What Are Your Family Birthday Traditions?
Growing up, my two brothers and I hung out with the Stantons, a family of eight down the block, who did the coolest things for birthdays…
Their mom, Heather, always welcomed my brothers and me into their bustling home with a huge smile and a “Come on in!” She was also the epitome of the ’90s granola mom. Whenever we stopped by, she was always whipping up a concoction: loaves of homemade wheat bread, jars of oat milk, or long strips of fruit leather. We knew we’d never find Lays, Oreos, or Goldfish on their kitchen counter.
There was just one exception: birthday cereal.
On each kid’s birthday, Mr. and Mrs. Stanton would drive the birthday boy or girl to the grocery store, where they got the honor of choosing whatever cereal they wanted. Fruit Loops, Cap’n Crunch, Cookie Crisp, Fruity Pebbles, you name it. Then they’d bring it home to share with their very excited siblings.
When I learned about this tradition as a kid, I thought it was the most special and thrilling way to be celebrated.
Ella with pan dulce on her first and fifth birthdays.
So, 20 years later, when I was planning my first daughter Ella’s first birthday party, I decided to create our own tradition. Instead of singing to her over cake, we plopped her first birthday candle into a bright pink concha, a Mexican sweet bread, then surprised our guests with a spread of pan dulce, or Mexican pastries. Everyone was psyched, and enjoying the leftovers with hot coffee the next morning felt like the best reward after hosting a children’s party. Since then, we’ve served pan dulce at all Ella’s parties, and she looks forward to it every year.
Another fun family birthday tradition? Photo garlands! Photographer Alex Steele makes these for her kids on their 10th birthdays. “When each of my daughters turned 10, I printed out a bunch of photos, attached them to ribbons, and hung them all over the house,” she told me. “Watching them wake up and walk out to find their faces everywhere is one of my favorite memories. Now I plan to do the same thing for my boys’ 10th birthdays.”
How cute is that? I’d love to save this idea for when my kids each turn 21 and cut out baby, toddler, school-aged, tween, and teenager photos of them. Sob!
Now, your turn: does your family have special ways of celebrating birthdays? Maybe it’s going to the same restaurant, or having the birthday kid wear a crown? I want to know!
P.S. A cool birthday present for kids, and 12 readers share their favorite birthday celebrations.
(Photo by Vradiy Art/Stocksy.)
Comments
104 commentsMy dad brought a birthday cake to the hospital when he came to meet my daughter for the first time. Now a “birth-day cake” has become a tradition for all babies born in our family.
Twin boys, now in their 20s. We sing the 3 Stooges version of the Happy Birthday song. My husband’s family has been singing it for years. We don’t do regular birthday cake. We have “birthday breakfast cake” which is Ina Garten’s sour cream coffee cake. That with a big glass of milk is a great way to start the day!
Does the Birthday Fairy visit anyone else’s family? It’s a tradition that at least been practiced by my great-grandmother, if not farther back in time, and one that I will start with my own daughter for her first birthday on Monday (!) — the Birthday Fairy visits the night before your birthday and hides your presents all around the house. She writes a letter to you describing the hiding places for you to find your gifts (“There is a gift from your grandparents in the place where we keep the flour” (the pantry)). Then you go on a scavenger hunt all over the house, looking for presents. Oh! And the letter notes any generous or particularly virtuous achievements of the past year, and how proud she is of you. She visits every year until you turn 13, in a rare modern marking of coming-of-age. Feel free to “call” her over to your house!
We have a few traditions, including birthday cereal! We decorate or fireplace with our favorite pictures of the birthday kid, hang a happy birthday sign and put up decorations the night before. Let the birthday kid pick dinner and dessert (sometimes cake, sometimes not) on their birthday. And as our kids have gotten older there’s a newer addition- fancy dinner out: each of our kids shares their birthday week with a parent, so whichever twosome is celebrating gets to choose the restaurant for a favorite meal out during their birthday week.
I put a candle in something unconventional every year. Highlights have been ramen, a milkshake, and a hotdog. 9 times out of 10, I get the MOST delighted reaction from the restaurant workers too – spread the whimsy and joy!
These are so fun! We have 10-year old twins. I always leave confetti on the ground, from each of their rooms to our dining table, where there are balloons and donuts that spell out each kids’ name (the donuts are letter-shaped). They love it and look forward to waking up to that confetti trail each birthday. We leave the confetti out for a day and then when their birthday is over, they have to clean it up. LOLLL
When my son turned 4, I made him the sewing machine bday cake from the Bluey episode/ Australian Women’s Weekly Children’s Birthday Cake cookbook. I am not sure he even knew what a sewing machine was, but that is what he requested. I am not a baker or a cake decorator by any stretch but it turned out great! Since then I have made both kids their requested bday cakes – Duck cake, unicorn, dinosaurs.. the ideas are getting more extreme, a Sloth, A Spiderman Donkey, A Kitty Mermaid but its really fun to try and figure it out. As a kid, we used to have the guests hide their gifts then the birthday girl had to unwrap them in the order she found them. The last one had to be unwrapped with your teeth! It was hilarious, a great way to fill some time, and over the years people caught on and started using a LOT of tape.
