A Word, Please: A year’s worth of holiday punctuation

Here comes another year full of holidays — some of them easy to write, others not so much (as anyone who’s wondered where to put the apostrophe in Presidents Day can attest). So as 2025 winds down, here’s how to write all the holidays to come in 2026.

New Year’s, New Year, new year. A new year in the generic sense isn’t capitalized. So you’d say, “Looking forward to seeing you in the new year.” But holidays are almost always proper nouns, so “happy New Year” gets a capital n and y (and note the lowercase h). When you’re making resolutions, that’s usually treated as possessive: a New Year’s resolution. New Year’s Day, New Year’s Eve. Treat these as distinct holiday names, with “Day” and “Eve” capitalized.

Martin Luther King Jr. Day. There’s no “Rev.” or “Dr.” in the holiday, which falls on the third Monday in January. And according to both the Associated Press Stylebook and the Chicago Manual of Style, you shouldn’t put commas around “Jr.”

Valentine’s Day. Put an apostrophe and an s after “Valentine” when you’re talking about the holiday, making it singular possessive. The word “valentine” is lowercase when you’re talking about your loved one or a card or gift for that person: He’s my valentine. I’m sending him a valentine. You can also call the holiday Saint Valentine’s Day.

Presidents Day. Every third Monday in February, people are baffled about how to punctuate Presidents. And for good reason: There are several correct ways to write this holiday name. AP style says no apostrophe: Presidents Day. Chicago style writes it as plural possessive, with the apostrophe after the s: Presidents’ Day. It’s also commonly called Washington’s Birthday. All of these are correct.

St. Patrick’s Day. There was just one St. Patrick, so this holiday, which falls on March 17, is singular possessive, meaning the apostrophe goes before the s.

April Fools’ Day. As you can surely attest, there’s more than one fool out there. This day is for all of them, so write it as plural possessive, with the apostrophe after the s: Fools’. If you’re using “fool” in a generic sense, for example if someone falls for a trick, you call them an April fool with a lowercase f.

Mother’s Day. In May, the logic of possessive and singular holidays breaks down completely. Even though the day is for all mothers, we write it as though it’s for just one: Mother. So the holiday is Mother’s Day.

Fourth of July, July Fourth, the Fourth. To follow the style of professional publishers, don’t use a numeral in this holiday name. Spell out Fourth when you write Fourth of July, July Fourth or the Fourth — all are correct. If you don’t care about editing style, there’s nothing wrong with writing July 4th or even 4th of July.

Veterans Day. If you’ve ever noticed that many news outlets use no apostrophe in “farmers market,” you have a basis for understanding why there’s no apostrophe in Veterans Day. The idea is that the words “farmers” and “veterans” are working more like adjectives in these terms than like true possessives. So just “Veterans Day” is the way to go.

Thanksgiving Day. Thanksgiving is one of the easier holidays to write. But “Thanksgiving Day” isn’t as clear. For the record, the word “Day” gets capitalized when you’re making it part of a holiday nickname. So: Thanksgiving Day.

Hanukkah, Chanukah. Both these spellings are correct, but Merriam-Webster’s dictionary says Hanukkah is more common and AP style prefers the H spelling as well.

Christmas Day, Christmas Eve. Just as we saw with Thanksgiving, the “Day” in “Christmas Day” gets capitalized, and the same logic applies to “Christmas Eve.” Xmas. Write Xmas with no hyphen. And don’t worry that this is in any way anti-religious. According to Garner’s Modern American Usage, “The X is not a Roman X but a Greek chi — the first letter in Christ’s name.” So this abbreviated holiday name in no way erases its namesake. If do you use it, note that you can use “a” or “an” in front of it, depending on how you believe Xmas is pronounced. If in your mind it sounds like eks-mas, you would write “an Xmas present.” But if you hear it as Christmas, you would write “a Xmas present.”

Spring, summer, fall, autumn, winter. Seasons are all lowercase, “I love the spring.”

June Casagrande is the author of “The Joy of Syntax: A Simple Guide to All the Grammar You Know You Should Know.” She can be reached at JuneTCN@aol.com.