Fabulous Four!

My middle child recently turned four.  He has been asking when his birthday is, and telling everyone he is going to turn four for months.  I think he thinks when people ask "How are you" they are asking "How old are you."  I see how he could make that mistake.

So, I don't do birthday parties for my children. You may think my kids are deprived, but I like to think my kids are wholly unspoiled.  Maybe when they start begging for it, but definitely not before they are old enough to appreciate it. I'm sorry, but I've been to parties for children who were too young where all the children couldn't understand why they couldn't have the presents, and then there was crying and fighting and... no thank you.  It's hard enough when we have younger siblings around.  That's why this year I decided to give each of my other kids a "consolation present," so they wouldn't hover or whine quite so much. Then they took turns sharing and taking turns with each others' toys. It worked pretty well.
To be honest though, I mostly don't have parties because I am too lazy, and I admit I'm a bit stingy too. I love just having my family to myself, and making it a special day for the whole family (not to mention that no one wants a stressed out mommy around on their birthday).

We celebrate with traditions, such as waking up to initial-shaped pancakes with strawberries and whipped cream. (Yeah, we pretty much begin and end the day with cake --isn't that what birthdays are for?)

We also prefer to go on special family outings for birthdays.  It's a great excuse to do something out of the ordinary... like bowling for instance.  (We were going to go to the zoo, but alas, it was a rainy day.)

We also went to Big Jud's and got a giant hamburger to share. The kids thought it was pretty cool.

On a less birthday-ish note, we also visited my sister-in-law who's in the hospital on bed-rest, and then went home for naps while I made the cake. It's still a pretty busy day, and to help us all have a good day, I like to do whatever I can make it easy on myself. For example, thanks to my husband, my kids have been trained to like box mix cakes (something that was unheard of in my household growing up) and the usual birthday staple is rainbow chip cake with rainbow chip frosting (another thing unheard of in my household).  The kids still like their cake decorated in fun ways, and it wasn't until the last minute that my now four-year-old decided he wanted a robot.  I wasn't about to try any kind of cutting and shaping with a box mix, and I didn't want to make even more frosting after already having the store bought stuff, so this is what he got.

He absolutely loved it. (I told you my kids are unspoiled.  Any other kid might start crying at a disgruntled looking robot staring back at him, but mine was thrilled.)

He got his choice of dinner, and we finished off our evening at home with cake and presents.

It was a perfect day.

He even got a rainbow.


And that's how we do birthdays.  At least for now.