When Happy Hour Fills Your Cup
Happy Hour is just that - HAPPY! Does it need to be anything else?
Grab your Kombucha, and grab your kid and their favorite drink - and have your own Happy Hour. Right now we cannot go out on “dates” with our kids, but we can still have dates…in our home! There are so many activities you can do alone with your child - paint each other’s nails and give massages, make their favorite cookies together, play video games or board games for one hour together. Build a Lego kit or Kiwi Crate kit together. Go on a walk or bike ride in the neighborhood, or hike on trails behind your house. Jacuzzi time with just you and your child can be pretty special too. Dance party, tea party, how-to draw videos together - whatever it is…give them options that are possible, and let them pick. The key is - you do it together, just you and your child. That is your Happy Hour.
Our Experience
Recently, we picked a Saturday for our Happy Hours with each parent and child since we knew that both the Spouse and I would be available. While one of us was on a Happy Hour, the other one was helping the other kids with their regular needs. This allowed the Happy Hour parent and child to truly have their own special time. The Spouse and my son went for a hike. My daughter made up a drawing game that was really quite fun for me. Another daughter wanted video games together with each of us. All our kids want is a little bit of our undivided attention doing what they want to do. They get to decide; they feel in control.
The Packaging
Yes - we do this type of stuff all the time, but it’s how we packaged it that made it feel more special. We called it “Bonding Bonanza Day: Where Everyone Gets a Happy Hour” and they lit up with excitement when we announced it. Even just calling it “Happy Hour: An hour to do happy things together” is creative enough to signify something special is happening. Many of us have had big “dates” with our kids whether it be a father-son trampoline event or father-daughter dance, but those are few and far between - how about weekly or monthly? Happy Hour can be a spur of the moment suggestion when you know one of your kids is having a rough day or week. Or, it can be planned on a certain night each week that rotates through each of your children. However you want to do it - it’s only an hour, but the packaging makes it more special.
Fill Their Cup
Happy Hour should be stocked full of syrup that sweetens the experience - syrup that adds flavor to their cup. Fill up their cup with rich encouragement. Tell them how proud you are of them. Give them hugs, kisses, high-fives, winks, whatever physical affection they appreciate. Show sincere delight in the activity you get to do with them. Show them that you are someone they can always trust to keep filling their cup. There will be others that poke holes in their cup, but you - YOU are the filler-upper.
The Precedence
Setting a Happy Hour precedence when your kids are young, will provide the architecture for the future - when you truly and deeply need the Happy Hour with your teenager to connect and talk about hard things. This precedence matters especially when they are at an age that makes it hard for them to approach you and talk with you about hard things. If you’ve had Happy Hours with your kids when they were little, as they get older, they might actually come to rely on that special time regularly. And this might possibly be the only time you two will have deep conversations, explore goals, and just enjoy being together with no painful interactions.
Start Now
So start the Happy Hour experiences now. Be there now. Listen now. Play now. And then later, they will turn to you to fill their cup - and yours will be filled too.
