Rituals permeate a home designed for thriving.
Sleep, eating, work, fulfillment, health, relationships, spirituality; there’s just so much to consider.
Sometimes we wonder how to keep all the balls in the air; sometimes we realize we are!
We’re so grateful for Riva’s on and for sharing the rituals they incorporate into their home, for the sake of their child. We loved uncovering their .
Cherish the opportunity to step into their unique story.
by Riva Soucie
When it comes to important life events – holidays, birthdays, weddings, new babies – my husband and I are pretty much on our own. Without extended family or even tightly-knit immediate families, we usually find ourselves scrambling to find last-minute invites to Christmas dinner and hosting our own graduation parties. Our families don’t have traditions or rituals or any other dependable practices we can plug into, replicate or expand upon in our own home.
Our kids, we assumed, would be destined for quiet birthdays and unfinished baby books. After all, their parents – us – tend to make things up as they go along. Nothing is special, nothing sacred.
At least that’s what we thought.
helped reveal to us our already engrained, and cherished, family practices. And the process let us see how these familiar activities help to in our home.
We begin the day as a family, in the kitchen, drinking coffee and eating breakfast. My husband and son say ‘Later, Alligator!’ when they part for the morning. At the end of the day, we circle back to the kitchen, eating a simple dinner, talking, touching. Every meal begins by holding hands and sharing a simple blessing, one we have said over our food for years before this and for years to come. When we put our sweet little boy to bed, there is a long bath with lots of splashing, books upon books, nursing, kissing, caressing and promises to see each other in the morning.
We also have weekly rituals – church on Sunday, family time throughout the weekend, date night in every couple of weeks.
Throughout the year, we have larger, beloved . Every Father’s Day, for instance, my husband receives a fresh flower boutonniere to wear to church. On Thanksgiving, we eat a festive vegetarian meal to say thank you to the earth and to the animals who inhabit it. On Christmas morning, we go for a family walk to feed the local birds and wildlife. On anyone’s birthday, they get to take the whole day off from work or childcare or school and do whatever they want all day long. And on our wedding anniversary, I receive pure white hydrangeas, the flower in my bridal bouquet and a lasting symbol of our deeply satisfying partnership.
One of our most treasured, and symbolic, traditions is leaving a light on whenever someone goes away overnight. Keeping the home fires burning is a powerful metaphor for the way we see family: as a supportive, dynamic, living organism that is always there, always available and infinitely abundant.
It seems we’ve made our . And made our own way. Most of all, we’ve come to see that building a nest is a lifelong journey for most families, not just ones like ours that have to start everything from scratch. Learning to love what we have and see what we’re already good at are gifts we will proudly carry as we learn forward.
If you want to know more about private Nest-Building coaching, please subscribe at Learn Forward to get the latest news. Additionally, we’re releasing powerful resources for families to support smoothing the way back into our fall routines! You won’t want to miss it!
With great gratitude,
Karine