The holidays are a time to create wonderful memories with family and friends. When you look back on happy memories of holidays in the past, you may associate certain scents and tastes with the memory. Perhaps Grandma’s house always smelled like fresh baked cookies. Maybe Aunt Sarah always had peppermint candy canes for the kids. If your family picked out a live tree to decorate, you might associate the smell of pine as happy memories of the holidays.
The Sense Of Smell
We don’t always think about our sense of smell and how it plays a role in our daily lives. Scents can have a powerful effect on us by changing our mood and our ability to recall memories. When we smell a scent, it goes to the brain’s olfactory bulb, which is connected to the amygdala and hippocampus. The hippocampus is known as the brain’s memory center. Therefore, this is why a certain scent can trigger a memory so vivid, and it’s like it just happened yesterday. For example, you walk into a room and smell a familiar perfume or cologne, and you are instantly reminded of your first love who wore the same scent.
How Scents Play A Role In Your Holiday Experiences
Some of the most popular scents that remind us of the holidays are peppermint, cinnamon, pine, and freshly baked sugar cookies. If you look around in stores, you will find candles, room sprays, and even hand soaps and lotions scented with holiday-inspired scents.
There is something warm and inviting about a home that smells festive and cozy. The Danish word “hygge,” pronounced “Hue-gah,” is a term that describes how they cope with the long hard winters there. Hygge is all about coziness, comfort, friendship, and surrounding yourself with love and laughter. Similarly, the hygge traditions have become a trend in other countries and the United States, particularly during the holidays. Creating a cozy and inviting atmosphere in the home is what a hygge holiday is all about. When you fill your home with festive holiday scents, you create a warm and inviting atmosphere for your guests. And you and your family will instantly be transported to happy memories every time you walk into your home.
Make Your Home Smell Warm And Inviting For A Hygge Holiday Experience
Making your home smell warm and inviting is part of the fun and excitement of the holiday season. Children will love taking part in this tradition, too!
- Scented candles. Part of the hygge holiday experience is to light candles throughout the home to create a warm and festive ambiance. If you use scented candles, don’t overdo it with the scents. In addition, choose holiday scents such as vanilla, cinnamon apple, sugar plum, pine, or peppermint.
- Essential oils. If you prefer a more natural scent option than an imitation fragrance, essential oils are a perfect choice. Make homemade room sprays or diffuse them in an essential oil diffuser. Ensure you know how to use essential oils safely as some are not safe to use around children and pets. Use single or blends of oils such as myrrh, cypress, cinnamon bark, and orange to make your home smell festive.
- Fresh cut evergreens. Another natural and beautiful way to make your home smell festive is to decorate with fresh-cut evergreens. Layer a cedar garland on top of your fireplace mantel. Use evergreen boughs as a centerpiece for your dining room table. Place sprigs of spruce clippings around your home. Make a wreath out of your favorite scented evergreens to hang on your wall and provide a natural fragrance. The best smelling evergreens are the Scotch pine, Douglas fir, white spruce, and Noble fir trees.
- Make pomander balls. Poke whole cloves into oranges for a festive and fragrant DIY holiday craft you can do with your kids. You can create different designs on your pomander balls and use them in your table centerpiece.
- Heat up a holiday simmer pot. A timeless tradition to make your home smell festive is the holiday simmer pot. Fill a saucepan with fragrant cinnamon sticks, whole cloves, apples, and lemons, and simmer it low on the stove. In addition, add more water periodically as it evaporates.
- Make scented fire starters. If you have a traditional wood-burning fireplace in your home, you can make scented wax fire starters that will make your home smell festive. Lighting a fire is another way to add to the ambiance of a hygge holiday.
- Mulled wine. A favorite holiday treat is mulled wine. Similarly, this is like the holiday simmer pot that you simmer on the stove to make your home smell amazing. However, this is a hygge holiday beverage you can also serve your guests.
- Cinnamon scented pinecones. Another DIY holiday craft you can do with your kids is to make cinnamon-scented pinecones. Wash and dry your pinecones after you gather them. After that, spritz them with a solution of water and cinnamon essential oil. Feel free to add orange essential oil for even more holiday spirit. Finally, seal them in a plastic bag for 24 hours, then remove them and let them air dry. Display them anywhere, however, they are beautiful when you arrange them in your holiday centerpiece.
- Make a dried fruit wreath. Holiday wreaths can be both decorative and fragrant. Use dehydrated citrus fruit slices and attach them to a foam wreath with straight pins. Hang the citrus wreath above your fireplace. This is a beautiful and fragrant way to add to the fireplace mantel’s evergreen boughs and pomander balls.
- Bake cookies and other festive baked desserts. Your home will smell amazing, and you will have a delicious treat to serve your family and guests. Baking cookies is a tradition that you can carry on with your children. Therefore, you can pass down your family’s favorite cookie recipes to your younger generations in your family!
Which of these ideas is your favorite way to make your home smell amazing during the holidays?