High days and holidays - a life in celebration

Like her famous American namesake, Aucklander Jackie Kennedy knows how to dress for any occasion.

The Summerset Milldale resident loves to celebrate holidays, high days and holy days, dressing in costume and decorating according to theme. Her passion has been met with enthusiasm by her new community at the north Auckland village, which she moved to in May. The most recent event was Oktoberfest, and Jackie set to work decorating the temporary rec centre, ensuring fellow residents had something to wear that was in keeping with the theme, lending out hats and a dirndl (German lady’s folk dress) to those without costumes.

Living on a lifestyle block for 20 years, Jackie got used to hosting large gatherings. “We had a lot of big Christmas parties and would celebrate a lot of birthdays. My collection grew over time.”

Christmas looms large on Jackie’s calendar, and every year tends to have a different colour scheme, theme and style. Last year’s was blue and white, reminiscent of Disney’s Frozen, much to the utter delight of Jackie’s four-year-old granddaughter Willow. “I had decorated the living room to look like an icy grotto. She was enchanted!” laughs Jackie. “She has very high expectations now!”

Jackie is looking forward to bringing Halloween, her favourite holiday, to her village home, and is planning to decorate her home inside and out to get into the spooky spirit. Willow will be in attendance, along with grandchildren of the other residents coming to trick and treat. Jackie is clear she doesn’t want to force anyone to take part. “Residents don’t need to feel pressured to join in if they don’t want to,” says Jackie.

Unlike most people’s seasonal decorations, Jackie’s supplies aren’t stuffed willy-nilly in a box. She is meticulous with her organisation, down to the number of spools of ribbon, organza bows and placemats she has, keeping a thorough digital record.

“I make a lot of my own decorations, so I don’t want to duplicate items unnecessarily,” explains Jackie. “I get a lot of my inspiration from Pinterest, and I like to think how I can repurpose things. Having digital files lets me know what I have got, and where it is kept.”

This organisation served Jackie well when it came to downsizing, first from her lifestyle block to a five-bedroom home, and then to her 3-bedroom Milldale villa. “I had been thinking about retirement communities for a while, but every one I looked at had been apartments,” says Jackie. “I wanted a villa, a garage and space for my dogs. The sales staff here were lovely and I got a great feeling when I looked around the show home.”

Jackie has turned her garage into her costume department. “I have a lot of shelving in my garage for my decorations! It is three rows deep!” she laughs. “I use one of the bedrooms for my crafting room. It has excellent light so I can see what I am doing.”

As well as making decorations and repurposing costumes, Jackie also creates scrapbooks – gifts she gives to family members for milestone birthdays such as twenty-firsts. Diligent about photographing events, these are no simple photo albums but a compendium of themed pages, all intricately decorated, celebrating a life lived so far. Like her decorating filing system, Jackie has an ordered system in place, with each family member having a detailed photo file on the computer.

“It’s the planning of the events I enjoy most,” muses Jackie. “For things like Halloween I will start a couple months in advance, but for parties I will plan about 6 months out. I tend to shop throughout the year, although that is tricky with Christmas as that tends to be very seasonal. The real buzz I get is from seeing people’s reactions – the event itself is secondary.”

Fellow residents and staff appreciate her zeal and are keen to join in with the fun. “There’s a lot of awful things happening in the world,” Jackie reflects. “If this spreads a bit of happiness and makes people smile, then I am happy too.”

This is an article from the Summer 2024 edition of Summerset Scene magazine

Click here to read the full issue