Virtuous English AcademyHolidays & Celebrations — A2 English Vocabulary
This A2 vocabulary list gathers 30 elementary English words about holidays & celebrations — festivals, parties and special days. Every word comes with a simple definition, its British-English pronunciation and a natural example sentence, so you learn each one in real context. When you are ready, open the flashcards to practise and remember them for good.
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Using holidays & celebrations words in English
Celebration vocabulary is mostly fixed phrases, and fixed phrases are unforgiving — Happy birthday takes no article, congratulate takes on, and the preposition in front of a festival depends on whether it lasts one day or several. The other thing worth sorting out early is wedding against marriage, because one is an event you attend and the other is a state that lasts for years.
What to watch out for
A wedding is the day; a marriage is the years
You go to a wedding — the ceremony and the party. A marriage is the relationship that follows: a long and happy marriage. The verb is get married, and the preposition is to, not with: She got married to an architect. Marry on its own takes no preposition at all: He married her in June.
Celebrate takes a direct object; congratulate takes on
Say We celebrated her birthday, never celebrated to or celebrated for. But congratulate needs a person and then on: I congratulated him on his exam results. The exclamation Congratulations! is always plural with an s. And Happy birthday, Merry Christmas and Happy anniversary all take no article whatsoever.
On a day, at a season, in a month
Single days take on: on my birthday, on our anniversary, on New Year’s Day. Multi-day festivals take at in British English: at Christmas, at Easter. Months take in. Also useful: a present and a gift mean the same thing, but present is the everyday British word and gift is slightly more formal — a gift shop sells presents.
Words learners mix up
Three tables: four words for the thing being held, the two roles everybody at it takes, and the objects that only ever appear in the plural.
What kind of thing is it?
| Word | What it actually means | In a sentence |
|---|---|---|
| ceremony | A formal set of actions done in a fixed order — a wedding, a graduation, an opening. | The ceremony lasted half an hour. |
| event | Any organised happening, of any size. The broadest of the four, and the one used in advertising. | It is the biggest event of the year. |
| occasion | A particular time when something happens, usually a special one: a special occasion. | Save that dress for a special occasion. |
| festival | A yearly cultural or religious celebration, and also a weekend of music in a field. | The village festival is in June. |
The frequent error is using occasion where English wants opportunity: I had the occasion to visit Paris should be the opportunity. Note also the fixed phrase on this occasion, meaning this particular time, and on occasion, without the article, which means occasionally — the same word doing two different jobs a single letter apart.
Who is who at the party
| Word | What it actually means | In a sentence |
|---|---|---|
| host | The person giving the party. Noun and verb: they hosted the whole family. A woman may be a hostess. | Our host met us at the door. |
| guest | Anybody invited. Countable, and the word covers hotels too, where you are also a guest. | There were sixty guests at the wedding. |
| invitation | The card or message asking you to come. Takes to for the event: an invitation to the wedding. | I got an invitation yesterday. |
| toast | A short speech before everyone drinks. The phrase is fixed: propose a toast, drink a toast to. | Her father made a lovely toast. |
The verb after invitation is accept or, if you cannot go, turn down — refuse an invitation is grammatical but sounds cold. Toast is the same word as the bread, which is uncountable, so a toast is always the speech and never breakfast. British weddings expect toasts from the father of the bride and the best man, in that order.
Things that come in plurals
| Word | What it actually means | In a sentence |
|---|---|---|
| fireworks | Almost always plural. One is a firework, and the show is a firework display, with the singular. | We watched the fireworks from the bridge. |
| decoration | Countable and normally plural for the things you hang up: put up the decorations. | The decorations go up on the first of December. |
| candle | Countable, and on a cake there is one for each year. You light them and blow them out. | She blew out all eight candles. |
| balloon | Countable. The verb for filling one is blow up, which is also the verb for an explosion. | The children blew up the balloons. |
Two of these carry an unexpected second sense: decoration in the singular can mean a medal for bravery, and fireworks is used figuratively for a furious argument — there were fireworks at the meeting. Note that the verb for setting fireworks off in British English is let off, not fire or throw.
