Celebrating a Birthday Should Not Require Painful Labor after the initial one...

Birthday paloozah is doing a number on me.  Every two weeks, we need a cake and presents and to possibly plan a party.  My brain is fried, or would be if it weren't already overstuffed with cake.  Two down...three to go...Easter will be in there somewhere. It's a good thing we're fasting in the meantime.

Because I've done birthdays for children of all ages for the past two and a half decades, I've learned a few things along the way.  As always, advice is maybe not even worth what you pay, and since blogging is free, that frees me up to make errors and pass them off as hard earned wisdom. 

However, my rules of birthdays might help to make celebrating of your children's birth both festive and less stressful/taxing on you. 

10 Tips for Making a Happy Birthday for All 

First off, I believe in partying.  I enjoy birthdays.  I like cake. I like celebrating.  I Love the Birthday Book by Dr. Seus, and think all birthdays should have no work or school, and cake should be served.  That being said, I also know, enthusiasm and inexperience sometimes take over and complicate what should be fun and simple...so here's to making your life less difficult while still having serious fun.

10) Is the child not yet in pre-school or any school?  If not, enjoy a family birthday. Take pictures, make a fancy cake. Invite over grandparents, godparents and siblings...sing and eat.  Life is good.  Note...it's an easy party. The kid likes boxes even more than the toys.

9) Kid's in pre-school.  Again, don't complicate matters.  Children this age enjoy McDonald's and think going there is a grand event, as is the park, the community pool, and the quarter arcade at the mall.  Pick the three best friends whose moms you don't mind having around, and invite for a birthday at a place they can seriously play.   If it's a park...bring the picnic. Cupcakes, songs, paper hats and blowers, bubbles and stickers and you're good. 

8) The kid is in kindergarten.  Now we get to the parties that get talked about...so here's the home party time.   Pin the tail on the --it doesn't have to be a donkey. It can be a dragon or a unicorn or whatever animal the kid is into (as long as it has a tail long enough to make it work. Although, one time I drew a chameleon for a birthday party, and we pinned the fly on the tongue...so be creative).   So to the parent of the kid who likes bears...do pin the nose on the bear...and the one who likes sheep...I don't know what you do there.  Introduce the kid to other animals.   To the one who likes pigs or spiders, Charlotte's web and pinning the spider on the web makes a handy game, and looks literary and intellectual too. 

7) The rule I learned is one kid per year...but these days, people feel very guilty if they don't invite everyone.  However, I think the primary goal of any party, is to celebrate the kid and not break the wallet or spirit of the parents.  So I hold to the rule.  It works and so far, none of my children have written manifestos about my evil parenting.  But back to the games. Musical chairs is another favorite...again it's only set up, no cost.  The third game we almost always play is freeze dance.  Everyone wiggles.  Most of the time, only adults get called out.  Memo to parents. You're always it, and you always get caught. It means everyone wins and it makes life easy. Simon says and Redlight Green Light if you're in need of extra time while someone is finishing up frosting the cake. 

6) The kid is in 1st thru 3rd grade.  If you've got a late spring or early fall baby, you've got good weather.  If you've got a summer kid, no one is around.  If you've got a winter kid, the party always has to be some place.  Mental note: Mix it up.   The spring and fall kiddos envy the bowling parties and the mini-golf and the pizza night.  The winter kid longs for a sports oriented event or some place they can swim or run...this is the challenge of little human beings. They haven't come to accept they can't have something unreasonable simply because they want it.   Come to think of it, neither have I. 

5) 4th-6th graders...if there's a good movie, take it.  If there's not a good movie, talk to your pizza guy and see if they'll let him and five of his buds make pizzas and pour root beer into mugs.   Call the indoor pool facility and prepare to suit up.   I've learned that a bowling party, however cliche, is always easy and always fun.  You just learn to set yourself up against everyone else and trash talk until they skunk you (which they will).   Party --one gender, all of them.  It's still cake, juice boxes and a bag or two of chips for the food of the ordinary party. 

4) 5th --9th grade...  We'll play tag football, capture the flag, have magic tournaments, play risk, we'll go to an arcade and use all the quarters...the trick is to play with them, and somehow, that helps them to enjoy playing.  I serve a piecaken, which is a mutant dessert of all desserts, pie inside of a cake, frosted, and served with ice cream. It dares you to eat it if you're not 13...but it's good, it's insane and adolescent parties need that touch of madness they didn't think of, to be successful. 

3) You'll notice, there are no sleep overs.  There's a reason. I don't believe in sleep overs if I can avoid them. No one sleeps and somehow, no matter how much you supervise, someone gets their feelings hurt.  Kids need breaks and sleepovers allow for no graceful exits.  As such, I do pizza poker parties or nail salons spa parties, I'll give you three hours of fun with rootbeer floats that rival Snoopy's in the French taverns on the funny papers, but go home.  Adolescents and adults, everyone does better when parties...end.

2) A word about gift bags.  They've become quite the costly endeavor in recent years --at least where I live.  My formula for a gift bag is simple. Brown paper bag containing pencil, note pad, chocolate bar, ring pop, and a glow stick.  It should be folded over and stapled shut with "Thank you for coming to my party!" --name written in marker by your child on it.   Do not put personal names. You will spend the end of the party tracking people down and going crazy.

1) Always have a gift on the day for the birthday kid.  Even if it's a little something.  Even if you already threw the party.   Even if you already had the family party.  Always have something. 

I'll let you know what I learn in the next twenty-six years of celebrating birthdays...in the meantime, Happy Birthday Faith! It's hard to believe today, you're seventeen.