Balancing Birthdays

How do you make birthdays for kids meaningful?  It's a delicate balance between making the day special and not over-indulging or over-whelming them.  And our family has an extra challenge of celebrating three birthdays (and one anniversary!) in one month's time.  That's a lot of cake!  We want to celebrate each individual in the family without experiencing birthday fatigue.  So how do you find the balance?  I think the answer is going to evolve from year to year depending upon what's going on in our lives and what the kids (and we) want.  Some years we'll get it better than others - and that's okay. 

When we asked Oliver what he wanted to do this year for his birthday, he chose to spend an afternoon at an amusement park over having a birthday party.  At first I was a little disappointed.  My Pinterest board was full of four-year-old-birthday party ideas and I wasn't going to get to use them.  Eventually disappointment gave way to relief.  Oliver had just given me a birthday gift - I wasn't going to have to plan a party!  Because, honestly, Pinterest-worthy birthday parties are not my forte.  More importantly, Oliver should get to celebrate his birthday the way he wants to. 

And he did.  We went to Como Town with his best buddy, the little guy he used to see daily, but now only gets to see when his mom and I manage to arrange a playdate.  He got to request what he wanted for breakfast (waffles!) and ate them off a special birthday plate.  He finished his day off at a Twins game, where his dad let him eat every possible bad-for-you kind of food his heart desired. 

With Oliver content to have a birthday outing instead of a party and Soren not old enough to provide much input, (his wants were simple - cake - that much I was sure of) we opted for a family party.  I did what I thought I wouldn't do for kids whose birthdays are so close together and that's hold a joint party and have, gasp, one cake!  But it worked out.  Really, the kids are at an age where it doesn't matter to them.  They were both happy to have family come over, open a couple gifts and eat cake.  They didn't care that it was the same cake and they weren't counting who got more presents.  This is one where I was finally going to let myself relax and truly "enjoy it while it lasts."