How to Have More Fun: A Guide to Enjoying the Holidays

(00:54):

All right, everybody. I don't know what you're doing right now, but lemme tell you what I'm doing. I am cruising into the holiday season, and in fact, today, the day that this releases, it is Thanksgiving here in the United States. What does that mean? That means cue the Charlie Brown Thanksgiving music, families getting together, Turkey on the table, uncle Bill talking politics, and Irene getting drunk. Okay, wait a minute here. Hold on, hold on. What are we going to talk about? Well, I thought a lot about this. What do I want to talk to you about, given that this is going to come out on Thanksgiving, and whether you listen to this on Thanksgiving or not, whether you are located in a place where there is Thanksgiving or not, none of that is relevant because at some point or another, you're going to be cruising into the holidays with your own family and loved ones.

 

(01:52):

And when I started to scan the possibilities for what you and I could talk about today, and it's kind of sad, when you Google the holidays and holidays with family, the first thing that comes up are not articles about how to have more fun with your family. You know what comes up? How to avoid toxic family members, how to have boundaries, how to do this. And look, you may need them with your family if they're that toxic, don't go. There's the only boundary you need, okay? You have permission from your friend Mel Robbins, to decline any invitations this holiday that involve hanging out with narcissists or people that have been abusive to you or anybody that triggers your trauma. Okay? That's just rule number one, because I want you to have fun. You deserve to have fun. What I am suggesting is we get serious about having fun with our families.

 

(02:38):

And here's the reason why we have to talk about this. Can we have a confessional moment here? I know you're excited to see your family, or at least I hope you are, but let's tell the truth about what happens when we all get together. We're all excited. We send the emails. We can't wait to go. We bundle up, we pack the car, we board the planes, we drive to each other's, we give each other a big hug. We're super excited. And then what do you do? You hang out with your favorite cousin or your favorite aunt, and you ignore everybody else within a couple hours of getting there. You've caught up on college and work and your dating life and you've talked about the weather, and then everybody's on their phone. Within a day, you're itching to go back and see your friends and get back into your routine and you're ready to kill your sister or your brother.

 

(03:23):

It's not just happening at my house. It happens at everybody's house. I'd like to change that this year. I'd like to pull up in the fun bus. I would like us all to walk into our family holidays and our family dynamics this year with our arms open. You know how you walk into the holidays with your arms crossed going? We'll see how this goes, and you carry in your expectations and maybe the slights from last year, oh, it's going to be the same thing every year. How about this holiday season? This is the one where you uncross your arms, you open your heart, and you pull up in the fun bus baby unc honk. And look, I'm sure that my family feels the same way about me. Oh, aunt Mel, she's a lot. Talk about a control freak. God, I wish she didn't talk so loud.

 

(04:13):

Hope she doesn't drink as much as she did last year. This is going to be a train wreck if she, I'm sure I'm very triggering. So thank you to my family in advance for still coming. But let's just promise each other that this is going to be the holiday season where you and I open our hearts, we uncross our arms, we drop the expectations, and we pull up in the fricking fun bus. We bring it people. We destroy this feas exclamation point because when you and I get serious about having fun, what's going to be cool? The fun breaks apart the old dynamics. It pulls people out of their shells. And you're going to see a completely different side of everybody that you think you know so well. And this matters. And I realize that you might be introverted, or maybe it's your mother-in-law who's hosting, and so it's like got to be a certain way, or your family's just not into that, Mel.

 

(05:08):

Or maybe you don't have a big family, but it's your circle of friends that you're spending the holidays with that really need to mix it up. How do we change this? I'll tell you how we change this. Fun, fun matters, especially when it comes to your family. Now, this isn't just good old common sense. There's a lot of research here. 

(05:58):

There's the middle child, there's the favorite. You fall right back into the old roles. Well, here's the thing about fun. Fun lessens the stress. Fun helps you sleep better. Fun makes you happier, it makes you smarter, and it strengthens your relationships when you're having fun with other people and you know that this is true. And look, you aren't the only one. Here's how sad the topic of fun is. Researchers have a word to describe the fact that you and I are not having as much fun as we should. You want to hear the words? It's pretty sad. Researchers say that you and I are living in a fun drought. I mean, my mouth is not just dry. Apparently my whole life is dry. 97% of us according to the research, and that includes you and me, wish we had more fun. 60% of adults believe that their life is just way too grown up.