I am about to turn 37, and every single birthday, whether we’ve been together or apart, my mom has told me (via phone or in person) “goodnight for the last time as a X year old” the night before my birthday. I thought this was something only I had come to cherish so deeply, but a couple years ago one of my brothers said he felt lost one year that my mom wasn’t able to call. My husband now says it to me each year and we’ve started saying it to our own daughters, who just turned 1 and 3.
My mother in law sewed a truly breathtaking burlap and fabric “Happy Birthday” bunting for my now 14 year old son’s first birthday. We hang it up for every family’s birthday. For the last 5-ish years, I’ve asked my kids for a self portrait for my bday gift. I have them saved, and know I will treasure them forever. Pretty sure I got the idea from CoJ! xoxo
As the least crafty person ever, I would love to have more specific instructions for the photo garlands. Do you just print a black and white version of the photo on a home printer, cut it out, and tape it to a ribbon? Any other tips for making it look good (besides being a good photographer!) ?
I make a photo bunting similar to this and I use canva, I place my photos on the page with the faces the ame size (maybe 6 to a page), turn then black and white using a filter, and then select the background eraser setting. Then I don’t have to cutout the face with my scissors, I can just make circles. I used sticky tape to attach to toothpicks and put them in the party food. I love using angry faces and sad faces too, to show all their sides and emotions!
We always put up colorful bunting around and above the dining table the night before – I’ll even bring bunting along if we’re traveling on a birthday. In my family we would always get woken up with birthday cake, so my family still does that for me. But for the kids we’ll put candles in pancakes or doughnuts or French toast depending on what they’ve asked for. Then the birthday kid gets to choose what they’re eating for every meal and we have cake of course. And at dinner we go around the table and everyone says what they love most about the birthday kid.
We’ve always done the “choose your own dinner + cake” for our kids plus “party porridge or party pancakes” which is essentially just those breakfast foods with sprinkles on them. The gifts are always on our coffee table and covered in the balloons I’ve forced my husband to blow up at all hours of the night when I’ve remembered. But my favorite tradition we have started is collating our funniest photos and videos from the birthday child into a folder on our phone and at the end of the night before bedtime, we squeeze on the couch and cast the images and videos to the TV and laugh our heads off remembering all the funny moments captured since they were a baby. I love birthday season!
So many balloons!!!! A few dozen regular latex balloons plus the jumbo sized mylar number balloon for our son. Now that he is double digits he gets two number balloons. I also hang up the same ‘HAPPY BIRTHDAY’ banner every year and red stars. They’re old school party decorations that I’ve had forever and I stash them away and reuse them every year. I also take a video recording of him. I ask him a few interview style questions and that way I have a small keepsake of his face and his voice. Sob!!!! :)
We wash a quarter and hide it in the birthday dessert (kind of like the baby in a king cake). My mom did this with us when I was a kid, too. She didn’t tell me, until my kids were 8 and 9, that she had always managed the presentation to make sure the birthday child got the quarter in their slice. It has gotten a bit absurd now that the kids are older, and know what’s up. Apparently I’m not as sneaky as my mom was, and don’t manage the presentation as well. No one is surprised; I think I could present them with the quarter on a separate plate at this point. But it’s fun and I almost like it more that they expect it.
Since our university years (so 15-20 years ago) my best friend and I have breakfast or morning coffee together on our birthdays. Not on a convenient weekend day, but on the day off. The logistics have become harder since starting jobs and having kids, but we manage to make it work 95% of the time. And honestly, the effort makes it even more special. It might just be a slice of toast and a coffee in our kitchen, but it shows that we’re a priority to one another and that it the best way to start the day! We’ve also started (stolen) a family tradition since having a kid. In the Netherlands, where I live, we eat ‘beschuit met muisjes’ to celebrate births. A friend of mine grew up eating ‘beschuit met muisjes’ every single birthday because it is, after all, a celebration of a birth. They’re a sort of toast with sugary aniseed sprinkles in pink/blue and white. Not something we eat very often but another great addition to the start of the day. My birthday is coming up in two weeks and writing this really makes me look forward to it!
Every year I ask my kids to draw a portrait of themselves for me for my birthday.
The kids get to choose their favorite meals for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and there is a candle and singing at each meal. While they’re sleeping the night before, we hang up the felt happy birthday banner and three strings of reusable pompoms, then add streamers to the chair of the birthday boy/girl and scatter balloons and add additional streamers. Tradition!
