This weekend, we will celebrate my daughter's first birthday with our families. My husband has a very large nuclear family so there will be 40 people celebrating our girl! I'm a bit overwhelmed with preparations and yet excited to honor the beautiful life of my daughter. I have been so moved by your posts- hungry too! I can't wait to try some of these delicious meals. I will include my beef stew recipe soon... yum... wait for it... wait for it....
This week's question is a bit of an odd one... and suits my current frame of mind. Let's talk birthdays... what do you do for your kids? I have a lot of friends who do things differently- some have big parties every year... some have only kid parties... some go all out with decor... some have a party every 3 years... some just have one friend and a fun-day.... I'm curious as to what birthdays look like in your home.
I know that some of you have kids that are no longer 1 year olds so I'm definitely interested in what you've done as they've gotten older. I mean, how often do you get to really reflect on a practice that most people take for granted?
Because I'm not the "party planner" type, this party for Gemma is taking a lot out of me, mentally. I really want to enjoy the time with my girl, watch her face light up as she eats pumpkin cake for the first time, and hear her laugh as she crawls through leaf piles. I am hoping to avoid being concerned with everyone else- except, I am the host... so... I suppose I HAVE to be concerned with everyone else.
I know that a first birthday is for the adults more than the birthday child (she won't remember) but I would really like to soak it in with her. I'll post pictures next week! In the meantime- I look forward to hearing all about what has worked, tricks and great input about birthdays in your home.
and while you post wonderful stories/ideas/input about birthday and celebrating the life of your babies, I'll be mentally preparing for a whole-lotta people up in my house! Here we go...
Love you mamas!
Sarah
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Well, my babies are just 9 months old, so we haven't had a birthday yet. But I'm already thinking about what we should do. Our dilemma is that A) all our family live outside of Minnesota, B) their birthday is in December and last year when they were born there was already 12+ inches of snow on the ground (no one in our family likes to travel in the snow), C) their birthday is so close to Christmas. Boo!
ReplyDeleteI'm going to plan a BIG party anyway. I love these babies and need to celebrate their first year of life. I'm not sure how many people can fit into my tiny little house, but I'm sure if everyone who we love can come, it'll be close to 40. And who cares if it's close to Christmas? They deserve a party! They already have to share their birthday with each other - just hope people don't think they can share their birthday with Christmas, too. (They were born Dec. 5 - so it's not like it's SO close to Christmas, but still. You know how people are with December birthdays).
One thing I will remind everyone celebrating a first birthday this year - Lunds & Byerly's (as well as Kowalski's) gives a FREEEEEE small round cake to the birthday baby! You might need to show a birth certificate, but there's no other purchase required.
We started out having the monster parties with a tone of people. Our oldest was the first grandchild on both sides of the family, there was some obligation. Slowly, however, those parties became no fun. We became the family that had a small (just the five of us) family celebration at a restaurant of the birthday child's choice and a small kid party for their friends. I found this to be so much less stressful and frankly more enjoyable for our kids. My mantra over the years as become "less is more", enjoy those moments with just the small family, these are the things our kids will remember.
ReplyDeleteMy kids are 7 and 4 and we have yet to have a friend party. I work with kids all day long and the though of having to bring them into my house and planning a probably really expensive party does not appeal to me. We have however always had a party for my kiddos. The parties have themes and I have recently started making hand made birthday banners to hang. It is so fun for them to go shopping for party favors and pick out their cake (FYI a Harley Davidson party is a hard one to plan)I also allow my kids to pick their dinner menu on their actual birthday. Last year Gabe picked Pancakes with Strawberries and Red Jello. It is a great memory to think back on the the crazy meals we ate for their birthdays. Anna chose her staple Chicken and French Fries (from McDonalds)
ReplyDeleteI have a feeling that I will no longer get away with doing small parties for Gabe and will have to give in to the friend party, but if we do it will be small with no giant bouncy house or spendy outing. I love to see how excited by kids get about the little things! It gives me great joy to celebrate their special day and I think the details are what they remember.
Sarah, best of luck on your party and enjoy Gemma's special day.
