New Year's Eve Toast for Family: 7 Examples

The short version: a family New Year's toast is short, early, and about one thing your family did this year. Do it while everyone is still at the table, which for many families means a countdown at nine o'clock or even noon, timed to midnight somewhere else in the world. Give the kids a job, keep the grandparents in it, and finish in under a minute. Seven short toasts for parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles, single parents, and blended families are below.

New Year's Eve with family is a different night from a party with friends. Nobody is dressed up. The youngest guest is three and the oldest is eighty-one. Half the table will be asleep before midnight, and at least one teenager is texting someone who is having a better time somewhere else. The toast has to work for all of them at once.

That's easier than it sounds, because a family toast doesn't need much. Everyone at the table lived the year together. You're not explaining it. You're pointing at one piece of it and raising a glass.

If you're hosting a mixed party of friends and family, the main New Year's Eve toast guide covers timing around the real midnight. This page is for the family night at home.

The early countdown

Plenty of families never make it to midnight, and they don't need to. The trick is that midnight arrives one time zone after another all through New Year's Eve, so whatever hour suits your bedtime, it's midnight somewhere.

Here's how it works in practice:

• Pick your hour first. Seven, eight, nine, whatever gets the kids to bed on time.
• Then find the place. Open a world clock on your phone and look for a city where it's midnight at that hour. If you're on the East Coast of the US, London hits midnight at 7 p.m. your time. If you're on the West Coast, New York hits it at 9 p.m. Wherever you live, a minute with the world clock will give you a city.
• Tell the kids where you're counting down with. "We're doing midnight with London" is a better story than "we're doing a pretend one." Small kids won't care either way. Older kids like knowing it's real.
• Or go to noon. Some families do a countdown at noon on December 31, which some people call Noon Year's Eve. It works well with toddlers and with grandparents who don't do evenings. It's the same toast, just with lunch.

Do the toast right before the countdown, at whatever time you picked. Then let whoever is still awake at real midnight do their own thing. The early one is the family toast. Midnight is a bonus.

Three generations at one table

When grandparents, parents, and kids are all at the same table, the toast has to land with all three. A few things make that work.

• Pick a detail everyone was there for. A move, a new baby, the summer the basement flooded. If only the adults get the reference, the kids tune out. If only the kids get it, the grandparents feel like guests.
• Keep it out of the past. The pull with three generations is toward "remember when you were little." One line of that is sweet. More than that, and the toast turns into a slideshow nobody asked for.
• Let the oldest person go first, if they want to. If a grandparent is hosting, it's their table. Ask them before dinner whether they'd like to say something. A lot of them would, and nobody thinks to ask.
• Grandparents who go to bed early should be at the real toast. That's the biggest reason to do the family toast early. If Grandma is asleep by ten, a toast at midnight is a toast she missed.

Teenagers who'd rather be elsewhere

You know who they are. They're at the table because they have to be, and they're watching a group chat light up with a party they're not at.

Don't fight it, and don't make them the subject of a joke. Two things work:

1. Give them a real job. Running the countdown on the TV, pouring the cider for the little ones, or picking the music. A job is a way to be part of the night without having to act excited about it.
2. Mention something they did, plainly. Got a license, made a team, got through a hard class. Say it in one sentence, without "we're so proud of you" in a voice that makes them want to leave the room. A teenager will forgive being mentioned. They won't forgive being performed at.

Then keep the toast short. The shorter it is, the more of it they'll actually hear.

Giving kids a job in the toast

Small kids don't want to listen to a toast. They want to do something. So build the toast around a thing they get to do.

• Cups up first. Kids raise their cups, then the grown-ups. It takes two seconds and every kid at the table will be watching for their cue.
• The countdown. Let the oldest kid lead it, or the loudest one.
• A noise at zero. Pots, a whistle, a bell, a lot of clapping. Pick one and tell them in advance.
• The last word. End the toast by handing a kid the final line. "And Lucia's going to tell us what we're toasting to." Brief her first, or be ready for anything.

Sparkling cider, juice, or milk in a real glass all count. Use the nice glasses for the kids if you can. They'll remember that more than anything you say.

The "one good thing" round

A lot of families skip the single toast and go around the table instead. Each person says one good thing from this year, sometimes one thing they're hoping for next year, and then everyone drinks.

It's a lovely tradition, and it goes better with a few rules:

• One thing each, one sentence. Otherwise the round takes forty minutes and the food goes cold.
• Kids go first. Their answers are short, they won't wait patiently, and they set the tone. "My good thing is the dog" is a perfect answer.
• Allow a pass. Somebody at the table had a bad year. "I'll pass, but I'm glad I'm here" has to be an acceptable answer, and the next person goes on without a pause.
• Nobody comments on anyone else's. No follow-up questions, no "and what about your job?" Just the next person.
• The host closes it. After the last person, one line from whoever is hosting, and glasses up.

If the year was hard for the whole family, the round can still work. It just helps to say at the start that small things count. "Good thing" doesn't have to mean a big one.

A shape that works

A family toast is the same shape as any short toast, just smaller.

1. Get them to stop. "Okay, everybody, cups up." At a family table you don't need to explain who you are.
2. One specific thing from this year. Something everyone at the table can see in their head. A thing, a place, a habit.
3. One line for next year. Small. "More of this" is enough.
4. The kids' job, then glasses up. The countdown, the noise, or the last word.