 

(06:57):

I know I feel that way. You wish you could go into a time machine and sit back at the kids' table again and be elbowing your cousins and laughing at all the adults. Well, that brings me to the next piece of research. 73% of us miss aspects of our childhood, like birthday parties or family celebrations. Let's just talk about your own family for a second. Forget about what your relationship is like right now. I want you to think back through time, what are the best memories that you have with your family? I guarantee you what popped right into your mind or the fun times? When I think about my family, the Shne Burgers, you know what I think about? I think about game night. I think about the fact that we love playing euchre and backgammon and we always divide up into teams. And my mom and I are a great team because we love to smack talk.

 

(07:52):

And then it's like the ladies against the guys. And we will play cards for hours, cribbage, eure. I just love those nights and we laugh and we're competitive. Or I can think of another memory that comes to mind for me is whiffle ball. When my little nephews we're tiny, they're twins and they're 14 now and they're taller than I am. Well, I'd get out there when they were little and I would always have to drop out of the whiffle ball game because I haven't had my bladder surgery yet. And then everybody would laugh about how Aunt Mel just peed herself. Ha ha, ha, ha ha. And they'd try to make me laugh so I would pee myself. Or when we go visit my parents, my dad always rents a pontoon boat and not just any pontoon boat, there is only one place on Muskegon Lake where you can rent a pontoon boat.

 

(08:39):

This pontoon boat is like 30 years old. We have rented the same thing every year that we go back and visit. And this thing's like Chaga, chaga, chaga, chaga Chaga. And the last time, last summer when we were back there that we rented it, it died in the middle of the lake, honest to God. But it was a blast. We laughed and laughed and laughed, and my dad had to wave down a boat and get a ride. It was a whole thing. But we always have fun. And I guarantee you when I go back this summer, it'll be that same 31-year-old pontoon boat and we'll all wonder if it will actually be able to have enough horsepower to do tubing. Now, on Chris's side of the family, when I think about memories there, it's always fun stuff too. How excited all nine cousins were when they get together and they would spend hours and hours and hours, particularly in the winter building, jumps on this huge hill that we live on and then they would sled on it.

 

(09:30):

And honestly, the last time they all did that, it's kind of sad. I bet it was about 15 years ago or another memory, we had this epic lip sync battle one Thanksgiving where all of, not only Chris's family got together, but all of his cousins came to, and it was every family was a band. It was this incredible battle. Absolutely amazing. Do you know when that was? 13 years ago. So it begs the question, if you always remember the fun times, why aren't we having fun anymore? And so before I talk about how we're going to do that, 

(11:15):

And then I guarantee you, you know what you felt. My family would never do that. And that's the second reason why we don't bring more fun. You're afraid you're going to get judged. Well, I can take care of that fear right now. You will get judged. Your family is going to tease you. Your family's going to roll your eyes. Your family will judge you When you show up with a huge armload of foam hats that you expect everybody to wear at the holiday table, guess what? When you bring the poster board and the markers, when you bring the whiffle ball, when you bring the face paint, when you bring the karaoke machine, I want you to expect to be made fun of. You want to know why? Because that's your family. That's what we do. And you know what else? Who fricking cares? They're going to complain anyway. So you got a choice here. Do you want them to sit around and complain about relatives that aren't there or about politics or about the weather or about how their back hurts? Or do you want them to complain about the foam hat that you brought that we're all now laughing at you get to choose. And I'm going to ask you, please choose the fun. And here's the third reason why we don't have enough fun. I'm telling you, and this is the single most important reason, and it's dead simple. We don't plan for it.

 

(12:25):

You and I are making a huge mistake. We think fun needs to be spontaneous. I get it. Fun was really spontaneous when you were a little kid, or at least you thought it was. But if you really stop and think about it, when you were a kid, all those fun moments, the adults planned. They planned the birthday parties, they planned the get togethers, they invited your friends over for play dates, they bought the Legos and the puzzle. They turned on the fun movie. They pop the popcorn. And what I'm here to tell you is now that you and I are adults, you and I need to plan those fun experiences for ourselves and the other adults around us. Don't just plan something fun for the kids this holiday plan something for everybody to do. So I have now opened the kimono people. I have lifted up the skirt, I have shown up here.

