Last Sunday was my birthday and I really didn’t expect much. My favorite meal is a rib eye steak with lots of A-1 sauce and Montreal steak seasoning. I’m an easy date right?

It’s a good thing Emily intuitively knew the 3 key components for a spectacular celebration at home!

This year we also have two big graduations (6th and 8th grade) and Natalie’s kinder magical year with our fav kinder teacher. Since Natalie was in the womb, Mrs. Higgins and our family have anticipated this year.

So when it abruptly got halted, the disappointment and loss was deep and emotional! COVID-19 has been really exercising my emotional range. I can go up and down by the minute.

If you feel the same, please know you are not alone! Small trivial things like ordering groceries from Instacart and then waiting 5 days to get it can seem super stressful.

I know in my mind it’s a comparatively small disruption and sacrifice. But the total disruption of our daily normal is a loss and one that we’re allowed to grieve. On top of that loss, it’s daunting to face the unknown with no timeline.

Anyways, back to my birthday! Celebrations during COVID-19 can bring up all of these ambivalent feelings and then some.

The silver lining is that well, there is always a silver lining. And I’m about to share creative ideas for your next celebration, milestone. All.at.home.

Where there is a will (and creative spirit) there is a way!

My middle kid Emily is exactly like me when I was her age. I had a younger sister and two younger cousins that I happily entertained for hours. I would create games, fun shenanigans, and creative crafts for all of us to enjoy together.

To see Emily have that same creative spirit to lighten up spirits through the arts is wonderful!

Before my birthday, Emily created a whole Disney Experience (that you can see on my IG highlights) and we went through four rides in an exhilarating and wait-free trip. I had so many followers tell me they shared it with their mommy friends and were all going to create their own Disney experience at home.

I didn’t think my birthday celebration would be next level, but Em and the whole crew certainly delivered.

3 Key components to celebrating at home

Find a theme: The girls recalled that I wanted to go to a tropical place for our next family vacation. Hawaii in fact. When you are planning a celebration, think of a sentimental or special key theme by location, favorite object or even favorite game or food.

Arts and Crafts: Emy is extremely crafty so she enlisted her sisters to help make all sorts of Hawaiian decorations. They made palm leaves out of construction paper. And went to Pinterest for ideas on painting Hawaiian deity wood statues out of cardboard boxes.

Travis even got involved and helped Natalie make a torch out of a soup can, construction paper and tissue paper.

Costumes and Accessories: Everyone has to look the part to immerse into the theme. It really helps even a rigid adult get into character and get lost into imaginative play. No luau is complete without leis and flowers in your hair. So Travis ordered them off of Amazon.

Not JUST fun and games

Let me take a moment and explain why all of this imagination stuff is so good for us right now (and probably why Disney is still so popular even though it’s so expensive)! For kids and adults alike, play can relieve stress, improve brain function, boost creativity, improve relationships, and keeps you feeling young an energetic.

Make the celebration an “experience.” Several months ago, Travis and I went to a Breaking Bad Experience pop up in LA. It was SO fun! The warehouse was transformed into key areas of the show’s drama. We took pictures, got serious abut which characters we loved and took so many silly selfies. It was a BLAST!

Make your celebration at home an experience where you are getting up from your chair, walking around the house and pretending it is entirely different location. In our case, Natalie led me down the stairs and all of a sudden I entered into a Hawaiian restaurant. From there, there was a hostess (Natalie) and Emy was the waitress. We had a menu, lei and flower ready for me to wear and then meal time complete with a fire eating show on youtube.

No celebration is complete without yummy food! The positive thing about COVID-19 so far is that there has been no shortage of food. Getting the food is another story. In any case, this is the time to treat yo self!

Emy made me a chocolate cake from scratch and it was so moist and yummy! Even the frosting was from scratch. I don’t think I’ll go back to store bought bakery items anymore after this.

MORE TO COME

With these key elements, I know your celebration is going to be MEMORABLE! And oh so doable at home!
I’m looking forward to sharing the next bday experience with you because Trav’s birthday is in two weeks. Then we also have Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, and three graduations all in quick succession – wow!

My mommy friends and I are already scheming how to celebrate the special graduates in an unprecedented way.

For those who have subscribed, I’ve made a handy tip sheet on how to celebrate at home. So if you haven’t subscribe, make sure you do now (link) and you will get a downloadable sheet asap!

Stay well and I look forward to communicating with you via my newsletter on Friday!