The night before each of our son’s birthdays, my husband and I snuggle in bed with them and tell them their birth story. The stalled traffic on the way to the hospital! My water wouldn’t break! The uncle who wandered into the room at the peak of labor pains! ‘You took forEVER to get here!” And then…our first meeting, the instant love rush, your hand so naturally curling around Daddy’s finger, the awe, the revolving door of visitors. At 12, 9, and 3, all three of them never tire of hearing their same, individual stories year after year, over and over again, and we never tire of telling them.
oh that is so beautiful, Jessica.
This is so very dear.
my kiddo’s birthday is in October so every birthday is a costume party! i’m Mexican so we always have a piñata, and i realized having a brunch party felt fun and easy for me. coffee, hot chocolate, tamales, and a birthday cake. i love it so much and plan to do it until my kid says otherwise 🥰
My parents have always called their adult children and their partners, grandchildren and other family members to sing Happy Birthday. My mom now has dementia and just moved into an elder group home a week ago. Sunday was her main caregiver’s birthday, and my mom asked me get her a card and some cash. I also got her flowers. When Jean entered the room on Saturday, my mom, dad and I all sang Happy Birthday to her. It made me so happy to celebrate someone who takes such incredible care of my mom, but even more to see that my mom still wants to take care of others.
Oh that’s beautiful. What a wonderful thing to witness about your mom.
We do pancakes, with candles for birthday breakfast. A fun way to start the day, especially when it’s a weekday. During covid, first year birthday, I bought reusable pom pom garlands. That goes up on the mantle. Lots of birthday wishes from family – spread around the world across different time zones. Morning mini-gift (usually a car toy or book) and story time during breakfast. Early pick up from school if she wants to or play with friends, balloons and cake. Dinner has historically been pizza but this year the 6y old wants to eat raw fish! Parent gifts – I often do small useful things and 1 fun thing. Extra bedtime stories, tickle fest and lots of cuddles.
I am reading this on May 19 and realizing that it was posted on May 18…aka, yesterday, my 42nd birthday! That feels like a fun coincidence. Does anyone else feel a bit let down by birthdays as they get older? My friends and I went all out with celebrations all throughout our 20s and probably even part of our 30s, but as of late they just feel sort of flat. This isn’t to say I expect people to plan a good day for me – I did that myself! Took the day off work, went to breakfast with my husband after dropping the twins at daycare, worked out with friend, got my free Starbucks drink, had a massage, watched some TV during the middle of the day, and finally went to dinner with girlfriends while my husband put the boys to bed. I had texts from multiple friends and a call from my parents early in the day. But for some reason, I just felt a bit sad when it was all over. Like, that’s it for another year? Also, no cake (the restaurant kicked us out quickly when a storm came in). Anyone else feel a bit sad after their birthday?
I understand what you’re saying and I think it’s normal as we are really being hit with the passage of time at this age! I will say, however, that I’d pretty much do anything to go back to earlier in my 40s to hear from both my parents on my b’day, now that my mom is gone. Totally not trying to give toxic positivity but I think social media sets us up for being disappointed! If you have people you love in your life- your husband, kids, girlfriends, and your parents, that is quite remarkable I have realized!!! But also totally normal to have the b’day blues. Think of all the fun things you want to do in the next year and then make them happen! Happy birthday!!!
Definitely a birthday breakfast at our house–she usually chooses pillsbury sweet orange rolls (also a tradition to have on Christmas morning and Easter morning) but sometimes donuts. When she was about 7 I started doing a birthday letterboard (hey, they were very trendy at the time) that sits next to her presents, and I still do that–it says happy birthday and then I list reasons we love her–one for every year. Her next birthday will be 14 and I’m not sure how I’ll find room for all of the words! May need to find shorter words!
My brother and I grew up with TONS of blown up balloons at our bedroom door when we woke up on our birthdays! I’ve continued the tradition with my son, and it’s one of his favorite things.
For my daughter’s birthday, I always stay up the night before decorating our bathroom mirror and living room windows with window markers! (I do it for her first day of school, too.) It’s become such a part of her birthdays/first school days now that she even reminds me the night before, which was unexpected and at first sort of disappointing because I thought the morning surprise was half of the fun… but, as it turns out, the unfailing recurrence and comfort/love it elicits probably outweighs the “surprise” to her. I love that she loves and expects it now. :)
*dulce
Immediately googled ”pan dolce near me”;)
Omg you’ll loveee
On our actual birthdays,we always go to our local Japanese Teppanyaki restaurant for dinner. We all choose it – me, my husband, and both kids. Whats better than dinner and a show WITH FIRE!? And the servers also sing a Japanese birthday song (with drums!) and bring a piece of cake. Inspired by some friends, we started offering our kids the option of EITHER having a birthday party with friends at our house or local park/beach OR an overnight/weekend trip as a family. My daughter just requested a trip to the Bahamas for her 11th birthday, so we might need to reel this one in a bit… :P.