 

(13:17):

I don't even know what other metaphor to tell you. I'm just free styling here with you right now on this holiday edition. The bottom line is, let's admit it, we're in a fun route. Second, let's also admit we had been planning on showing up at the holiday gathering, hoping it was fun, and then just being critical when it's not. So here's what we're going to do. You and me we're bringing the fun and rule. Number one, 

(14:14):

And so he put together an email and he assigned all the things out that everybody was doing and bring the dogs and bring a bathing suit and blah, blah, blah. And everybody replies back, excited to see you. And we are, we're so excited to get together. So now as the emails are starting to fly, I'm starting to feel excited, but everybody's just kind of commenting on the logistics. We'll be there Thursday, we'll be there Wednesday night, we're going to bring the dog. And all of a sudden out of nowhere, our son Oakley replies and he replies in all caps, people, we are going to destroy this feast exclamation word. And I just laughed out loud. That could be you. Why not reply to the family logistics text chain with a hilarious gif of somebody dancing with a Turkey? Why not put in a hilarious photo of somebody in the family?

 

(15:07):

Why not bring the fun? So don't just focus on the logistics. Make sure you focus on the laughter too. Now, let's talk about step two. How do you stop falling into the, oh, funnel just happened, spontaneity category, and you fall into the I'm going to make this fun thing happen category. Well, let's look at the research. People who are happy do things that make them happy. That's one of those studies where I'm like, yeah, duh. But then you're like, oh, no wonder I'm not happy. I'm not doing anything or prioritizing happiness. They work at things that make them happy, and it makes sense because when you try things that make you happy, you're a happier person. Well, guess what? The exact same research relates to fun. It's seriously so obvious. It's kind of stupid, but let's have some fun with it, right? Let's not be embarrassed.

 

(15:59):

Your life becomes fun when you plan things that are fun to you. Or even when normal things, you just bring a fun attitude like our son did to the email chain, all caps, exclamation. Let's go people. And on that note, I want to share a story with you about the power of bringing the fun, okay? Don't wait for somebody else to do it. Thankfully, we have somebody in our family who's incredible at this, our oldest daughter, Sawyer, who's 23 years old. This woman always brings the fun. I mean, she is always doing something really fun with her friends. I can give you a few examples. There was one year where she and her friends were out in Breckenridge, Colorado, and I was looking at the photos online and they were out at bars in these colonial costumes, literally like think Holly, hobby Bonnets, Prairie Dress Apron.

 

(16:52):

They had gone on a bar crawl in costume looking like women from a colonial era, like Little House on the Prairie. It was such a riot that people all over Breckenridge were stopping them. They were featured on the Breckenridge Facebook page. People were taking photos with them. I mean, talk about bringing the fun. That's hilarious. I mean, I'd never think to order costumes and go on a themed bar crawl. Who does that? Well, apparently people who have fun do that. Another thing that she did recently is we had all of her college friends from Boston College up with their moms for a big mother daughter weekend. And when we found out that one of the moms who was a widow had just gotten engaged to her boyfriend, Sawyer turned to me and said, let's throw a wedding. I'm like, throw a wedding. She's like, yeah, we're going to throw a wedding.

 

(17:41):

And sure enough, impromptu they made a sash for the mom. We made a veil out of a paper towel, like a long thing of paper towel and flowers out of foil. And then we blew bubbles. And we had her daughter who was wearing this huge foam hat walker down the aisle in our living room. And then Sawyer went. It was hilarious, absolutely hilarious. Why she brought the fun. When she heard something, she leaned into it and it was just amazing. And she also did this repeatedly during quarantine. So quarantine was actually a really awesome time for our family. Once we got over the grieving and we settled into the routine of being together because our kids brought the fun, Sawyer went through and made an entire chart for the month of March, and she came up with theme nights. Every other night there was a family Olympics night, there was a bake off where we divided up into teams and we had to bake desserts, and we also had to dress up as chefs.

 

(18:54):

I mean, it was super fun. But the most fun night was a night that I had never heard of. This is a theme you should steal. I love this. It's an anything but clothes dinner. And what does that mean? I didn't know either. It means you have dinner with your family wearing anything but clothes. You're not supposed to go nude. You are supposed to wear something other than clothes. So Sawyer, for example, took two huge king size pillows and duct tape them all around her. So she put one in the front, one in the back, and then duct taped it. So that was her clothes or her outfit. I can't remember what Oakley wore, and I can't remember what Kendall wore oddly enough. But I took a champagne bottle box and I put it across my chest. And the way that I fastened it to me is I poked holes in the top of it and then I put a ribbon around it and hung it like a necklace, and then put duct tape on the side so it stayed in place.

