Birthdays at Trying Traditional are a fairly low-key affair. The older two have had one party with friends…one. It sounds awful to some and a dream to others. Here’s a bit of a shocker for you. I have a really, REALLY hard time dealing with a room full of children…especially other people’s children. I know, this coming from a mom of four who would have more if she could figure it all out. I can handle mine, though my husband will tell you that when the noise level gets too high I get cranky. I guess with mine I know what to expect (for the most part) and know what needs to be done if they are out of line. More importantly they know what to expect out of me. It isn’t that I do not like kids. A room full of kids, though, is like a nightmare to me. Twice I have helped at church with VBS (or something of that nature) and both times I have had an anxiety attack and vomiting. It’s odd, really. My girls are lucky they had the one “friends” party they had two years ago and their amazing Aunt Jodi stepped in and made it a real hit. (I had been home with the twins for about 2-3 weeks, still not sleeping well, and Aunt Jodi set up a princess photo shoot complete with costumes!) Not to say they won’t have one again, in fact, I am thinking next year might be the year to tackle it again.
Back on track. The average birthdays around here include:
- choice of meal served on china (the china part is new this year)
- cake of choice
- family (including grandparents and great-grandparents)
- a few gifts
That’s it. No games with prizes, no goodie bags to send home, no closets overflowing from all the gifts they got (wait, we have that still from Christmas.) Perhaps it’s because the girls’ birthdays are so close to Christmas. The costs associated with Christmas as well as the influx of “stuff” into house associated with Christmas, that is.
We do try to keep it pretty simple, but deffinately tailored to the girls wants. We’ve had multiple princess birthdays, Strawberry Shortcake, Pooh Bear, etc. This year they are growing up, 8 and 7 to be exact. The choices this year were an artist birthday and a cooking birthday. Here are the cakes from this birthday season:
a gourmet chocolate cake with raspberry filling for chef Liz
artist pallet for Jane the artist (with name blurred out)
I have always ask the girls what they want to eat for their birthday meal. This year we added a new twist. Mom gave me one set of her china when they moved. It’s a set she bought piece by piece when her and dad got married and I’ve always loved it. So now we eat a meal of their choice on the china for the birthday. We never used the china growing up, it’s time to put some food on those plates!
green pancakes and scrambled eggs for supper
I love that my fancy dishes will mean something to the girls, that it is something special that they look forward to. I enjoy seeing my Great-Granny’s sherberts in use (though it makes me nervous seeing as they are so old…Granny was born in 1896.) I enjoy putting green pancakes up high on the cake plate, steaming up the glass cover while waiting to be served. Pouring syrup into the creamer dish, watching the girls stick out their pinkie to sip milk with the saucer held high underneath the cup. The only down side, hand washing all those dishes! If that is my only complaint, though, it’s worth creating the traditions and memories with my girls.
We usually keep the birthdays down to just family also (we have a schedule of which years they are allowed to invite others), but with my family that is still a lot of people. And I am sooooo with you on the large groups of kids that aren’t mine. I’ve gotten better over the years, but still . . . there are some Sundays I leave church wantiing to scream or puke or something because for an hour I am in charge of all the kids under 12! I mean, I have lots of help, but still, there they are, all together, in the same room. And I’m in that same room! Aaaaa!!!!!
I don’t really like groups of kids cause honestly I am not a kid person. I mean I can do a few kids, or like when you were here, 1 on 1 time with them but otherwise they freak me out. I don’t know what they want or do etc. I don’t want to volunteer at school cause I will have to try to “get” another kid, whom I don’t know!
I think this year is going to be a small b-day. We have 2 huge blowouts. 30+ people and 3 seems like a good year to cut it back to 10!