I forgot to mention our birthday wreath! I made it years ago after seeing it on Pinterest. It’s a wreath of (non-blown up) balloons. I always hang it on our rock fireplace in the same place the first day of a birthday month. We take a picture of the birthday person in front of it. The rocks help show us how much they’ve grown year to year! Also, when our third was a baby, I got the idea to make a “we love you” sign for my husband with their little handprints in paint. When my daughter was born, we added her. Every year I take a picture of them with it & that’s one of my husband’s Father’s Day gifts. Another fun way to see them grow!
We did the sugar breakfast cereal too!! I wonder if 80s and 90s parents all read this idea in a magazine somewhere.
we did it too!! Cookie Crisp on my birthday; the other 364 days, homemade muesli (smh)
I know two separate couples (all born in the 80s) who do birthday cereal. And we’re in Australia!
We used to go to bday breakfast at a long gone diner. The same owner and waitresses forever, they knew our family and our orders. I airways loved how they took their order of Minnie Mouse pancakes so super seriously, coming up with questions to ask like, “now would you like your maple syrup on the side, and do you want whipped cream?” It was so cute to watch the girls pretend… maybe they didn’t want whipped cream lol. Ha ha. Nah, OF COURSE THEY DID. And a big milk shake too. For breakfast. Because why not. We also always had caramel rolls for my youngest’s bday, and shared a plate full with our neighbors. Happy happy days.
Happy happy days indeed,” the years of the young family ” Yes the ensuing years all have their good points, I know, I know. . But the years of just being a bumbling young family, with our inside jokes and , traditions, and messy house , golden years all.
Growing up an entire wall of our kitchen was cork board, painted white. It was always plastered with kid artwork and posters for upcoming events. Every night before our birthdays, my mum would stay up until the wee hours and turn the entire wall into a scene. Me in my first play, soccer match, or climbing a tree, or, one of my older sisters engaged in whatever their current interests were. She made the entire thing out of crepe paper, and giant art pieces cut out of poster board. It was absolutely incredible, and I’m so grateful!! Over here we don’t have a cork wall, but my hb makes beautiful bday posters, and we have thrown some killer birthday parties. We always let the bday girl choose any theme, and then we’d go wild in the DIY dept.
With twins the traditional Happy Birthday song always gets garbled—whose name goes first?! So in our family we always sing For He’s/She’s/They’re a Jolly Good Fellow as our birthday song!
I love the birthday faces! I have a garland I made of the kids faces from babyhood (up to 2) and look forward to hanging them up every single year! We laugh and reminisce and it’s so much fun. We also just had a half birthday this past week and to celebrate we do half-birthday breakfast—they get half of a birthday card, half-pancakes, half-bananas, you name it. It’s a silly, simple way to celebrate the in-between.
How wonderful to hear about everyone’s happy traditions! Each year, I write birthday letters to my daughters, sharing warm memories and capturing their responses to an annual questionnaire (e.g., what they want to do when they grow up, their favorite color, their favorite meals). Their collection is growing, and now that they are getting older (9 and 11) they love reading earlier editions. We also have a tradition where the birthday kid gets to pick who they want to sleep with the night before their birthday. For a long time, it was exclusively me, but now even their dad and sister get a turn! On the day of, the birthday girl wakes up to balloons, a birthday banner, and a sidewalk-chalk birthday message on our driveway. Finally, we *must* play Quincy Jones’s “Candle on the Cake.”
my children are 18 & 14. as they grow older i don’t get teary when i assumed i would, (adds to list of what they say about assuming) but instead their growing up has a wicked way of catching me completely off guard, and the tears have a mind of their own! this post was that. it crept up on my subconscious when i read about “for their 10th birthday”. gah, sob! 10 seemed so far off, and now, there will never be another 10th birthday. oh, motherhood…she’s a sneaky one!
The morning of my kids’ birthdays they come downstairs to ‘tunnel’ of crepe paper zig zagged across the hallway. They get to run through the hall, breaking all the streamers, and into the dining room where there’s an explosion of decorations.
After one of my kids gave me ‘gossip’ about themselves as a present, we started a tradition of the birthday person asking everyone else at their birthday dinner a question – which must be answered honestly. We’re kind with our questions but we’ve discovered secret crushes, latest nights out, deepest fears, best dates, and so much more.
absolutely amazing! I want all the gossip for a bday gift!