 

(19:48):

And then I made a pair of pants out of brown grocery store garbage bags, like one bag per leg and then taped the front together. Now, Chris Chris's outfit was something Chris took a rubber pot lid. So have like a metal pot lid. Well, somebody gave us once these kind of rubber lids that you can put on top of dishes like in the summer so that flies can't get him. And it had a little knob on it. He hung this thing across the front of him in front of his private parts, and that's all he wore except for a pair of clogs and socks. I mean, when he came down the stairs, I almost had a heart attack. He had basically a pot lid across the front of him with a ribbon around his waist and clogs on. I'll tell you, we have laughed about that moment forever. And every time we get into a fight, Chris threatens to wear that to the rehearsal dinner for one of our kids' weddings. What you're going to learn is that it's not that hard. It only takes one additional person to cause a major shift with you and have the fun be what everybody remembers. That's what we're going to do this holiday season.

 

(21:25):

In fact, this is called the first Follower Theory. When you're the one person doing something out of the ordinary, people think you're crazy. Think about if you were to go in at the holidays and you're wearing some silly outfit. One of my favorite things to do is to buy themed blazers. You can get 'em really cheap on Amazon that are just ridiculous, whether they have turkeys all over 'em or they have holiday decorations or they blink or whatever, hilarious. If you're the only one wearing one, you might feel like an idiot. When two of you show up, now there's a party that first follower that joins in with you, turns you from, you're an idiot to this looks like fun. Same true about a dance floor. The first person that gets up, you're like, Ooh, bad dance. Move. The second one, you're like, maybe I'll go.

 

(22:13):

Right? That's how you go from being the lone nut job to being the leader of the fun Train. Everybody. That's how fun becomes a movement. And so I'm going to take the first follower theory and I'm going to recruit someone to help me, and I want you to do the same. I am going to get our daughter Sawyer on the line because she is the CFO, the Chief Fun officer of the Robbins family. And so as I get Sawyer on the line, I want you to think of your Chief Fun officer, the person you are going to drag in to help you. Because if you both are like, come on guys, everyone will be like, all right. And the Fun Bus will run the resignation and the cynicism right on over and make sure that Fun Bus has a damn good music dance party mix too, because that'll also bring the energy up.

 

(23:06):

So ladies and gentlemen, without further ado, we'll be right back. We're going to take a short break, but when we come back, I'm going to introduce you to the CFO Chief Fun Officer of our family, Ms. Robbins. Oh, and we're going to talk about how the hell we're going to make our holidays fun, and in the process we're going to give you some amazing ideas for how you can do the same. Okay? So soy, thank you for being here because you know what? You are the funniest person in our family. Not only because you have the best sense of humor and you have the wittiest and driest sense of humor, but you also bring the fun and you make our family so much better because of it. And I just love that about you.

 

Sawyer (23:51):

Thank you.

 

Mel Robbins (23:53):

I mean, literally, dude, everything. I mean the foam hats, your idea, dinner without clothing, your idea, a bar crawl in colonial costumes, your idea throwing a fake wedding, your idea. How the heck did you become so fun?

 

Sawyer (24:15):

That is a tough question. Honestly, I feel like first off, I'm just very outgoing and obnoxious. So I think that that kind of plays a role into it. But I think that I have been fortunate enough to be a part of friend groups where all we want to do is have fun and do things that are out of the ordinary. And I don't know, you can always just go to a bar, but it's more fun to dress up as old women to go there, to just go alone. That's what it was for Halloween. I was a granny.

 

Mel Robbins (24:56):

Can you please describe your costume to everybody because I think it's one of the best costumes I've ever seen.

 

Sawyer (25:03):

I wore a wig and I got glasses and pearls, and I got a cane and I was wearing a sweater, I don't know. And I looked on probably 15 YouTube tutorials of how to make your makeup look like old women. And so I had wrinkles all over me and a big mole. Yeah.

 

Mel Robbins (25:29):

Oh, and you know what other detail, I loved

 

Sawyer (25:31):

What

 

Mel Robbins (25:32):

You had on New Balance geriatric sneakers, and you had Oh yeah. That you had a covid mask hanging from one of those eyeglass things. I mean, the attention to detail. And that's why I wanted to talk to you because this is the first year that our family is hosting Thanksgiving at Ground Zero for Thanksgiving, which is the southern Vermont house. And I feel like there are traditions that used to go with the Southern Vermont house when your grandparents owned the house. And now that we are the owners of the house, and this is the first Thanksgiving that we're inviting the extended family to come, that we should probably get really intentional about mixing up the traditions and inserting a lot more fun.

