The Goodness of Hosting
Imagine walking into a fresh home, the aromas are delightful, and you are welcomed by smiling friends and/or family. They have saved a spot for you, and you are offered a refreshment upon your arrival. There is a space for your belongings and an ease to the atmosphere. What a fantastic evening of conversing with loved ones!
How do you feel in this space? Cherished? Seen? Loved? Is your cup filled?
This is the gift of hosting – reflecting another’s goodness back to them, revealing their dignity and communicating their immense worth.
Why Plan?
Why can’t I just say, “come over at 7 and we’ll figure it out”? Well, the great thing about life – and about many friendships – is that you can totally do that. But, I think there is something so elevating in having a specific planned event/occasion for those you love to come together. We all want something to look forward to, and often that ‘something’ can be our highlight for the week, month, and even year.
While I have often hosted last-minute thrown together events/meals, I really enjoy getting the opportunity to plan ahead. Humans thrive in order – I have seen this in my own life and when I have worked with children in various roles. Having an outline, something to reference, or an expected flow can help people to live creatively and magnanimously within the known parameters of life. So, I have 5 simple (and timeless) tips for preparing an hosted event – no matter the size of gathering or the occasion!
1. Examine Your Resources
If you’re a little bit sanguine like me, I bet you can sometimes begin a project without ‘counting the cost.’ Then, especially when we have some healing perfectionism, the shame and blame game creeps in once we realize we don’t have the resources to finish what we had hoped to complete. Resources come in many shapes and sizes. For hosting, these are a few I suggest examining:
- Time – We all only have 24 hours each day. Are you able to give more time to host a gathering, even if it stretches your comfort zone a little? Is there anywhere you need to be prioritizing your time more (or less) than you are?
- Money – It is critical to be honest with yourself about what you can and cannot afford. Hosting is not putting on a show, but a way to unite and honor those you love.
- Space – Know your space and limits. Maybe you live in a 700 square foot apartment. With that, your hosting may be more aligned with a small gathering of 2 or 3 friends rather than a dinner party for 12.
- Skills – Skills come in all shapes and sizes! You might be an incredible cook, but you’re not blessed with the foresight to send out invites in advance for a dinner party. Or, maybe you have an eye for decorating, but you have no idea how to bake treats for your hosted Easter brunch. You don’t need to be perfect here! Always ask for help if you don’t know how to do something that you are hoping to accomplish or use as an aid in your hosted event.
- Community – Community is an incredible resource for hosting! It allows for the resources and responsibilities to be shared so that there is more to go around for everyone.
- Here’s an example: One friend has a great space in her home to host a baby shower for 20. While you don’t have that space, you have the time to make the invitations and games for the shower. Another friend has the skills to create adorable cookies and cakes for the event. You each pitch in some money for purchasing decorations. Voila! There’s community working at its finest, and none of you had to do everything on your own.
At the end of this examination, I find it helpful to make a realistic plan for whatever event I am hosting. This can be a simple outline of invitees and a few notes about food, times, décor needs, etc.
2. Send a Personal Invitation
Now that you have examined your resources and come up with a realistic plan, the next step is to make a personal invitation to your guests! The gift of a personal invitation cannot be understated! It feels incredible to be specifically chosen, to feel that you are not overlooked or a last-minute addition to someone else’s plans.
Sending a personal invitation to your guests shows your care and love, but also clearly communicates details, need-to-knows, and a little of what to expect as they RSVP. This doesn’t have to be a face-to-face operation, either.
I really love sending digital invitations via text to my invitees – its simpler and more efficient. If there is an event like a baby shower or milestone birthday, you may opt for a printed and mailed version if the budget allows (which, sometimes it doesn’t, and a text/email version is great to send either way).
Be sure to include these things in your personal invitation:
- Name of the event/occasion (ie. Galentine’s Day Cookie Exchange)
- Location of event/occasion – Self explanatory
- Date and beginning/ending times – Picking an ending time is helpful to honor your guest’s time so they can plan well
- Any dress code requirements (ie. Come casually dressed in shades of red, white, and pink)
- Any action items (ie. Bring your fav cookies & the recipe to share with the group!)
