Happy New Year! I awoke to a wonderful, appropriate new word in my inbox (from dictionary.com):

First-foot

1. the first person to cross the threshold of a house on New Year’s Day.
2. the first person met after starting out on the day of an important occasion.

Quote:

Custom held that the most fortunate “firstfoot” on a Hogmanay was a tall and handsome dark-haired man; to welcome one as the first visitor across the threshold after midnight brought good fortune to the house for the coming year. — Diana Gabaldon, The Fiery Cross

Origin   First-foot is a compound of the adjective first and the noun foot. It entered English in the late 1700s.