Recently we celebrated Halloween. It was not the typical Halloween, of course, because nothing is typical this year. Our town did not hold trick-or-treating, the kids’ school did not allow parents to volunteer for the parties, nor were we permitted to attend the school Halloween parade. Community parades and other events were cancelled. So yes, it was different, and there seemed to be a lot that was “lost” this year.

Even so, my kids didn’t sleep the night before. They had their costumes all ready to go, and they were just as excited to wear them with their Covid masks as they were last year to wear them without. Their school held a virtual parade, so they still dressed up and marched through the hallways while we parents watched from our devices, or caught the video replay later. Their classes still had parties, and I really tested my “craftiness” boundaries, going all out and contributing to each child’s party a hollowed-out watermelon jack-o-lantern vomiting fruit salad. Really, how could you not be excited about bringing the vomiting watermelon head to class? So they were pretty excited. And our neighborhood had decided to hold a small, neighbors-only trick-or-treating event. The kids again dressed up, said “trick or treat” to smiling neighbors sitting out at the end of their driveways at tables set with sanitized candy and treats. Many of the neighbors looked as excited to see the kids as the kids were to see the tables full of candy. They really went all out and my kids’ buckets were overflowing before we even made it to the other side of our block, yielding enough candy to fill a bin and go “candy diving” the next morning.

All-in-all, it was a fantastic Halloween, and ironically, I have a feeling this one might go down as one of the best in their books. How did that happen in a year consumed by a global pandemic, stock market instability, periodic closures and “lockdowns”, a crazy political climate and a highly anticipated and stressful election looming on the immediate horizon, and everything else that has gone completely insane this year?

I thought a bit about this in the days that followed as my husband and I made the official decision to keep the holiday season quiet and forego the usual extended family celebrations this year. As we discussed the decision, our experience with Halloween kept coming to mind. Somehow in the midst of all the stress and chaos, or perhaps because of it, my children had an absolute blast. So while I feel the loss of the anticipated extended family events and will certainly miss seeing the people we hold dear during this holiday season, quite honestly I can also very clearly see the opportunity inherent in our decision. How can we make Thanksgiving and Christmas as much fun as Halloween was?

What happened to make Halloween so much fun was simple—people embraced the reality of the situation, thought creatively, focused not on what they couldn’t have/do and instead on what they could, and decided to do what they could to make it fun. If we follow that same formula as we enter the holiday season, the possibilities of fun are seemingly endless.

We now have the opportunity to make these holiday events something as unique as the year in which they are happening. We can decide not to cling to tradition and ritual that simply is not possible this year, and instead get creative and make these events our own. So instead of the four of us sitting around a huge Thanksgiving table crying into our plates of turkey and all the traditional fixings, painfully aware of the empty chairs and absence of people we love, we will do something different.

What that is we do not yet know, but we do know that half of the fun will be in trying to figure it out. The question itself has already sparked some enthusiastic and animated conversations with our kids, who are focused on the fun we can create specifically because we aren’t locked into any rules or routines this year. They, too, see this as something potentially special and fun, and as something they get to help create.

I, myself, have already generated some enthusiasm and excitement about our holidays at home. This year I am not focused on the deep cleaning of the house, the huge trips to the supermarket, nor on the other chores of preparing for big holiday events. Instead, I get to go into the holiday season with the perspective of my children, focused on the newness, the opportunity, the possibilities, and the fun. My imagination is in high gear as I think about the food, activities, relative relaxation, and special time spent with the small group of people I see every day. How can I see them differently, spend time with them differently, and create something special with and for them just a little differently this year?

I challenge you this year to ask yourself the same questions. How can you embrace the reality of the uniqueness this year and create something beautiful with that?

Think about it. You just might have fun. I already am.

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