- Date to RSVP & way to RSVP (ie. RSVP via text to Catherine at 123-456-7890 by Feb. 1st)
If you’re like me, and love sharing beautiful things, I have a few invitation templates in my shop tab (or click here) . You can also make a free Canva.com account and begin creating your own! If you’re not an invite person, this list can be used as a simple text/email template for you so your guests have a clearly communicated invite.
3. Plan Accordingly
Have you finished your invites and sent them out? Congrats! The next step is to plan according to whatever event/occasion you are hosting. Is this occasion a potluck dinner for Easter? Great – time to meal prep your shared dish! Is this a game night with a few other couples from book club? Amazing – pick out a few games, and put some wine and charcuterie on the grocery list for that week.
Planning according for your event is one way to help take away any last minute scrambles. I think something to note here is that your goal is to have fun, bring connection, and build some better friendships, right? The goal is NOT to be perfect and to “wow” or one-up those who are invited.
The art of hosting is not so that you can keep up with the Joneses. Rather, hosting is a way for you to use your individual (or collective) resources (however large or limited they may be) to bring about connection, honoring your friends, and having a darn good time together.
4. Follow Up
In Step 2 you made your invitation with an RSVP date, meaning you asked your guests to send their “yes” or “no” by a certain date so you have a headcount to expect for the event.
Let’s say, for example, February 1st was your RSVP date, and pretend that today is February 1st. Today is the day to send a follow up text (or email/phone if that was the way you sent the invite). Send a follow up message to those who you have not heard from yet. You may choose to send an additional text/email/call a few days before the RSVP date to remind your guests to send in their RSVP, but I often opt for the single reminder to simplify this step.
To those who have already sent their “yes,” reach out to them and thank them! Let them know how excited you are to celebrate with them soon! The follow up is so important because if this event is a rushed afterthought for you, it relays the message to your guests that they also are a burdensome afterthought.
Once you have your follow ups, keep a list of who is committed to coming. If there are any remaining details they should know (like “feel free to park in the driveway if there is a spot open!”) definitely send this with the follow-up. To stay organized, I will often make a list on the Notes app on my phone. Other ways to keep this list are by making a Google Sheet or Excel spreadsheet, but pen and paper work just as well.
5. Tidy the Space
Tidying your space is not about making everything perfectly spotless. The goal of this is to create room for your guests to come and feel at ease. We experience joy, peace, and ease when there order, beauty, and room to be.
Tidying your space will often look different depending on your resources laid out in step 1. Your situation may be such that it is very simple for you to pick up your hosting space – like that 700 square foot apartment example. But, maybe you are a mom of littles, and your slippers are perpetually crusted with crumbs from snack time. It may feel impossible for you to have a clear space for any guests.
Fear not! Even if you are not a naturally clean individual, here are a few tips to keep your space put in order and event ready:
- Make a list of the rooms needed for this event.
- Often, it is the public areas of the home like the bathroom, living area, kitchen/dining area.
- Then, once you have your list, create a simple cleaning routine checklist. Don’t go crazy, just hit the basics.
- For example, for the “Bathroom” my check boxes for that would be clean toilet, wipe counter, switch hand towel, refill soap. This takes all of 7-10 minutes max.
- Set a goal to do a little bit each day of the week leading up to the event. Doing a 10 minute tidy in an area each day is far simpler than a 70 minute clean up of the whole house the day of your event.
It might be helpful for you to invest in a few bins for your home to easily store toys, shoes, or anything else you notice in your day-to-day that seems to take over an area often. This can be particularly helpful if you notice that these types of items are ones that you or your family will use daily. A new routine of quick-bin clean up is more helpful than to be overwhelmed the morning of your event trying to figure out where in the world you’re going to put all of your toddler’s dinosaur figurines.
Now, Enjoy!
While there is more to hosting an event than these 5 steps, I know that if you follow these steps you will have a much simpler time preparing for hosting! We all have limited resources and can only plan so much. At the end of it all, we can surrender our expectations of the perfect event, and instead love the goodness of the people who we have the blessing to call friends.
What have you found helpful in your preparations for hosting? Is there something on this list that transformed your ease in hosting? Anything that was not helpful and you tweaked? I would love to hear from you! Until next time, let’s keep doing our lousy best!