don’t read these until after you’ve done your own assess­ments. It’s a thing of beauty to hear how well you are loved!)

Carry these cards with you. If you’re having trouble during the wedding plan­ning process. Stop and read them again. The more you know about how you are loved, the less easy it is to push it away. If it’s too hard to think of things, or it’s too hard to accept, then you may need to work through this. (If you really can’t think of ten ways your partner loves you and your partner can’t come up with ten ways, you may want to consider why you’re plan­ning a wedding!) It is a blessing to have someone love you. Honor that gift by taking it seri­ously and cher­ishing your lover for his or her gifts of love.

On the ninth Day of Christmas, My Beloved gave to me
Nine hours of sleeping
Eight gifts of bounty
Seven days a-​​helping
Six stolen kisses
Five looks of Love
Four calling friends
Three snow strolls
Two nestling hearts
And a day free of expectations.

I don’t know whether anyone has done the sleep math for couples who are plan­ning a wedding, but I do know that people in almost every age group in the United States are sleep-​​deprived. Here’s some thing I do know. Sleep depri­va­tion makes you cranky! It makes every one cranky. Wedding plan­ning makes most people cranky as well, so all in all, it’s not a great thing. Plan­ning a wedding, cranky. Not getting enough sleep, cranky. Partner breathing wrong, cranky, cranky, cranky.

Here you are marrying the person of your dreams and you’re cranky.

Tip: Start the new year out right. Go to bed early tonight and get enough sleep. Get a little more than enough. Climb in bed early, talk to one another, see where that leads, and then go to sleep. When you wake up tomorrow, cuddle up and roll over. There’s nothing that you have to do that can’t be done an hour later. That’s what the Wedding Priestess thinks!

The Swahili word Imani, faith, repre­sents the Last Day of Kwanzaa. The commit­ment of the last day is to believe with all our heart in our people, our parents, our teachers, our leaders and the right­eous­ness and victory of our struggle.

There have been other years, when life went more smoothly, that this commit­ment could seem to be a little high-​​blown. But in a year when so much has gone wrong, (other than your engage­ment!) It seems that we might be better engaged in paying some atten­tion to not only bigger goals but also to the places that we look for support. What is the struggle? Who are our teachers? What support do our leaders need? Who is our community?

You’re getting married. You’re making a start on some­thing new and wonderful. Take this wedding and make a marriage that you want to live in forever. Cele­brate what’s real and strong between you. Find ways to hold your hopes up to your commu­nity and get their support. Let love be the guide that takes you forward into life. Your commu­nity needs the testa­ment of hope and faith your marriage offers. I’m so excited to see how you all are going to change the world in the year ahead.

Tip: Take a slow meander through the offi­cial Kwanzaa website www.officialkwanzaawebsite.org There you’ll find the answers to your ques­tions and be able to start your study and your cele­bra­tion. Book­mark it, so you’re ready for next year!