Our simple birthday traditons
This is the time of the year when most people are back into the swing of normal life after the holidays, but my family is still recovering. This month, we celebrated Three Kings’ Day, my birthday, my daughter’s birthday, and we have an upcoming joint birthday party for my two oldest kids. It is still a bit crazy around here.
Yesterday was my daughter’s 7th birthday, and so, of course, we needed to keep up with all of our birthday traditions. Birthdays are a big deal to me; it is the one day of the year that really is a time to just celebrate each child. That being said, it is important in our family to have traditions in place to make their birthdays feel extra special.
To start, we post signs around the house wishing them a happy birthday — just construction paper and markers, but it is a big deal to them. I overheard the kids talk in bed the night before my son’s birthday last summer about how excited they were to see signs around the house when they woke up. I also stick a couple of balloons on the chalkboard in the kitchen, which, of course, is also decorated for their birthday. Before we had a chalkboard, I would just hang up a birthday banner from the dollar store that I kept in the closet for birthdays.
For breakfast, we have the birthday treat of the kid’s choice, usually cupcakes and ice cream. Yes, we do ice cream for breakfast. I figure it will be one tradition that they will talk about for many years to come. It goes against everything in my whole-foods mentality, but it is a special day so we live it up.
The birthday child gets measured on our ruler growth chart, and then we fill out a birthday questionnaire. The questionnaire goes into their scrapbook, along with a letter from both my husband and I. Later this week, I will post more on the scrapbooks I keep for the kids.
They also get to choose dinner for the day, and when Carlos gets home, they can open their gift.
Over the weekend we started a new tradition: We took Eden out with just her dad and me. We did it the day before her birthday because we knew her siblings wouldn’t want to miss out on any birthday festivities. It ended up being a really nice time to focus on just her and to ask her some questions about her hopes for the next year. We let her choose a restaurant and took her out for lunch, but I really think any time alone would work well — ice cream, a hike, anything you are into.
It all seems rather simple but it makes a big impact on our kids. I love the simplicity; that is what makes it doable. Do you have any birthday traditions in your house? I would love to hear them!