Music for sure!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did you have appetizers and drinks when people arrived?

I note you didn’t answer this question, OP.

I did but not a particularly inspiring spread.

I don't mean people were just standing around waiting bc everyone was starving. More like sort of bores.

Appreciate some of the suggestions on lighting/decor (ours is not great) and starting off with a simple activity like a puzzle.

Anonymous wrote:Did you have appetizers and drinks when people arrived?

I note you didn’t answer this question, OP.

Do your guests generally get along? If so, then there’s not much else. Lights, fireplace, great music can all help, but after a point, people are just waiting.

Some kind of activity for your guests helps. Like a jigsaw puzzle or a card game, or darts, or frisbee. Ask someone with good social skills to be an "activities director" for the day to help get people engaged with each other.

Also, if you can spread out drink /snack stations to different areas of your home it gets people milling about and prevents traffic jams in the kitchen.

It's hard to know what you're doing wrong, if anything, without knowing what you're doing. If your guests/family have no affinity for or interest in each other, then you've got a bigger problem than a lack of festive holiday feeling. You can only do so much as the host, but anything you can do to get people to talk about themselves should help to get the ball rolling. In terms of ambiance, it helps to start with a clean, tidy, well maintained environment. Neutral and sparse beats garish and cluttered, but a sense of style (any style, well done) is important to make people feel comfortable. A lot of people are pretty clueless and need help in this area.

After that, it's a matter of creating a joyful holiday mood. As a PP stated, proper lighting is important. Think table and floor lamps, and candles or votives. Relaxing holiday music. Enticing smells (that should be easy at Thanksgiving; if not, simmer water with cinnamon, cloves, and orange rind on the stove). Set a lovely holiday table or a nice buffet. Ideally, use real dishware, silverware, glasses, and napkins - not paper products. This can be done very affordably by shopping at Ikea, Target, etc. Yes, it's more work, but it makes a real difference. To the extent that you can, put out natural decorations (e.g., tree branches, leaves, berries, fruit, nice baskets, etc.), and supplement with artificial seasonal items as needed (mini lights, ornaments, wreaths, ribbons, etc.). A lot of this is common sense, but not everyone has common sense in this area.

So I’m not saying you did this but I always feel held hostage when im at my ILs. We had dinner on our own today because my DD just had surgery Tuesday and it was lovely. But MIL will say to arrive at 5, then we kind of sit around while she talks about herself or what we’re going to eat, where she bought it etc, then we eat, then clean up, then dessert, so by now it’s 8pmish which is when my kid normally goes to bed and I still feel like we can leave but I just want to. At Christmas it’s the same but we have to wait to open all presents. Which adds another 2 hours because it’s literally one person at a time. We don’t play games or any fun stuff, we’re just sitting trying to make polite conversation.

Did you have appetizers and drinks when people arrived?

Everyone IS just sitting around waiting for the food. That’s all there is. It’s obligatory at this point.

Anonymous wrote:This is not a joke, I bet the lighting was bad.

No one can have a festive party in bright, overhead light. It’s impossible. You must have lamps and/or candles - light at different levels - and everything needs to be on a dimmer.

We are visual creatures. Look at stills from every “cozy holiday” movie you’ve ever seen and look at the lighting in the warm celebration scenes. It is a) dimmer than you think and b) coming from different heights and least of all from overhead.

I've had the cozy feeling even in overbright surroundings. You can improve your space and consumption, OP, but your feeling has nothing to do with these things. When a party doesn't "go", it's usually because a few of the people present are hormonal (or lacking thereof), tired or preoccupied, and not ready to fully engage. Perhaps you were one of them, or perhaps you just reacted to them. It happens, and it's not anyone's fault.

Anonymous wrote:This is not a joke, I bet the lighting was bad.

No one can have a festive party in bright, overhead light. It’s impossible. You must have lamps and/or candles - light at different levels - and everything needs to be on a dimmer.

We are visual creatures. Look at stills from every “cozy holiday” movie you’ve ever seen and look at the lighting in the warm celebration scenes. It is a) dimmer than you think and b) coming from different heights and least of all from overhead.

Music, of any sort

This is not a joke, I bet the lighting was bad.

No one can have a festive party in bright, overhead light. It’s impossible. You must have lamps and/or candles - light at different levels - and everything needs to be on a dimmer.

We are visual creatures. Look at stills from every “cozy holiday” movie you’ve ever seen and look at the lighting in the warm celebration scenes. It is a) dimmer than you think and b) coming from different heights and least of all from overhead.

Hosted Thanksgiving today and it was fine. But... it didn't have that cozy warm festive vibe I've sometimes experienced. Kinda felt like everyone was waiting around for the food to be ready to eat, rather than just enjoying the time together.

I've already thought of a couple things for next time. Fun but simple DIY food and beverage stations. The right music (ideas welcome).

But what am I missing? Is there anything that can help or is this sorta "you have it or you don't" and can't be forced?