Love this non traditional gift! I would totally want this from my teenagers… for my birthday this year my son read I book I love and asked him to read. I love when people read books I recommend to them! He wrote a short “book report” so I could see how he felt about the book, and got me chocolate too.
For both of my children’s first birthdays we invited friends and family to offer something to a time capsule to be opened on their 16th birthdays. While the birthday child rarely remembers their first birthday (aside from pics) having this beautiful surprise made both their 16th birthdays extra special. There were letters of wishes and dreams, keepstakes and special relics from their first year. My daughter was delighted to receive a 16 magazine 16 years later with a complete tear out Zac Efron poster, my son first edition Harry Potter the year it came out. Of course the words of wishes from family including those we lost were priceless. We also tucked special baby clothes etc in before sealing it at the end of that first year!
I love this idea so much I copied and pasted it into a calendar reminder for October 1, the month my first born turns one!
Growing up we always got to choose what we had for dinner on our birthdays, and what kind of cake my mum made for us. Lots of themed cakes that turned into hunting through magazines and recipe books the week before to decide what fancy cake we wanted as teens! We also developed traditions for specific birthdays – at 13 we got CD players (my 2 youngest brothers got ipods, plus ca change), at 16 my brothers got a full portion of chow mein (the UK takeaway version) to themselves. Negotiations based on ‘you can do that when you’re older’ ‘how old do I have to be?’ were taken VERY seriously, celebrated to the day!
Born in january, one week after new year’s eve, I always had this feeling that people around me, family and close friends included, were never in the mood to celebrate my birthday. I mean, Christmas, New years eve and then… my birthday ! So I think i suffered a bit from not being celebrated as a child and teenager (and even as an adult, because now everyone is usually on a dry january on the B day ) So, for my two daughters, it is so important to make the whole day of their birthday a party. And it ALWAYS begins with a stack of pancakes with a lovely birthday candle on the top and of course, a first present, even a small one. That’s our very own tradition !
Food is one of my love languages. The birthday person gets to decide what is being eaten at every meal. That’s three special meals and cake of their choice too. I now also bake the cakes for my son in law and daughter in law too. You can literally have anything to eat. One daughter had ice cream for breakfast one year.
Our family celebrates the b’eve – the evening before the birthday to say farewell to the year that’s gone. It’s marked by a silly and inexpensive gift and a moment to reflect on the great stuff that went on the year befor.
I love this! Maybe it’s not too late to implement in our house…
Like many families, the birthday kid always got to choose dinner…for me it was usually fried chicken, because since it was labor intensive, mom didn’t make it often. I’ve kept up the tradition with my kids…over the years birthday dinners have been grilled cheese, Subway, sushi or dinner out. I had a great aunt who had no children of her own, but was the matriarch of my dad’s side of the family. On the occasion of the grand niece and nephews 21st birthday, she started the tradition of taking the whole extended family out …sometimes 15 people(!) to a fancy dinner…Maxwell Plum, Trader Vics…and the whole party would help the celebrant select their first “legal” beverage…I had a champagne cocktail!
Slightly different tradition but on the day I had each of my children we bought a newspaper and each year on their birthdays we do the same. Its interesting every year as we add a new one to their stack to look back at what was in the news on their birthdays previous years.
My father inadvertently started this tradition in our family too! He says he bought the paper the day I was born, but as I had arrived, he was too busy to read haha. I have two younger sisters, so newspapers were also bought on their birth days and we add to it once every 10 years. It’s fun to pull out a newspaper that is 10 years old and see what was going on the world back then!
My parents both turned 70 last year and I made them each birthday banners. Each one has 7 things they love- silly little things, like model trains, blue china and the tv show LOST (ha!). I hand drew each image and then used water colors on top. I tried to find things they loved from different eras of their lives. It was funny and sweet, and I think they appreciated the extra effort.
Our kids get to request a themed cake and my husband and I do our best to make it! We’ve had a puppy football game, Pokemon (happy birthday to Mew!), Lord of the Rings, etc. My husband is Australian so we also celebrate our birthdays over two days because the day before means it’s already your birthday in Australia (we’re in California)!
Today’s one of my daughter’s 15th birthday! A few years ago I started a tradition of the night before the bday, after they’ve gone to sleep, I hang metallic door fringe outside their bedroom door. The idea is when they open the door in the morning they’re surprised by a cascade of tinsel. But it’s extra funny when they wake in the night to go to the bathroom and have a “what the hell” moment. $5 magic that works for all ages.
My brother and I grew up spending part of the weeks before our birthday parties making a pinata with our mom. It was whatever we wanted to make that oval balloon into. My son helped me make his first pinata last year for his 5th birthday. The only thing on his wish list for his birthday this year was a pinata. I was probably as excited as he was to make it together.