 

Sawyer (26:32):

That sounds great. Honestly,

 

Mel Robbins (26:35):

Why do you think that holidays are normally not that fun?

 

Sawyer (26:41):

No, I think they're fun. I love holidays. If I could, I would just have Christmas all year long. But the fact that Thanksgiving is always a good time in when politics are not talked about, or money or people's life, I dunno. I feel like all we talk about is the boring stuff and what everyone does for work. And then Uncle Tom does his accents and everyone laughs, and we have the exact same memories told over and over again, and then we go to bed. So I don't know. I'm down for some more fun this year for sure.

 

Mel Robbins (27:25):

I agree. So can you give me some ideas? Because you're a way more creative thinker than I am, and I remember when we were quarantining, you came up with a chart of themed evenings that we were going to do as a family in order to mix up the doldrum and to create things to look forward to.

Sawyer (28:03):

Honestly, I feel like I'll just spitball. I don't have any in particular knowing our family, but I think there's ideas that can be super out there and wild. For example, like the anything but closed dinner, which I really wish honestly didn't happen after dad walked down in a pedal, something over his junk and nothing else

 

Mel Robbins (28:33):

He had clogs on.

 

Sawyer (28:34):

Oh, perfect. But I mean, that was a little too out there. And we do that with our friends, and I didn't anticipate you guys taking it that seriously, and God knows, I don't want to see our grandmother JJ with a vve box over her uplifted tits. But I think that what we could do, which could be wholesome, is, I don't know. I feel like there's a ton of different things. The first thing that came to my mind is we always, this isn't like out there anything, but I remember we used to paint pottery a lot when we were up in Vermont, so maybe we could get a bunch of pottery to paint for everyone or something wholesome like that. Or we could, I remember you and Amy went to a flower build or a flower building thing, or refilling class, something like that. I mean, the obvious dance party. We've done lip syncing battles. I feel like it would get a little, I feel like people would be offended if we did the theme. Everyone dresses the other person. So I think avoid doing that, but Oh,

 

Mel Robbins (29:58):

I like that one.

 

Sawyer (30:00):

You like

 

Mel Robbins (30:01):

That? Yes, I do. So how do you come up with your ideas?

 

Sawyer (30:08):

Honestly, I don't even know. I feel like I get inspiration from online. I'll see a photo of, for example, a colonial costume and be like, oh my gosh, it would be so fun to incorporate that into a bar crawl. And then you plan the whole bar crawl and you just make sure, I don't know, I feel like I'm very forceful in these type of ideas, so people don't really have a choice whether they want to dress up or not. And I'm not saying that that's the way to go about it, but I think that every single idea or fun theme or party idea that I have ever come up with, I just make sure that I go 100% all out so that if you don't do so and you show up to the party or you show up to the bar call, you're the one who looks at a place, which sounds horrible, but I just feel like if you're the one planning and you're not the one going a hundred percent, or even being super outgoing or rowdy about it and making sure everyone feels comfortable in and around the group, whoever's participating in it, then it would never work.

 

(31:25):

Because I feel like anything as the creator, you need to believe in it just as much as anyone else for anyone else to actually do it.

 

Mel Robbins (31:33):

I absolutely love that. Okay, so take away number one from our chief fun officer, Sawyer Robbins is if you're going to plan something fun and unexpected over the holidays, which we are saying you absolutely should, you got to go all in. You got to be the most excited in order to enroll everybody else. Now I want to give everybody a couple ideas because you've been sensational at planning things for our family. So over the quarantine, everybody, Sawyer made a month long chart and on it were themed nights. And so one of them is the one she regrets where she made us all show up to dinner wearing anything but clothes. Second one that she did is we did that cooking show where we had a bake off where you had to make a dessert.

 

Sawyer (32:26):

Yeah, that's another actually good idea. I feel like for Thanksgiving is instead of everyone bringing the food to the table and then everyone just eats it, it's fun to bring all the ingredients to individual's house, et cetera, and then bake off or cook off or whatever and have a little bit of a competition. And I am severely competitive, so I always love that type of stuff, but I think that gets everyone together and in high spirits, and obviously food brings people together. So that's another fun idea. But yes, we did a bake off. I did not win. I was crushed for days. My mom won. And Kendall, I think you guys made moose. Yes, me and me and dad might've literally bought cookie dough and hat at it. I have no idea.

