You do not need seven years of practice to host Maysgiving. You need a table, a meal, and a decision to show up for the people you love.
Here is how to start.
I Picked a Date in May
I schedule my Maysgiving on the fourth Thursday of May, just like we do for Thanksgiving. It marks the halfway point to Thanksgiving, and it gives the day the same kind of weight and intention. Put it on the calendar and let your family know! The act of scheduling it is itself part of the tradition. It says: this is happening. We are doing this.
Keep the Menu Simple the First Year
You do not have to cook everything from scratch to have a meaningful Maysgiving. A roast chicken works just as well as a turkey. Store-bought pie can absolutely sit next to homemade stuffing. The food is the vehicle, not the destination. Give yourself permission to start small.
Be Intentional at the Table
This is the piece that makes Maysgiving different from any other dinner. Take a few minutes before or during the meal to name what you are grateful for. You can keep it casual. Just go around the table. You can make it a whole thing if your family is into that. But say it out loud. That is what makes it Maysgiving instead of just dinner.
Invite Someone New Each Year
This is optional, but it has been one of my favorite parts of growing the tradition. Each year, consider inviting someone who might not have a big gathering to go to in May. Maysgiving has room for everybody.
Make It Yours
The best thing about Maysgiving is that there are no rules; well, at least my rules! The table belongs to you. Make the recipes yours. The traditions you build will be specific to your family, your kitchen, your people. Let it evolve. Let it surprise you.
If you want a full guide, a collection of tested recipes, and all the stories from seven years of doing this, The Maysgiving Table has everything you need.
Music has been part of Maysgiving from the beginning. Not background noise. Not a playlist you forget is on. Real, intentional music that sets the mood before the first dish is even started and carries the day through to the last bite of pie.
So it felt completely right that when I decided to fully celebrate Maysgiving this year, the music got its own release alongside the book.
I created two Maysgiving music albums: one with eleven songs and one with twelve. Together, they are the full sonic world of the tradition. Warm and nostalgic and rooted in the same things the book is rooted in: gratitude, togetherness, the beauty of an ordinary day made extraordinary.
Available on All Streaming Platforms
I write and produce all of my music under my artist name TheMelanieGrace. This music is a little different from some of my other releases. It is quieter. It breathes. It is built for the kitchen on a May morning, for the table, for the hour after dinner when everyone is still sitting there not quite ready to leave.
I collaborate with AI in my music production, and I credit my AI collaborator as Claude H. Becker, in honor of my late father. That feels right for Maysgiving, which is so much about legacy and the people who shaped who you are.
If you want to cook your way through The Maysgiving Table recipes with the right soundtrack, the albums are available wherever you stream music. And the book is available on Amazon in hardcover, paperback, and Kindle.
Put on the music. Make the food. Set the table. That is all there is to it.
When I set out to write a summer album, I knew I needed a title track that captured everything I wanted to say in three minutes – and “Summer State of Mind” became exactly that. It’s the first song on the album for a reason: it sets the tone for the entire journey ahead.
The Moment That Inspired It
Picture this: It’s a Friday afternoon, you clock out early, throw on your flip-flops, roll down the windows, and just drive. No plans, no stress, just sunshine and the promise of a weekend ahead. That feeling – that shift from work mode to summer mode – is where “Summer State of Mind” was born.
I wanted to capture that first-day-of-summer energy, when you trade your deadlines for paradise and everything just feels… lighter. Easier. Right.
What Makes This Song Special
“Summer State of Mind” is an upbeat, feel-good anthem that kicks off the album with pure summer optimism. The lyrics paint a picture of those perfect summer moments: grabbing limes and ice from the store, feet up by the pool, phone on silent, world feeling wide open.
The chorus is intentionally simple and singable: “I’m in a summer state of mind / Leaving all my worries behind.” Because that’s what summer is really about – not perfection, but presence. Being fully in the moment, soaking it all in, letting yourself just BE.
Why It Opens the Album
Every album needs a strong opener that tells you what you’re in for, and “Summer State of Mind” does exactly that. It’s upbeat without being overwhelming, relatable without being too specific, and optimistic without being cheesy. It welcomes you into the summer journey and says, “Hey, let’s do this together.”
The Vibe
Musically, this is bright acoustic pop with a breezy, poolside feel. Think acoustic guitar, light drums, walking bass line, and harmonies that make you want to sing along. It’s the kind of song you want playing when you’re driving to the beach, hosting a backyard BBQ, or just lying in a hammock with nowhere to be.
For the Playlist
If you’re making a summer 2026 playlist, this is your opening track. It’s perfect for:
Road trips to the beach
Pool party background music
Saturday morning coffee on the patio
Any moment when you need to shift into summer mode
This song reminds me why I love summer so much – and why I love California. Every time I listen to it, I’m transported back to that feeling of complete freedom and contentment. That’s the state of mind I want to live in all year long.
