We just celebrated Miss Ada’s fifth birthday! We did a few traditions that we’ve done for years, but we also started up some new ones, and I really like what we’ve got going now! I’m already excited to celebrate Holly in the same way in just a few months :) Here’s everything we do!
Traditionally speaking, American birthdays are all about the gifts. Gifts from friends, gifts from grandparents, and (at least in my experience) multiple gifts from mom and dad.
As a minimalist, this is just too much for me. I have a hard enough time getting her to clean up the toys she already has, and now we’re supposed to add 10+ more? Whose idea was this?!
Not only that, but what if gifts aren’t her love language? I want the purpose of birthdays in our home to be a true celebration of that person, where we show our love to him or her in ALL the ways! So this year we radically changed the focus of birthdays from gifts to LOVE.
Love Languages
Instead of 5 gifts (or however many we might have done), we hit the five love languages.
Words of Affirmation: Russ and I heart attacked Ada’s bedroom door with reasons that we love her.
Quality Time: We’ve always done a fun family activity on birthdays, so we’re going to keep that up! Ada chose for us to go to the trampoline park together.
Physical Touch: The Kissing Machine! We all gather around the birthday person in a group hug sort of way and kiss them as many times as their new age.
Service: The birthday person doesn’t have to do any chores on their birthday, and Russ and I even cleaned up Ada’s room and playroom for her this year.
Gifts: We decided that one gift is really plenty, so that’s all we did!
I’ve heard it said that there should have been a sixth love language – food! Whether that’s right or wrong, I’m not sure, but we hit that one as well. We always get kolaches and donuts for breakfast on birthdays, and the birthday person also gets to choose a special dinner (homemade or out – either way!).
Privileges & Responsibilities
I got this idea from a friend of mine. On each birthday, her kids get a sheet of paper that has their new privileges and responsibilities that come with the new age. I love that it makes each new age special and distinct – kind of like a rite of passage every single year!
We haven’t actually done this part of the birthday yet (we forgot – oops!), but a few things I’m thinking for Ada at age 5 are: Privileges – use the toaster and microwave by herself, get added into the movie-picking rotation for family movie night, and decrease quiet time to 1.5 hours (from 2). Responsibilities – set the table, wash dishes, and fold her own clothes.
If you have any other ideas for this category (whether for age 5 or another age), I’d love to hear them!!
Ownership
In my experience, birthdays as a kid were super fun, and then birthdays as an adult were kind of disappointing. Once I got married, I guess I thought Russ would take on the role of party planner for my birthday and I’d do the same for him. It took a few years, but eventually we figured out that we actually want very different things on our birthdays, and things go more smoothly if we just plan our own birthdays.
I want to give my kids a leg up on this one (not to mention, make things easier for myself!), so as young as we can, we’re having the birthday person pick as much as possible about how to make their day special. They choose the activity, the special meal, and I don’t know that we’ll do this every year, but this year we even had Ada choose her own gift (she chose a Princess Belle Barbie).
Part of me feels like this is the wrong way to do it, because I LOVED surprise gifts and surprise activities as a kid. However, more of me feels like this is the right way to do it, because from a young age, we’re letting her know that she doesn’t need to be surprised to have a great birthday; she’s the one with the power to make her birthday great!
Birthday Parties & Birthday Cake
My mom always made fun birthday cakes for me as a kid. I distinctly remember a cookie monster cake and a barbie cake! So starting with Ada’s first birthday, I knew that’s a tradition I wanted, too.
Well, as it turns out, Ada is not a huge fan of cake! But I’ll still keep making cakes for all the birthdays because I’ve found that it’s a fun way for me to try new things. And even if she doesn’t love to eat the cake, she still gets to take part in deciding what the theme of the cake will be, and she likes that aspect :) This year, she wanted a Princess Leia cake, and after showing her a few different things I could try, she landed on a galaxy cake with a Leia topper.
Birthday parties are work. They’re fun work for me, but work nonetheless. I’ve gone all out for Ada and Holly’s first birthdays, and then I also did a themed friend party for Ada last year. After last year’s party, I decided we really don’t need a big party every year (I kind of thought it was the start of big parties, but changed my mind after carrying it out!). Instead, for ages 2 & 3, as well as this year, we’ve done a casual party at the park.
Park parties are the best because there is built-in fun, it’s free, and you don’t have to clean up much mess afterward (just the cake stuff in my case)! Plus, you can invite more people because you aren’t limited by an indoor space or party expenses. We typically invite friends and family to these park parties, and the only “entertainment” I provide is the cake.
Like I mentioned earlier, I didn’t want gifts from all these friends, so I put “no gifts please :)” on the invitation, and I LOVED what happened.
Instead of an influx of toys, Ada got notes and pictures from her friends, and Star Wars water bottle stickers from her aunt. And was she disappointed? NOPE. She was thrilled! She got to spend time with all these friends at the park, and she got little love notes from them – she just felt loved, which is my ultimate goal for birthdays!
I’m not sure when we’ll do more structured parties again, but for at least this age and younger, I really love the park birthday parties.
(Any ideas for a similar option for winter? Still not sure what we’ll do for Holly’s December birthday parties, other than possibly celebrate at her half birthday.)
I really LOVE family traditions, and I feel like I finally found birthday traditions that fit my main goal with birthdays — to help the birthday person feel loved! Of course, there’s always the opportunity to adapt traditions as needed, but for now, I’m really happy with where we’ve landed (nearly 10 years into marriage and 2 kids into parenting 😜).
What are your family traditions for birthdays? I’d love to hear!