How To Make Your Own Holidays And Use The Calendar In The Sims 4: Seasons

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In The Sims 4‘s Seasons expansion, the main highlight is undoubtedly the changing weather and seasons. However, another essential feature that has become hard to imagine without now is the customizable calendar with holiday options! Although this calendar was eventually incorporated into the standard game during the Cottage Living expansion, the holidays are still exclusive to the Seasons DLC at the moment.

In Seasons, I find myself greeted with four yearly celebrations that resemble real-world festivities: Love Day, Harvestfest, Winterfest, and New Year’s Eve. However, it’s not compulsory to celebrate only these events! I have the creative freedom to create custom holidays from scratch, or even modify or remove the pre-existing ones if I so choose.

In The Sims 4 game, the holiday system is relatively simple, with only five elements you can customize: the name of the holiday, its traditions, the decorative theme, its calendar icon, and whether your characters have a day off from work. You’re free to choose any mix of traditions (up to five per holiday), and there’s no requirement for your holidays to be logical or meaningful in any way. Let’s delve into the specifics now.

In this discussion, all topics will revolve around events occurring within The Sims 4’s calendar system. You can access it easily by pressing the calendar icon located at the bottom left corner of your screen, right beside your Sim family’s portrait row.

Editing holidays in The Sims 4

To modify an existing holiday, locate it on your calendar first and then tap on that specific date. On the left side of the screen, a summary of the holiday will be displayed. Clicking on the pencil icon will take you to the Edit Holiday page. Here, you can alter the icon by clicking the thumbnail at the top-left corner, change the theme and work status in the upper right corner, and the rest of the menu is dedicated to selecting traditions. If you don’t celebrate Christmas and prefer Winterfest to have a different feel, for instance, you could replace the Festive Spirit tradition with Lighting a Menorah or Lighting a Kinara activities instead. You can also customize it in various ways or simply remove it altogether.

Making new holidays in The Sims 4

Creating an entirely fresh holiday isn’t much unlike tweaking an existing one, except that you begin from zero instead of adjusting something already set up. To get started, you should look at the calendar and choose a day which doesn’t currently have any holidays assigned (each day can only have one holiday). Underneath your family’s work schedule for that particular day (if applicable), you will find an option to add a new holiday – simply click on the ‘+’ button there to initiate creating your custom holiday.

If you’re the type who enjoys expanding the list of holidays in your calendar, remember to exercise caution during the process. It might be tempting to create numerous days off for work and school, but it’s important to consider the potential drawbacks. While the thought of a sim having a perpetual payday without working due to constant bank holidays sounds appealing, they won’t have opportunities for promotions or salary increases in this scenario. Additionally, if your teenage sims are frequently absent from school, they may struggle academically and lack practical skills.

Those other holidays

Apart from the four predetermined holidays, Seasons also offers a collection of smaller, unique celebrations, each with its own tradition. These special days appear spontaneously, similar to Talk Like a Pirate Day or Prank Day. However, these holidays are not fixed on the calendar; instead, they’re introduced when the game decides it’s time for them. Once announced, The Sims 4 will alert you that one is approaching soon. Unfortunately, you can’t modify these types of holidays or create new ones with similar functionality in the game.

Other things you can do with the calendar

In The Sims 4, typically a year consists of just 28 days, with each quarter representing a unique season. However, if you tinker with the game settings within the Environment section, you can adjust the length of the seasons to either 14 or 28 days, thereby extending the duration of a yearfor example, with 28-day seasons, a year would stretch out to an immersive 112 days.

Beyond creating daily celebrations, you can also pre-plan and schedule social activities on your calendar, even up to a year ahead. This allows you to arrange a bar visit for your character’s birthday, or any other desired event. Unfortunately, at this time, it’s not possible to set up recurring events like a weekly bowling night. Each event must be created separately.

Sims 4 holiday traditions

You have the freedom to pick and mix your own unique holiday traditions as you go along. The layout of the holiday menu might make it seem like there aren’t many options, but in reality, you’ll find over forty traditions to choose from! Many of these are based on real holidays, while some are fun and quirky creations like Festivus from Seinfeld. Scroll down below to explore them all.

  • Air Grievances: Select other sims and use mean social interactions.
  • Appreciate an Object: Click on objects and use the “Appreciate” interaction.
  • Art & Music Spirit: Create art using skills like painting, dancing, playing instruments, or singing.
  • Attend Holiday Ceremony: Attend a holiday ceremony via phone.
  • Baking: Bake using a stove.
  • Bar-B-Que: Cook using a grill.
  • Cleaning: Clean up by picking up trash, washing dishes, and mopping puddles.
  • Countdown to Midnight: Watch the Countdown to Midnight on a TV after 11:00 PM.
  • Decorate: Place holiday decorations from Build/Buy mode or use the Attic Stack Decoration Box.
  • Drinking: Drink from a Bar, Drink Stand, or Fridge.
  • Egg Hunt: Search objects in the world using the “Hunt for Egg” interaction.
  • Exercise: Perform workout activities.
  • Fasting: Don’t eat for six hours.
  • Festive Spirit: Use festive socials like “Light the Holiday Tree,” “Ask if Good or Bad,” or “Belly Laugh.”
  • Fighting: Fight other sims.
  • Fire: Interact with fire by lighting a bonfire, campfire, fireplace, or leaf pile.
  • Fireworks: Buy and light fireworks.
  • Flower Bunny: Perform friendly interactions with the Flower Bunny, who will visit your home.
  • Give Flowers: Gift another sim any flower.
  • Give Gifts: Gift another sim any object from your inventory.
  • Games: Play video games, board games, or chess.
  • Gardening: Use gardening interactions.
  • Go on a Date: Take another sim on a date.
  • Go on a Vacation or Travel: Visit a commercial venue or use the “Take a Vacation” interaction on their phone.
  • Grand Meal: Cook a Grand Meal and then call other sims to eat it.
  • Holiday Gnomes: Interact with the creepy gnomes by appeasing them with gifts.
  • Invite Guests: Invite at least two sims to their lot and socialize with them.
  • Light Kinara: Light a Kinara.
  • Light Menorah: Light a Menorah.
  • Make Resolution: Choose a resolution and complete it within seven days.
  • Mischief Spirit: Perform mischievous social interactions.
  • Open Presents: Open presents from a gift pile.
  • Party Spirit: Dance, drink, sing, flirt, joke, or play instruments.
  • Romantic Spirit: Use romantic interactions.
  • Polar Bear Plunge: Swim outside while it’s cold.
  • Remembrance: Interact with an urn or gravestone, or talk to a ghost.
  • Spooky Spirit: Interact with occult sims, carve pumpkins, or play spooky music on a pipe organ.
  • Sports TV: Watch sports on TV.
  • Streaking: Go streaking.
  • Tell Stories: Tell stories around a campfire or read books to toddlers.
  • Thankful Spirit: Use the “Be Thankful” interaction with another sim.
  • Trick or Treat: Use the “Trick or Treat” interaction with visiting children.
  • Watch Romantic TV: Watch the romance channel on a TV.
  • Water Fun: Interact with a pool, kiddie pool, sprinkler, or water balloon bucket.
  • Wear Costumes: Wear one of several mascot costumes.

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2025-06-03 19:10