Uplifting Umbertaversary: Creating Holidays

It's reader butter jelly time!!! Hello my readers and happy October 10th, today we celebrate the 3rd annual Umbertaversary, that said, I would like to wish you all an uplifting umbertaversary!! Huh? What's that you say? You don't know what I am talking about? Well, for those of you who haven't read my LA Travel stories post, mainly part 2, umbertaversary is a holiday that me and my friends invented to mark the day another friend lost a bet, basically losing his real name in exchange for the name Ungrateful Umberta, but instead of being jerks about it, we have made it into a fun time celebration!! 

Give it up for that BIG 03 Umbertaversary <3

Now I am sure you are thinking, "Wow that's stupid and no one really cares SUPER COOL, I wanna make a holiday for myself and my friends!! But how?" Well fear not my compadreaders for I have found a pretty good recipe throughout the years of how to make your homemade holidays a little more legitimate, let's begin shall we!?

Step 1: Finding something to celebrate!

So first step is pretty basic, but probably the absolute most important one, and that is what are we celebrating, it can be a life changing event, something personal and sentimental to you, or something silly that erupted from a moment in your lives. Whatever it is you choose, make sure it is something worth remembering and celebrating as well as something others may be able to get into, as it isn't fun to celebrate alone now is it?

Step 2: Naming the day(s) and choosing a date!

This is where you need to get the creative juices flowing, after you have chosen what to celebrate, find a creative name that will intrigue others to join in as well as sound catchy enough to put on calendars, slogans, and possibly a song or two. A fun way to create a name if you don't know where to start, choose the emotion of the event and what it is that is celebrated and mash them together. Just as important as finding that perfect name, you need to choose an attractive date that will lure people into wanting to take a break from their lives to enjoy this day, now sometimes you can't choose the day as it is a situational or anniversarial (real words) experience that has to fall on a specific day, but if not try and make it on a date where you and your friends normally don't have anything going on.

Step 3: Choosing a proper greeting or saying for that special day!

You know a holiday ain't no holiday without a proper holiday specific greeting, we have the classics such as "Merry Christmas", "Happy Halloween!", and the lesser know, but just as important "Turn down the Mutha----ing lights, it's EARTH DAY!" Now with umbertaversary we chose to make the greeting, "Have an uplifting umbertaversary!" Now why uplifting? Well there's two reasons for it, 1. the origin of the name Umberta was due to our pal's increasing ungrateful attitude, as you may know, gratefulness is an important tool in order to be happy in life, hence Thanksgiving being a time of joy, good food, and even better company, a time of thanks!! Therefore, we want people to feel uplifted on this day as it marks a day where if you lift up those spirits, perhaps next year you can get your real name back, or something along those lines :)
and 2. The alliteration, that is to say that both words in the greeting begin with the same letter, it's not a must, but I feel it can give the greeting that extra pinch of catchy-ness. So have fun with it, and keep it simple!

Step 4: Choosing Holiday characters/themes for your day!

Just as Christmas has Santa, Rudolf, and Frosty and it's usually associated with white, red, green, and gold colors as well as the Christmas tree and the stockings, and gingerbread, etc etc etc. Now you have to do the same for your day, what characters either existing, generic, or made up by your own mind represent what you celebrate? For example Umbertaversary is about Carlos AKA Umberta, he has a thing for Asian nurses, he has confirmed himself that he IS a Diglett, and he has a weird Spider Man "fetish", or so we assume, because he has a weird semi-sexual looking Spiderman toy with a hole in... a place, anyhow therefore Mr. Parker AKA Spiderman became an umbertaversary staple, lastly Muscle Man from that Regular show and Carlos share similar traits and therefore he has become a re-occuring umbertaversary character... Now, we don't have any definitive themes yet aside from LA and/or the beach, and since it is celebrated in October we think both settings are uplifting as they are a swift change of pace from the incoming fall into winter times that can sometimes make us feel a little "down" or "ungrateful".

With that said, feel free to grab that Holiday's meaning or person and dissect them for the most diverse cast of characters and themes that will help bring other people's holiday creativity out and about, which of course leads onto the next step...

Step 5: Merchandise and Advertisement!!

This one is a bit unfortunate as most holidays quickly dwindle from something meaningful to a simple marketing scheme or cash grab, but even so it doesn't mean you can't still make it special and  memorable for all, even those not involved!!

So here's some examples I have set up for proper Merch to get the best out of your holiday celebration!

Shirts: Shirts and any clothing for that manner, help people really get "into" the holiday spirit *cue laugh track*; and the fun thing with holiday themed clothing is that anyone can create their own, I recommend using the site CustomInk (http://www.customink.com/) for some great quality apparel using your designs. For those who haven't seen here is my Umbertaversary shirt design;

Umbertaversary "Kiss me Spidey" Shirt: CustomInk Umbertaversary

Memes: In today's society especially memes are just about anywhere and everywhere and therefore a good source of advertisement as it were for your special holiday, and since they are user created they can be placed anywhere without fear of copyrights and the like, here are some examples <3

Anyhow despite the above images probably not making much sense to you at first, one may become curious and wish to look further into this holiday you've created therefore hooking a bigger following for that special day of yours! :D

Holiday Videos or Songs: Now for those especially creative types, holiday videos and songs are the best way to create and further capture a holiday's essence and overall feel, make it catchy, and simple enough for anyone to pick up and follow along, there in lies the key to global holiday success!!

Now if you aren't very creative you can use Ecard site JibJab (http://www.jibjab.com/ecards?gclid=COHl6a-7uMgCFYoUHwodRW4Dsg) in order to paste your holiday-centric characters into a vibrant fun card, though there is a small monthly fee to use this service, but here are some examples to what you can create and share with the world!

Mr. and Mrs. Parker: http://www.jibjab.com/view/6fj0dtXRSl24RcohMUa_wQ

Now ignore the "Valentine's Day" at the end, unfortunately as highly praised as Jibjab is they still don't recognize Umbertaversary as a legit thing, even on the eve of it's 3rd coming. But here's another example in case you need one, here is one where we could include all the Umbertaversary cast!!

Umberta's Summer Fun: http://www.jibjab.com/view/SAwOTpqRSj2oz-Q_usdA2w

See this video actually contains the beach theme a more upbeat attitude which could undoubtedly bring in the younger audiences lol. In the end just have fun with it, if others see you having fun, they'll want to join in, and that is what will inevitably create holiday cheer! 

With that my dear readers I'd like to bring it to a close so that we can all enjoy an Uplifting Umbertaversary on this day of days! I'd love to hear any of your own created holidays so if you have any or come up with some in the near future feel free to share them with me and if they are interesting enough I may just add them to my calendar! S go forth, create some long lasting traditions and remember that October 10th is more than just the 10th day of the 10th month, it is the day Carlos became Umberta, and that is a big deal, especially because we choose to make it one, and in the end, isn't that what keeps the Holidays going on all these years? The meaning <3

Much Love & An Uplifting Umbertaversary to All,

Wachi