Well, hello there December!
(ohmygod . . . is time flying or what?)
A new month means it’s time to . . .

Ah, December! That magical month of festivity, celebration, light, merriment, and . . . ritual and tradition. But . . . maybe also that month of high expectation, pressure, stress, obligation, and . . .  ritual and tradition.

Never fear, my friends! I’m here to rev you up and start your engines this month by . . . giving you this reminder (and maybe “permission”) to make this month any way you’d like it to be. Because . . . it’s all good!

For many years, Tom and I have hosted a big winter solstice party on the Thursday night nearest the actual winter solstice. (And, yes. Thursday is an odd night for a big party, but . . . with complicated schedules in December, it worked really well and we always had great attendance.) Anyway, it was a Big Deal. Lots of fun. Lots of people. And . . . lots (and lots) of work. Our last party? December 2019. (And you all know the rest of that story. . .)

This year, we decided it was time to bring the solstice party back! We dug out our notes and lists and timelines from solstice parties past. We set the date. We re-vamped our guest list. I even ordered the invitations.

And then . . . “buyer’s remorse” began setting in.

Although we loved hosting that solstice party, we started remembering just how much WORK is involved. The stress. The complications. The time. A week after our decision to go-for-it, Tom looked at me and asked, “Have you TOLD anyone we’re having the party again?”

Nope. The answer was nope.

We decided to bail.

We gave ourselves permission to . . . let that solstice party go. I realize that now it’s . . . gone forever. Because once we decided not to go forward with it this year, we’ll never do it again. It was a tradition . . . whose time had passed. If not for the pandemic, we might still be throwing that party every year. But the pandemic gave us the break we needed to . . . let it go.

And this story, of course, becomes a (sort of) metaphor for December, generally. Just because you’ve always done things a certain way, it’s okay to . . . re-evaluate, to mix things up, to let things go. To bail.

Or not.

Because whatever you WANT to do, however you WANT to celebrate in December? It’s ALL GOOD.

Maybe you like throwing parties and hosting big celebrations. Go for it! Maybe you like traveling over the holidays. Bon voyage to you! Maybe you like making All the Gifts. Stitch on, my friend! Decorating your whole house? Lots of lights? No tree? Gift exchange? No gifts at all? Decorating right after Halloween? Have it your way — because there’s no right way!

A month of celebrations . . . is a gift to all of us. It’s a wonderful way to end a year. But we need to assess and celebrate the way WE want to celebrate. Everybody does it “right.” Because there is no “wrong.”

“So, put up all the lights, or don’t. Decorate every surface, make every project, sing every song, or don’t. Seasons find a way to sparkle regardless of how well we set the stage.”
Brandi Kincaid

It’s YOUR holiday celebration.
Do it YOUR way!

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December is here.
Don’t wait, my friends!

Start Your Engines!