A few years ago my daughters started the tradition of making a birthday piñata for their dad and we have so much fun trying to keep the theme a surprise for him as we work on it the week of his b-day.
Our family tradition is simple but we have silly paper hats and banner and I make a cake – when it’s someone’s birthday my kids eagerly look around for it and it makes me happy that they have that consistency in their lives! Growing up my best friend’s mom had a cool tradition – they had a tablecloth that she embroidered a little something on to represent what they were into for each birthday. I’ve always thought that was so loving and fun – the kid didn’t get to see what it was until the birthday celebration. And just now I realized that I have started embroidery recently and I can do it too!
I LOVE the hats. When my daughters turned four they loved Little Bear and had a silly hat birthday party in honor of the party at Owl’s house: “Owl came out of his house. He said, ‘Here are the party hats. Put them on.’ So they all put on the party hats and laughed at each other. Then they sat down to eat.”
I, capital L, Love these comments. Birthdays can be so special! I decorate the kitchen table while my boys are asleep and pile their cards and gifts at their chair. It’s really sweet to see them start their day with a little extra sparkle even if they are just going to a regular school day. But more pressing is that I need to figure out how to celebrate my own birthday this fall. I’m turning 40 and want to set aside time to be with my favorite people, but will it be fun to go to a restaurant with 4-5 kids in our group? Will it be stressful to host at my home where I will need to clean and mow and set up? Ideas for hosting your own party and what ended up being truly fun? Help!
Hi Jessica I‘ve had a friend who celebrated her 40th during the year with several smaller gatherings instead of one big party. I lived the idea, because you get to spend time with everyone! Another friend planned a birthday weekend with different activities, and everyone was free to join whatever activity they liked (hiking on friday, staying in a cabin overnight, barbecue on saturday, outdoor games on sunday).
Yay! Yes, you definitely need to celebrate in some way for sure! I think this is so personal, Jessica – when you picture it, what do you see? How many people? Hosting something can be a lot of work but there are lots of ways to keep it simple too! Enlist the kids to help decorate, make as much food as you can in advance (choose something that is easy to freeze perhaps or a big piece of slow cooked meat that would actually benefit from being made 1-2 days before), ask a friend or family member to make your cake or bring a veggie tray etc.People will love to help!
For my last birthday I threw a big party at the beach. I ordered platters of sandwiches, stuffed drinks and ice into a couple of coolers, sliced up a bunch of watermelon, served bowls of potato chips, and got a Costco birthday cake. I invited everyone I knew, and families brought their kids of all ages or relatives visiting from out of town. Friends help set up before hand and pack up after. Was a lot of fun. I have a summer birthday, but you could do something similar in a park with a playground.
If the weather is reasonable how about planning an outdoor pot luck picnic? Go to your favourite park to outdoor place, everyone brings some food and drinks, their own blankets or chairs. Very little planning or cleaning and space for children to just be children. X
My problem is I keep waffling on the vibe, but when I picture it, my friends are together and we are outside with some space for the kids to focus on their own nonsense. That probably means most restaurants are out but maybe it’s possible to do a picnic with takeout food somewhere. I also love the idea of little celebrations, and I still want to have lunch/dinner the weekend of the big day.
My husband is turning 40 this year and while we don’t have kids, most of our friend group does. My husband is also the cook of our friend group so I understand the whole “If we host, will it still feel celebratory or just like a lot of work?” We considered a big beach day, but my husband grills out there too! We ultimately decided on a local resort for one night. We’ll get two full pool days, people can come just for the day if they want, and kids are welcome and will have a good time. We can bring in snacks and drinks, and we’ll spend on dinner out but hosting isn’t always cheaper these days and now he can actually have fun vs. feel like we’re working a party at our house! However you choose to celebrate, happy 40th!
A childhood friend of mine sent out a link where we could all “sign up” for a dinner party at her house. She had figured out that she could fit 8 people around her kitchen table and then she planned a menu that didn’t require her to be running back and forth to the stove all evening. And then she had like 6 or 7 dinners, one every couple of weeks, for months around her actual 40th birthday. We went to one and my parents to another – so much fun!
Growing up my mum would make us a big cake (no recipe) and layer it with homemade custard, one layer vanilla and one chocolate. The cake would rise in the centre and crack and I named it the volcano cake. As mum worked full time and there was 5 of us kids, this was extra special
For our oldest son’s seventh birthday, we made him a scavenger hunt with rhyming clues had to solve to make his way a small stash of presents. It was exhilarating watching him read and race around the house at 7am. It’s since become his tradition, and each year we try to get more creative with the clues!
Ohhh, I’m up at 2am nursing my 2 month old (first) baby and writing a note with these great ideas, thank you!