Collocations that sound natural
Celebrations run on set phrases more than almost any other topic, because everybody says the same thing at the same moment. These are the exact forms, including where the article disappears.
birthday
Happy birthday!a birthday partyon my birthdaya birthday card
The greeting takes no article and no verb — Happy birthday, never a happy birthday to you outside the song. In Britain a card is expected at least as much as a present.
present
give someone a presentopen your presentswrap a presenta birthday present
You open presents rather than unwrap them, and the giving verb takes two objects with no preposition: I gave her a present.
invitation
send an invitationaccept an invitationturn down an invitationa wedding invitation
British wedding invitations ask you to RSVP, from the French, meaning reply either way. Failing to answer at all is the one thing that genuinely causes offence.
fireworks
a firework displaylet off fireworkswatch the fireworksa fireworks night
The British date is 5 November, Bonfire Night, when almost every town holds a display. The verb let off is the standard one and cannot be replaced by open or make.
candle
light a candleblow out the candlescandles on the cakea scented candle
You light a candle and blow it out, and on a birthday cake the whole room waits for the second one. Put out works too but sounds like a fire.
tradition
a family traditionan old traditionkeep a tradition aliveIt is a tradition to…
The adjective is traditional, and the frame it is a tradition to plus a verb is the natural way to explain your own country’s customs to somebody.
Where each word belongs
Six words with a British habit attached — one of them the single most useful informal word on this page, and one a word you almost certainly know with a different meaning.
- cheersBritish · three jobsRaising a glass, but also thank you and goodbye in informal British English: Cheers, see you Monday. It is friendly and casual, never formal, and it is one of the fastest ways to sound at home in Britain.
- costumeBritish · not what you expectFor a party, British English says fancy dress — a fancy dress party — and costume belongs to theatre and film. On top of that, a British swimming costume is a swimsuit, which is the sense you are most likely to meet first.
- nationalAdjective · in fixed namesIt lives inside set phrases: a national holiday, the national anthem, national dress. Britain calls its public holidays bank holidays, which is the word on every calendar and in every shop window.
- feastWritten · or jokingA very large special meal. In modern English it appears in historical writing, in religious names such as a feast day, or humorously about an ordinary dinner. What people actually say is a big meal or a spread.
- midnightNo articleTwelve at night, and it takes no article after at: at midnight, never at the midnight. Midday works the same way. In Britain the New Year is counted in at midnight with Auld Lang Syne.
- champagnePronunciation · French spellingSay sham-PAYN, with the stress at the end and no hard ch. Strictly it comes only from the Champagne region; anything else is sparkling wine or prosecco, and British shops label them carefully.
Sentences to try
Four frames with the fixed prepositions in place. Change the events to ones you have actually been to.
- We are going to my cousin’s wedding in July.
- I got a lovely present on my birthday.
- They celebrate the festival with fireworks every year.
- Thank you for the invitation — we would love to come.
Questions about holidays & celebrations vocabulary
What is the difference between a wedding and a marriage?
A wedding is the single-day event: the ceremony, the guests, the food. A marriage is the long-term relationship that begins there, which is why you can say a thirty-year marriage but not a thirty-year wedding. The verb phrase is get married, and the person you marry takes to, not with: He got married to his neighbour. Note that marry used directly needs no preposition at all: She married him.
Do I say "at Christmas" or "on Christmas"?
British English says at Christmas when it means the whole holiday period of several days: We always go home at Christmas. Use on only for the specific single day: on Christmas Day, on Christmas Eve. The same pattern applies to at Easter and at the weekend, which is another British preposition Americans replace with on. For birthdays, which are always one day, it is on my birthday.
Is it "present" or "gift"?
They mean the same thing and both are correct. Present is the ordinary British word you would use in speech: a birthday present, Did you open your presents? Gift is slightly more formal and appears more in writing, in shops and in set phrases — a gift shop, a gift card, a wedding gift list. There is also a completely separate meaning of gift as natural talent: She has a gift for languages.