There are so many stresses around the holidays. Parties should NOT be one of them.
My husband and I have been hosting a Christmas party every year for 27 years. It started with a small group of friends who lived in the neighborhood, and, for years, was always on Christmas Eve. As our families – and commitments to children, families of children, then grandchildren – grew, getting together on Christmas Eve became impossible, so we moved the party to “sometime before Christmas.”
The group has grown as our families added members, and the party has become that rare opportunity to actually catch-up, face-to-face, with people who mean so much to us but stay so busy that we rarely see them. It is absolutely in the top three things I look forward to most at Christmas.
I would love to tell you that it has always been “stress-free,” but there were years when I flew into the house from work two hours before party time, started shoving clutter into the laundry room to hide it and defrosting hors d’oeuvres from Sam’s with just enough time for them to lose their icy covering.
It’s not that way anymore, and planning and implementing the party only adds joy to my holiday season. Here’s the key: There is absolutely no need to try to impress anyone who will be attending!
It’s not that this group of friends doesn’t deserve my best efforts. They absolutely do, and I give the party everything I’ve got. These people are important to me because I love them, and I want them to have a great time. But trying to impress them would be a little foolhardy. They already know way too much about me to be fooled by a glittering centerpiece or gourmet food.
I was reminded of that this week as my husband and I had one of our debates over party details. I am on a kick of trying to justify why I hang on to my good china and crystal when I never, ever seem to find a reason to use it. I am like many middle-class women my age: Blessed with dinnerware. I have the “everyday” dishes I got when we got married, the china and crystal I got when we got married, my mother’s china and crystal, pieces of my two grandmother’s china and crystal and Waterford crystal that I couldn’t live without when Andrew Morton’s was my favorite store back in the 1990s.
I also have two sets of Christmas dishes because my mother loved dinnerware, too.
Beginning of the week I made a decision: No paper plates for the party this year. “I’m going to us my Christmas dishes and my china,” I told my husband.
“You do remember that almost half the party is now children under the age of 10?” he replied.
“Ok, I’ll get paper for them,” I said.
“And you do remember that all your china and crystal has to be hand-washed – both before and after?” he added.
“So, we wash it,” I retorted. “No big deal.”
I’m not sure why, but when I have an idea, it is seldom enough for me for my husband to just philosophically disagree but do nothing to try to stop it. I want him to think it is a great idea. And if he doesn’t, I want to keep at it until he changes his mind and moves over to the “great idea” side.
It rarely – ok, never – happens, but I still try. “The table will look so beautiful,” I exuded.
“If something gets broken, the person who did it will feel terrible,” he pointed out, probably figuring it will be him.
“So what if something gets broken?” I replied. “It’s just one less piece for the kids to give to Goodwill when we’re gone.”
He shrugged.
The next day I was counting plates and looking for the lace tablecloth.
The day after that I was at Party City picking out some adorable paper plates.
Why? Because the whole idea was silly. This party doesn’t fit with a china and crystal setting. All I need is a welcome mat, tasty food, a playroom where the kids can eat chicken nuggets and spill their drinks without a worry and a gathering room for the adults so we can catch up on all our trials and blessings.
It’s a stress-free holiday tradition that mirrors the spirit of the season.