Jessa Duggar has wormed her way into my cold, dead heart. How did she do this, you ask? With a simple YouTube video in which Jessa Duggar admitted she's "not an amazing hostess." During the video, she also opened up about her family's goals for 2020 and shared some genuinely helpful and laid-back advice on the art of hospitality.
The Counting On star is a busy mom of three children, 4-year-old son Spurgeon, 2-year-old son Henry, and 7-month-old daughter Ivy, all of whom she shares with husband Ben Seewald. While her children certainly keep her busy, as anyone who follows her on social media is well aware, she still wants to make time for adult social interaction.
As she explained in a new video on YouTube, Jessa and her family made being more hospitable a goal in 2019. This makes total sense, since most moms know that parenting with little ones can be a lonely business. Sure, you're already surrounded by little people who want you all the time, but there's something to be said for welcoming people into your home. Connecting with actual other adults, teaching your kids how to be hospitable and polite when people come over for a visit.
As Jessa explained in the video, she doesn't feel like she's an "amazing hostess" so she has set goals for her family to become more hospitable. After working on this over the past year, she had some pretty great advice to share with other people in the same boat, including setting realistic goals for your family. For instance, in her case, she likes to host people once a month because that's about as much as she can manage with her busy life. As far as cleaning her house goes, her feeling is that "people are there to visit you not your house."
Jessa also noted that she learned a great lesson from mom Michelle Duggar, who has 19 children herself. She recalled that her mother subscribed to the belief that having a little dust in the house didn't stop her from welcoming people into her home.
All of Jessa's advice for hosting boils down to the same thing: Be easy on yourself. If you don't have time to cook, order takeout. The meal is secondary to a more important goal of creating a community, as she wrote on Instagram: "Having people into our homes for a meal is a great way to foster community and get to know people on a deeper level."
Not only is Jessa giving herself a gift by welcoming other adults into her home, she's also modeling hosting skills her kids can watch. She's teaching them that your house doesn't have to be perfect and your meal doesn't have to be gourmet to make people want to come to your home. You just have to relax and let yourself enjoy the sense of community.
