Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year to You All from Our and Our Daughters’ Homes!
Here are three auspicious platters for you to view and welcome 2026.

On New Year’s Eve, Kashmiri families prepare an auspicious platter, thaal to welcome the New Year. The early morning of January 1, the mother of the family carries the thaal to each slumbering family member’s bed so that they can carefully view each item on the platter the first thing and awaken to the day. They look at the bowls of milk and yogurt, sugar and salt, fresh and dry fruit and flowers, and a meaningful book, a notebook, a writing tool, gold/money and a mirror. The items are placed over uncooked rice. Other items may include hot chili, pods of tamarind or similar items. At the end of the day each ingredient is transferred back to its container.

Rice symbolizes sustenance, and gold/money, abundance. The transformative process of milk turning into yogurt signifies the skill, method, duration and patience it requires for a task to bud, blossom and fructify. A wisdom book of your choice to read 2-3 pages every morning, for mental clarity, a notebook to dump in words useless narrative always floating in our heads. Fresh fruit and flower celebrate the fullness of life, dry fruit the passing of time. Sugar, salt, red pepper and other spices signify inevitable emotions that are experienced through the year. The mirror reminds us to look frequently at ourselves during the year to assess who we think we are, who we truly are. Have the judgement to note the things we can change and things we cannot. Then through the year courageously change what we can. 

Finally, collectively each item nudges us to cultivate generosity, gratitude, forgiveness, contentment, kindness, patience and self-understanding to experience physical and emotional wellbeing and joy.