That's thirty to forty-five seconds, about 65 to 100 words. If you want to check yours, paste it into the speech length calculator.

What to leave out

• Grading anyone's year. Not the cousin who dropped out, not the uncle between jobs. Toast the family, not the scoreboard.
• Resolutions, yours or theirs. Nobody should be asked for one in front of the whole table.
• Announcements. If you have news, give it its own moment. A New Year's toast that turns into a pregnancy reveal leaves somebody at the table blindsided.
• Anyone who isn't there. If someone is missing for a hard reason, a single sentence for them is enough, and only if the family wants it said. For a toast that centers on a loss, the Christmas toast after a loss guide covers how to do it gently.

7 New Year's Eve toasts for family

Names are placeholders. Timings assume about 130 words a minute.

For a parent at a 9 p.m. countdown (about 30 seconds)

Okay, cups up. Kids first.

This year, the high chair went out to the curb. Nobody in this house needs it anymore, which I'm still getting used to. Wren, you started eating at the big table in March, and you've had opinions about every dinner since.

We're doing midnight with New York tonight, so we have two minutes. To the big table, and to all four of us at it.

Why it works: the high chair is a small, visible marker of the year that every kid at the table understands, and the kids get the first move.

For a grandparent hosting three generations (about 45 seconds)

Your grandfather and I will be asleep by ten, so this is our midnight. Pay attention.

For about twenty years, the back seat of our car was empty except for groceries. As of this spring, there are two car seats back there, and they don't come out. Your grandfather can buckle both of them in the dark now. He's very proud of that.

That's the year, as far as I'm concerned. Fuller car, same table.

Thank you all for coming here instead of somewhere livelier. Glasses up, cups too. To the back seat.

Why it works: the car seats say the family grew without listing anyone's news, and the early toast is framed as the real one.

For a sibling hosting everyone's kids (about 45 seconds)

Okay, cousins, look at me for one second.

Your parents are all here tonight because I said I'd watch you. There are nine of you, so everybody got a glow-stick bracelet, and I've been counting bracelets all night. I keep getting ten. Kojo, I know you're wearing two.

Here's the thing. Every one of you was at this house at least once this year, and every time, you found each other in about four seconds.

Next year, same house, same nine of you. Cups up. To the cousins. Now let's count down.

Why it works: the glow-stick bracelets are a funny, true detail from the host's evening, and they turn into a toast to all the cousins at once.

For a single parent and one kid (about 35 seconds)

Okay, it's just us, so I'll say it to you.

This was the year you got your own library card. You picked it out yourself, the one with the whale on it, and we went every Saturday after that. You checked out the same octopus book five times. The librarian knows us by name now.

That's my favorite part of this year. Next year, I want a lot more of those. Cups up, Pip. To the library card, and to you.

Why it works: at a table of two, the toast talks straight to the kid, and the library card stands for a whole year of weekends without having to say so.

For a blended family's first New Year's together (about 50 seconds)

Everybody, before the countdown, one minute.

This is our first New Year's Eve in one house. I don't think anyone at this table knew exactly how that was going to go, including me.

Here's what I've noticed. In January there were two neat rows of shoes by the front door, one for each family. Now there's one big pile, and I genuinely can't tell whose sneakers are whose. Everybody trips over it. Nobody fixes it.

I'm not going to fix it either. I like that pile.

Thank you all for being patient with each other this year. Cups up, everybody. To the pile by the door, and to all seven of us.

Why it works: the shoe pile is something the new household made by living together, so nobody gets sorted into whose kid is whose.

For a family doing a this year, next year round (about 45 seconds)

Okay, it's that time. Everyone grab a pencil and get under the table.

For anyone new tonight: every year we each write two things on the underside of this table. One good thing from this year, one thing we want next year. My mother started it when I was nine, and there's barely any bare wood left down there.

Last year Efua wrote, next year I want to learn to swim. Efua, you swam the whole length of the pool in July. I'm calling that one done.

Kids go first. One line each. Then glasses up.

Why it works: the writing under the table is a real record the whole family has kept, and the host only opens the round instead of taking it over.

For a parent with a teenager running the countdown (about 35 seconds)

Quick one, because Zuri is in charge of the countdown and she won't wait.

This was the year she learned to drive. Every Sunday since August, we've been in the church parking lot with four orange cones, and she has knocked over every single one at least once. Last Sunday, she didn't hit any.

That's my good thing from this year. Zuri, take it away. Cups up, everybody. To the orange cones.

Why it works: it mentions the teen's real accomplishment in one plain sentence, hands over a real job, and ends before anyone has to look embarrassed.

Delivering it

• Do it at the table. Not in the kitchen, not by the TV. Everyone sitting together is the whole point.
• Tell the kids their job before dinner. A kid who knows they're leading the countdown will sit through the toast just to get there.
• Keep your glass in your hand the whole time. It's the signal that the toast is almost over, which keeps the little ones in their seats.
• Let the countdown be loud. You don't need to say anything after it. Hug whoever's closest.

For a quick line instead of a full toast, the New Year's toast one-liners are short enough for any table. To hear how yours lands before the night, try it on The Room, or write one here around your own family's year.