 

Mel Robbins (33:19):

But the other way that our chief fun officer Sawyer supersize this is we had to be in costume as chefs.

 

(33:27):

So another thing that we do as a family that you have planned is we do like these games like salad bowl where you take a big salad bowl and everybody just takes pieces of paper and throws in names, and it could be names that are anything from Mickey Mouse to the president to actors, to people in your family. And then you basically divide into two teams and you play the charades game of having to guess how many you can get in a minute. That's a really fun game. Brings out the competitive spirit. We've also, with our family over the summer vacation, we have done these family Olympics where you Google yard games, whether it's the balloon toss or the egg races or various yard games, but key to this, Sawyer, again, bringing the fun makes everybody divide into teams that have a color. And then you got to go all out on the color of your team and the costumes you're wearing for your team. Now, do you have any other ideas, because I feel like these are kind of in categories, everybody, that there are activities that you can do together, there are games you can play and teams you can break into together. What if this were the year Sawyer that we did a huge capture the flag game with the whole family?

 

Sawyer (34:50):

Yeah, that would be really fun, actually. That's a great idea. See, look at you. Go ahead. Yeah, I don't know. I think well capture the flag is a great idea, like games, et cetera. I think that always brings people together. And I think that what always makes something more fun is as I'm sure you can see, a consistent theme here is costumes or dress up or something along the lines of not wearing just regular, your regular everyday sweats or clothes or Thanksgiving meal dresses, et cetera. And so costumes always makes things more fun as well as decorations. If you are able to really deck out your house or even the Thanksgiving dinner table, it always just makes people feel so much more excited and lively. And if you want to get everyone involved, I've done parties where I ask individuals to bring different types of decorations and then we all get together and decorate the place together and then essentially destroy the place. And then I'm the one cleaning it up. But I think that decorations and costumes and obviously music is always a good idea.

Sawyer (36:32):

Okay,

 

Mel Robbins (36:33):

What are we doing?

 

Sawyer (36:36):

Oh my God, I feel like, so put on the spot. Well, I think capture the flag is always a good idea. I think mean we do have the new pool, which would be fun to do relay races in or something along the lines of that. I think we could, I mean, there's so many different Olympic s games like cornhole or egg tosses or water balloon tosses, whatever. I am trying to think. I mean, I think that the best tradition that I was very young for, but the Lip Sync battle was very, very fun. And that was one where everyone went super all out and just basically lip synced and dressed up as their, each family was a band, et cetera. And then they sang a song that was really fun.

 

Mel Robbins (37:48):

What about a karaoke machine? We could rent one.

 

Sawyer (37:52):

Yeah,

 

Mel Robbins (37:53):

That's a no. Okay. I feel like no enthusiasm there.

 

Sawyer (37:57):

I mean, I think karaoke iss fun when everyone's a bad singer, but I can see that turning into Kendall, just taking over.

 

Mel Robbins (38:05):

Oh yeah, that's true. So do we plan? So I am gleaning a couple things from you. Number one, we need costumes. Number two, we need a planned activity that everybody participates in. Number three, we need directions. And number four, we can't just let this be something that might happen. So we got to know that people are rolling in Thanksgiving day, there's going to be the feast. Uncle Tom will do his accents. We'll all laugh, we'll talk about the same stuff. And then when we wake up on Friday morning, all bets are off and it's Family Olympics. Is that what I'm getting?

 

Sawyer (38:47):

Yeah, no, I think that's a great idea. I think that we need to get more creative with the games or else, I think it's never, or it's the worst when we come up with something and we're always really excited about it, but we've done it before, so then when we actually try to do it, it's very half-assed instead of everyone being super involved in everything. So I would advise against Family Olympics just because we have already done that, but even I know that a lot of our family likes to drink, as does many other people in this world. We could do a cocktail making contest or something where everyone brings their own fixings and makes a unique drink and everyone could make their own drink. So I could make one. You could make one, and then we could all try to do that, or we could do it based on family.

 

Mel Robbins (39:49):

That's a cool idea. And since there's a couple people that don't drink, we could force you to have to do an alcoholic and a non-alcoholic version, which is actually quite hard.

 

Sawyer (39:57):

Yes,

 

Mel Robbins (39:58):

Absolutely. I like that as a Thanksgiving thing. That's an assignment per family. Okay, check. We got that one done. Should we have a pool party?