It’s 1am & I’m nursing my 7 month old. I’m a second time mom now and I remember reading so many Cup of Joe comments in the middle of the night with my first baby, as well. Sending love and company to you Abigail and to so many other wonderful mothers awake at all hours too!
Im my family we have a 12th birthday tradition of taking a parent/child trip somewhere new. My grandmother took my mom to NY when she turned 12. My mom took me to London. And I’ve taken each of my boys to Paris and Italy. It’s been so special to be on both sides of this tradition. And my boys can’t wait to take their kids (one day) on a 12th birthday trip!
My son develops obsessions with different topics each year. So, starting with his 4th birthday, I started making custom t-shirts for each birthday. Each t-shirt has the thing he is currently obsessed about (construction trucks, dinosaurs, sharks, Minecraft, etc.), his age, and his name. On the day before his birthday, he wears the previous year’s birthday shirt. Then on the day of his birthday, he wears the new shirt. He’s going to celebrate his 10th birthday soon and his shirt this year features dragons because he just finished reading the Inheritance series and went crazy for dragons! I don’t know how long he’ll be willing to carry on this tradition, but I hope he is willing till he’s 18.
Birthday signs, but with a [#] of things we love about the birthday child. So: when my daughter turned 9, we wrote “9 things we love about M!” on her birthday sign. The kids love hearing the things we love about them! Also, birthday money in the amount of your age!
We also did birthday signs and a “birthday spider” where the siblings would TP the birthday kid’s room while they were sleeping. It made birthdays fun for the whole family.
Yes! We take a “birthday bump” photo at the same spot (outside a local chocolate factory) every year around my birthday. We call it the birthday bump as we started the tradition when I was 7 months pregnant. So, every year we get to see how much our daughter (the “bump”) has grown. It’s my absolute favorite tradition, and it’s a gift itself seeing how much she has changed over the years. Plus, we all get chocolate afterwards. <3
My oldest gets Cheerios for her birthday, because she loves them but we had to ban them from the house because she was eating them for every meal. We also have a set of twins with different birthdays, so for one night we all cram into a bed together and they hold up the number of fingers they are old so we can celebrate the only day each year when they are different ages!
I have twins, and I wanted them to have different birthdays SO badly!
My boys have always worn new clothes for my birthday. They also wear new clothes for their own and each other’s birthday. They are 32 & 27 and live in different cities in USA while I am in UK. To have them do so willingly even though they have left home is a joy.
We have birthday banners that have a photo per year on the birthday. It will be filled at age 18. That hangs in the living room. I always write what the birthday kid is into in their birthday card. I keep a running list on a post-it inside a kitchen cabinet so I’m sure to capture all they were into over that year. I also make a photo collage of their birthday party/day and those are fun to pull out and look at once/year. The last thing is a birthday book a friend gave me for each of my kids when they were one-it has interview questions for each year up to age 18. My favorite question that appears in every interview is “Who was the last person you kissed?” Now that I have a teenager, it gets interesting!!
We clap to the person’s age, and always add ‘one to make them grow’ (might be an Australian thing). Cute and easy for a child, but we are still doing it for my parents almost in their 70s. This includes at big parties for their 40th, 50th and 60ths, resulting in people remembering in real time ‘oh that’s this family’ My brothers made sure to clap extra loud to get everyone started at my 40th and I almost cried with joy.
Catherine, I remember doing this for kids’ birthdays, always and one to make them grow. It probably is an Australian thing. I may have to bring it back. My brothers are the same they would clap and cheer very loud. and then we would sing it in Italian – Tanti Auguri a te.. and on it went.
We do this in England too, the extra one is “for luck”. It’s the first time I have ever heard it been for growing, how fun to hear about similar traditions.
My mom’s house is on the main drag in the town she lives in, so lots of cars pass by. Anytime anyone in my family has a “big” birthday (18/21/30/40/etc), we get a giant bed sheet, spray paint “Sarah is 40!” on it (hopefully without the birthday person knowing), and hang it on the front of her house so that everyone driving by can see. Also, my husband randomly starting singing the happy birthday song in a falsetto (like Michael Scott from The Office) once and now he does it every time. The niblings have grown to expect it.