A woman I work with gives her kids the option of having a party at home with friends (the same number as how old they are) OR doing something special with 1 or 2 friends (Twins game, hotel stay, etc).
ReplyDeleteSo far we do big parties and I just LOVE to decorate! I am thinking when they start school we might follow my friends lead.
From Annie... who was having trouble posting!
ReplyDeleteHappy Birthday little Gemma!!! I'm so with you Sarah-I love the idea of celebrating but the idea of planning, preparing, hosting-uggghh! And all of those decorations, appetizers, cake and frosting can't come close to displaying the sheer joy in your heart that comes from celebrating your little 1 year old. So what I'll say, is that Gemma will never turn 1 again. She won't remember it, but YOU will. And everyone else??? All they care about is getting to buy the cutest outfit or toy for her to open. So throw the food on the counter, tape up a balloon or two and then, revel in your little nugget of joy and cherish that she is as little and young as she ever will be again today and on her birthday. Smell her little baby head, soak up her soggy kisses, nuzzle her chubby neck. Make her birthday about your love for her-what better gift than that?
And for me-well, I was so nervous on Ryker's birthday. Our gift to him was a t-shirt that said "Big Brother"-and along with that the announcement to our families of Lincoln-on-the-way! I wish I remembered it better..*sigh*. I want to go wake up my babies right now and nuzzle them and not let them get a day older.
Jen here... it's been awhile but I need a fun break!!
ReplyDeleteBirthdays were a pretty big deal for me growing up. My folks always went all out with crazy themes, bringing in characters, magicians, puppeteers, etc. We always did a small family only thing in addition to the big kids party. Birthdays weren't such a huge deal for TR growing up... he still doesn't want much of a celebration. I think for our family, we've found ourselves somewhere in the middle.
For Everett's 1st birthday we were moving away from all our friends in Nashville so it ended up sort of doubling as a going away party. We invited a lot of our friends and neighbors (both with and without kids). The "theme" was music since he loved all kinds of music, instruments, etc. We had a guitar cake for the guests and a drum for him. I had his baby book out and a couple display boards with monthly and holiday pics. We had some appetizers out. Other than that it was just come over and play for a couple hours. On his actual day we got together with TR's family and had cake and he opened some presents.
For his 2nd birthday we had a party at our house with our new Va Beach friends. The "theme" was sports since Everett is obsessed with all of them and I had a friend do a cake with a football, soccer ball, basketball, etc. I got some balloons, and hung up a few inflatable sports balls. It was a nice enough day that the kids just played outside for awhile and then we had cake. Then we had like 3 other mini-celebrations... 1 on his actual day, 1 with TR's folks and 1 with my folks. It's hard living away from family but I don't think E minded since he got to blow out candles and have dessert 4 times!
With both parties we put "no gifts please" on the invites. He just didn't need all that stuff, we weren't going to spend time during the party opening and I didn't want people to feel obligated to bring something. Of course a few people still did both years but overall it worked out well for us.
I'm not sure what we'll do going forward. I always have a tough time deciding who to include so I usually opt for a larger, more casual thing when planning events!
Thanks for posting all those pics of Gemma as a 1-year-old!
ReplyDeleteBirthdays. I love kids birthdays, the decorating, the excitement, the cake. We usually do something fun together with the kids - Sam's 4th we took him to ride go-carts, he loves cars. Elin's 2nd we took her to the "rock star" area of the kids museum here in Denver. She loves to sing and dance.
We also have a family party. It is smallish - Brent and I each only have one brother. I decorate, cook their favorite meal, buy them a cake and a princess hat (or Lightning McQueen shirt) to wear. And it is so fun with the families, who thankfully live close (except my brother in CA) and get along great. The grandmas and aunt help by making some side dishes and cleaning up, too. It's a great time.
We started "friend parties" with Sam at 3. I don't love to have them at my house (cleanup reasons). Sam's parties have been at a cool park by our house, a little kid "gym" with lots of inflatable jumping and playing equipment, and for his 5th he has decided that he would like it at our community pool... and his birthday's not until May! He's already planning the guest list... Apparently he likes party planning like his Mama.