Birthday Celebrating

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Last year we started the tradition of forgoing normal “birthday presents” with our kids, and instead spending money to do fun things with them that we wouldn’t normally do.

This year we continued the tradition with our now four-year-old daughter (our oldest).

She and I have birthday’s only one day apart, which is just fun. I can’t even tell you what a sweet time we had together celebrating last week.

Here’s what we did…

On my birthday:

My husband took off work for both our birthdays, which made them feel so special. This also allowed Clara and I to go out and do some girly, birthday things together, just the two of us.

We saw Cinderella, Clara’s first real movie theater experience. It was a hit!

Then we went for pedicures together. Clara was SO into it and SO good throughout the whole process.

When we got home my husband sweetly gave me my choice for dinner, a tradition in our family. The conversation went something like this:

Hubs: What would you for your birthday dinner?

Me: (pause) I want a sandwich.

Hubs: A sandwich?

Me: Yeah! Like a turkey sandwich, with tomatoes and good bread.

Hubs: …ok… and would you like anything else with your …sandwich?

Me: (thinking) No. I think I just really want a sandwich

So, thanks to odd pregnancy cravings, for my 28th birthday dinner I had just that! And it was delightful!

On Her Birthday:

My daughter currently attends a mini-preschool one day a week, which happened to be on her birthday. She chose to get dressed up in her favorite dress and was able to bring a special birthday treat for her whole class, which she also picked out.

They gave her special “birthday” treatment throughout the morning, including singing to her as a class, which made her feel very special.

Throughout the day we said “yes” to her as much as possible, which made me realize how often I put off playing because I don’t feel like it or I’m busy. But not today.

In the afternoon her Papa, who happened to be in town on a business trip, came by and brought her flowers, which thrilled her greatly and was ADORABLE.

After that we made the dinner of her choosing (chicken and broccoli to be precise), and had birthday cake.

She loved being sung to (for the now 3rd time, including an early celebration with out of town family) and blowing out her candles.

Thankfully she’s too young to care that my cake decorating attempt was pitiful.

(Unfortunately I hadn’t remembered to reference Craftsy’s free Cake Decorating eGuide, but honestly, she did not know the difference)

All in all it was a very special, simple, gift-free, relational and love-rich birthday for her (and me), and we both felt celebrated and special.

 

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