What puts YOU in a summer state of mind? Is it a specific place, a smell, a song, an activity? Drop a comment below and let me know! And don’t forget to follow me on your streaming platform so you catch all the new summer music coming your way!
Let me tell you about three dishes that have been on the Maysgiving table since the very beginning. These are not just recipes. They are the foundation of the tradition.
The Cranberry Sauce
Here is my hot take: canned cranberry sauce is perfectly fine and I will not apologize for it. I open the can, slice it, put it on the table, and nobody complains. Maysgiving is about the gathering, not the performance. Some things do not need to be homemade, and cranberry sauce is one of them.
The Stuffing
Every family has their stuffing, and this is ours. It is a classic base, but the details are what make it: the bread, the aromatics, the way everything comes together in the oven with just the right amount of crisp on top. My boys started helping with this one in year five, and now when they make it, I can taste the memory in it. That is what a good recipe does. It holds time.
The Gratitude Pie
This one needs a little explanation. In year two, I decided that our Maysgiving dessert needed a name with meaning. The Gratitude Pie is a simple, classic pie, nothing fussy, because the point is not to impress anyone with the technique. The point is that every year we make it together. Every year we sit with it. Every year it tastes like the exact right ending to the day.
The full recipes for all three are in The Maysgiving Table, along with all the stories behind them. If you want to bring any of these to your own table, the book is where to start.
There are blogs I write because they are timely. There are blogs I write because they are useful. And then there are blogs like this one, that I write because I simply have to.
This Mother’s Day, I am not writing about music in general. I am writing about one woman. My mom. The one who is still here, still strong, still the person I reach for when life gets loud. She has been widowed, she has carried things no one should have to carry alone, and she has done it with a grace that I am still learning from. This blog is for her.
And it turns out, so is a lot of my music.
What Songs Did I Write for My Mom?
When I started looking back across everything I have released this year and last, I realized that my mom shows up in more songs than I ever consciously planned. She is woven into albums about love, about home, about the holidays, about where I come from. She is in the DNA of this whole music project whether her name is in the credits or not.
But there are five songs that belong specifically to her. Five songs that I wrote directly from the experience of being her daughter, loving her, watching her, and being shaped by everything she is.
You Showed Up from Soundtrack of Your Life was one of the first songs I released this year, and in many ways it set the tone for everything that followed. It is about the people who do not just say they love you but prove it by being there. My mom is the original person in my life who showed up. Not just for the big moments, but for the ordinary ones, the hard ones, the ones that no one else would have noticed. This song is a thank you that words alone could never finish.
Still Loved from Through It All carries a different kind of weight. My mom has been widowed, and watching someone you love navigate the loss of a partner is one of the most humbling things a daughter can witness. She did not stop loving my dad when she lost him. She carried that love forward and built a life inside it. Still Loved is about exactly that. About love that does not end when circumstances change. About the kind of devotion that proves itself over decades, not just in the good years but in the years that ask everything of you.
Home from the Unbreakable Sky album is perhaps the most personal of all of them. Because home, for me, has always had my mom’s fingerprints on it. Not just the physical place, though that too. But the feeling of being somewhere safe. The feeling of being known. The feeling of walking into a room and being exactly the right person to be there. My mom created that feeling and I have been chasing it in every home I have tried to build since.
Where I’m From from my Thanksgiving album is about roots. About the people and places and traditions that made you who you are before you had any say in the matter. My mom is the biggest part of where I am from. Her faith, her strength, her way of loving people quietly and completely, all of that is in me. This song is my attempt to honor that lineage honestly, to say I know what I was given and I do not take it for granted.
And then there is Christmas at Mom’s from My Kind of Christmas, which might be the most joyful thing I have ever written. Because Christmas at my mom’s is its own kind of magic. The traditions she has kept alive, the way she makes a room feel like the best version of the season, the table she sets whether there are two people around it or twenty. That song exists because some things deserve to be sung about, and her Christmases are one of those things.
What My Mom Taught Me About Music
She may not know this, but my mom is one of the reasons I finally said yes to music in 2026.
Not because she pushed me. She is not that kind of mom. She is the kind who lets you find your own way and then tells you she knew you would get there. But watching her carry loss with strength and still show up for every person she loves with a full heart, that taught me something about not wasting the things you have been given.
I had songs in journals for years. I had melodies in voice memos that no one had ever heard. And somewhere in watching my mom live her life with that kind of quiet courage, I stopped having good reasons to keep them to myself.
Happy Mother’s Day
Mom, if you are reading this, I want you to know that five songs are not enough. I could write an entire catalog and still not fully say what you mean to me. But I will keep trying. That is what songwriters do.
Thank you for showing up. Thank you for staying strong. Thank you for being home.
I love you more than any song I have ever written. And that is saying something.
Happy Mother’s Day to my mom, and to every mother who is loved more deeply than words can hold.