 

Sawyer (40:10):

See, I think it's hard with those. Yes, absolutely. But I don't think it's one of those things that you can plan that just needs to happen naturally. And I think that that's the thing with making fun is it's always fun when it's not super forced. And I think it's one of those things where if you're the only one that wants to have the pool party and then you're sending out all these emails, oh, bring your bathing suit, whatever, and then people aren't really into it, then it's not fun at all. So you need to make sure a lot of people are into that.

 

Mel Robbins (40:46):

So now let me focus us on the actual Thanksgiving table. Okay. How do we make that more fun? What's your opinion on adult versus kid tables?

 

Sawyer (41:01):

I think that having, well, an adult table, it's always, I think every table, it's fun to make creative handmade name tags for everyone and potentially have flowers, especially on the adult flowers or tree things, or just make it Thanksgiving esque with that type of fall color scheme. I think having, I don't know, I feel like having little presents or little, oh, another thing that we used to do is we would have the poppers.

 

Mel Robbins (41:41):

Oh yeah, I love poppers

 

Sawyer (41:43):

That you pull, everyone holds them crisscross and you pull those. Those are always fun having crowns or,

 

Mel Robbins (41:53):

Ooh, I like the idea of crown. What if we make our own crowns

 

Sawyer (41:57):

To wear? That would be

 

Mel Robbins (41:58):

Fun. Or you get assigned a crown to make for somebody else to wear at the table. I like that.

 

Sawyer (42:03):

Oh, I like that too.

 

Mel Robbins (42:04):

Let's do that.

 

Sawyer (42:06):

Yeah, that's a great idea. You

 

Mel Robbins (42:07):

Pull a name out of the hat and you got to make somebody a crown to wear at Thanksgiving dinner.

 

Sawyer (42:12):

Yeah,

 

Mel Robbins (42:12):

I love that. Okay, that's done. What about a question? I was recently at a dinner party and Maxine, who was hosting the party with her husband Andrew, asked a table of 10 people tell us about the very first apartment you lived in. And it was kind of surprising. Everybody had a really crazy story about the very first apartment they lived in. Is there a question that we could ask all 14 family members that would bring some fun and would shake things up?

 

Sawyer (42:51):

I think that's a fun question, except we do have younger kids, so obviously some of us, or not me, but others haven't had their own apartment maybe. I don't know. I always think it's hilarious to hear people's first kiss, but I know that

 

Mel Robbins (43:13):

Let's do that.

 

Sawyer (43:14):

That can make people uncomfortable if they haven't had their first kiss, who

 

Mel Robbins (43:18):

Hasn't had their first kiss in her family.

 

Sawyer (43:21):

I don't know. I don't want to call anyone out, but just like younger kids. I'm trying to think if you, oh, here's a good one. If you could plan with, if money was not an option and you could plan a trip for our entire family, where would we go? What would we do? That type of thing. And then everyone can go around and say that.

 

Mel Robbins (43:52):

That's fun. See, what's happening when you plan this stuff is that you are creating an environment for fun. You're creating ways for people to connect in a different manner than how we normally show up because I don't know about you, but even with our family of five, when all five of us are home, it's super exciting and really amazing for the first day, and then literally by the next morning, everybody's back in their old roles. Do you feel that?

 

Sawyer (44:30):

Yeah, totally. Totally. Going off of the question thing, another thing you could do is we could create a big bowl of interesting questions on pieces of paper and fold them and then hand everyone one at the table or that people can pick randomly. And so then everyone has a different random question that they can answer.

 

Mel Robbins (44:54):

Great idea. Great idea.

 

Sawyer (44:58):

Well, yeah, the first day is always, oh, it's so great to see you. What have you been up to? And then the second day turns into either boring or I hate you all.

 

Mel Robbins (45:10):

Oh,

 

Sawyer (45:11):

No, no. I don't know. I just think it's always really hard to come back for the holidays with the family, and it's exciting at first, and then by the end of it you're like, okay, I am ready to get back to my regular routine.

 

Mel Robbins (45:25):

You're right. I wanted to talk to you today because our family gets into this rhythm when we come together where we deeply love each other, we're all excited for the first day, and then by the time the second day rolls around, everybody is in their own corners. Everybody's staring at their phones, everybody's grouchy. They want to go see their friends instead of hanging out with us as a family. And nobody can agree on what we're going to do together. And I don't want the holidays to be like that this year.