Somewhere along the way in middle school, I had a yellow cake with Betty Crocker Rainbow Chip icing. From then on, that was my birthday cake of choice. My mom is a notoriously horrible baker; a box cake was as good as it was going to get. She once burnt 3 different pans of brownies while watching Old Yeller. Ha, she didn’t even attempt dinner when Where the Red Fern Grows was watched. Once I went to college, mom would make the 2 hour drive up to Raleigh to celebrate my birthday, one time she got Funfetti instead of Rainbow. NOT the same, but we let it slide. Each year my mom would say “now which one is it again!?” She may have been the most pleased when in 2013 Betty Crocker discontinued Rainbow Chip! However, the people went wild with despair. Someone even started a change.org petition and got 7,000 signatures. Katy Perry even retweeted the desire to bring back the who-knows-what-is-in-it-but-who-cares, not healthy cult classic of Rainbow Chip. After two long years, Betty Crocker did right by all of us and brought it back. Once it was back, a friend had a 6 tubs of icing shipped to me for my birthday. Mom was off the hook for a couple of years. Turns out the icing doesn’t have a super long shelf life. For my 40th, I gathered friends in Hudson Valley to stay at an Idyllic house in Leeds. We had a chef cook my birthday dinner. One friend asked the chef he would do box cake with Rainbow Chip icing. He said absolutely not, but he created his own version! To this day, my mom will text me or call me a couple days before frantic b/c she can’t find it or remember if it’s Funfetti or Rainbow Chip and we get a big ole laugh, sometimes cry laughing, about how ridiculous it is after all these years, because well, she’s had a year to prep…. Each year.
We have a birthday banner that proclaims “Celebrate” that my crafty friend made for our eldest’s baby shower. At first not quite on purpose, but now very much so, it hangs for every birthday in the family for at least a week.
The Best mornings is the birthday’s morning. I have two sons now 28 and 32. We started the tradition when the kids where small and they have taken upon themselves to continua the tradition with their families. So, here it is: On the birthday morning, we silently prepare and then come in the the birthday boy’s room. We have perhaps a pack or two, but most importantly we sing the birthday song, spread a big beach towel on the bed put the small cake in the middle (there is bigger for the official party later in the day) and each one get a spoon and the whole family is shearing the cake directly from the cake. No plates just fun eating. When there is no more cake, just roll up the beach towel. This is the best time of the birthday, just the family and a lot of fun and love.
The birthday boy/girl sits on the coffee table and spins around to face each family member in turn. Parents and siblings each say at least one thing that they REALLY like about the birthday person. Even as Mom I loved hearing something nice from everyone. One year our youngest suggested we go around again and say what we thought they could improve on. We still laugh about that one.
oh this is so sweet!
I do something similar in my classroom. We call it the “gift of kind words.”. Each student takes a turn to say something that they appreciate about the birthday boy or a girl, and then we sing to them!
Yes! We all go around the dinner table (or breakfast table, or whenever we can manage that day) and start out by saying, “I love…” about the birthday person, which is equally cheesy and WORTHWHILE. Our kids are now 9-16, and sometimes find the ritual cringe, but I can tell it’s filling up their little cups and strengthening sibling bonds. I cherish what they’ve said on my birthdays over the years, too!
We have 4 kids. The night before the birthday, the birthday kid stays in their room and the other 3 (along with my husband & I) decorate for the birthday! The kids draw pictures of the birthday kid’s favorite things, blow up balloons, etc. I tape a note to their chair at the table that says something like “reserved for x years olds” or “only teenagers sit here” (when our oldest turned 13 earlier this month. The gifts are then left on the table on top of the birthday tablecloth. We open gifts at breakfast, play the Beatles “Birthday” on the way to school, & the birthday kid picks dinner. The kids absolutely love to decorate for each other, it’s so sweet! I also go into their room when they’ve fallen asleep the night before their birthday & take one more picture of them at that age before the big day!
I love how you involve all the siblings in making the birthday kid feel loved and special. I know they’ll carry that into their future friends’ and partners’ birthdays down the road. And it teaches them that it’s not just up to a parent (especially mom) to make the magic
My kids each have a homemade birthday banner with their name on it. It gets hung up on their birthday and then I write a message to them on the back each year. I heard about this tradition from a friend’s friend and am so happy o decided to make it happen for my kiddos.
OMG this is so sweet, i want to do that!
Is this just done on regular paper? It sounds lovely.
We hang a ‘birthday board’ for both of my kids’ birthdays, a tradition since my oldest was two years old. It’s just a piece of patterned paper in inexpensive 20×30 inch IKEA frame, but I use washi tape to stick ‘birthday photos’ to the Plexiglas every birthday, one photo from their birthday each year, with their age written on it. Some photos capture their faces illuminated by the glow of their birthday candles, or the utter delight at opening a long wished for gift, or just beaming with pride at ‘finally’ being five, or six, or sixteen (!) But every picture is a snapshot of their special day and how much they have grown since the year before. All together, the entire collection shows, I think, just how loved they are and how much joy we all take in celebrating that they exist (sob!) When I take down the decorations each year, I print out the latest birthday photo, add the age, and stick it in the envelope with the others, until it’s time to take it out on next year’s birthday ‘eve,’ to tape to the birthday board once again. I am overcome with nostalgia and joy every time, and the kids love laughing at the old pictures and remembering what it was like to be little.