It was my daughter's birthday Wednesday. She had to work. And to add insult to injury, she had to put in an 11 hour day. No fun at all. We had a family dinner for her Thursday evening (her night off). Her boyfriend came by, along with my mom, sister, nephew. It was a nice evening. She is difficult though because there is nothing she wants present-wise. It is always a challenge because usually, if she wants something, she buys it for herself... or it is too expensive for anyone to buy . How do you celebrate birthdays? Do you (as an adult) get birthday celebrations? Do you celebrate others but not yourself? Do you get birthday freebies and stretch it out as long as possible? Is it party time or does it go by quiet and unannounced? Do you like receiving gifts? Have a wish list?
It's typical for round birthdays to get big parties in Denmark. I was miserable with pregnancy sickness when I turned 30, though, so no big party, and I haven't hit 40 yet. My ILs cook me the dinner of my choice and get a cake and I open presents. Nothing huge but it's plenty enough to be nice. I keep lists for all of us in Amazon so I can email them when asked about what to get. Elder daughter turns 7 in a couple weeks and younger turns 5 a month later so we've had birthdays on the brain too.
Our birthdays are March 16th, April 28th, May 11th, June 6th, & the cat's is July 1st. 5 months of birthdays. Everyone gets their own celebration. Both boys had their 5th birthday at Disneyland, those were the biggest celebrations. Only the 5 year old is into parties. The rest of us have cake & pizza on our birthdays. I like to make myself a really fancy cake for my birthday, it's fun for me. The cake gets some sort of cake shaped mound of fish with a candle in it & a new toy. I collect & redeem my freebies on my birthday. I especially love free makeup because it's something I never buy. My coworker started a tradition at work. On our birthdays, he buys us tacos for lunch. It's kind of awesome.
In our family, we choose where we want to go for our birthday. Hubby and I usually just do one decent present for each other (I more often than not get him a personalised football jersey, he will get me power tools or crafty gift vouchers - birthday last year I got a huge water blaster). We often consult with each other too, like he told me he was getting me a water blaster, but took me to choose which one I wanted, I told him I was getting him a jersey, he chose which club or strip). Our boys birthday, we will get him some small things to unwrap in the morning (this year was books and a batman hoody) then we took him out to choose his 'big' present. He wanted a Nerf gun, so we took him to the shop and let him pick which one he wanted. He got a giant green Nerf crossbow. It's amazing. Then he asked to go to a certain restaurant, so we went there. Christmas is more of the 'surprise' gifts, birthdays involve the giftee more often than not.
we exchange cards (me & hubby) and go out to dinner. No longer do the "gifts" for Birthdays or Christmas or Anniversaries as we get what we want throughout the year. For our Anniversary we sometimes plan a trip, but that is what we do... plan a nice trip for the year or a "big" item we need for the house or something like that. To me being together is the best present It was different in the beginning, and we don't have kids so that is the way we do things.. not for everyone, but we are happy we do it this way.
We usually just go out for a quiet dinner and/or some family activity. I used to enjoy parties and gifts, but now I'd rather just spend it with my greatest gifts.
We always do diner out wherever he birthday person chooses. For the past two years my hubby has taken me away around my birthday. I jokingly told him he has to keep it up now, but I don't think he has anything planned for this year. It's always tough on our daughter, her birthday is Christmas Eve. We always try to make it special for her and separate from Christmas, but it's not easy so we usually celebrate it a few days earlier.
DH and I just look for the funniest cards, and usually we go out to eat with or without kids! My mom still buys me gifts, usually a purse or something I won't buy for myself... lol! We give the kids something small, usually $50 or so. My parents give bigger gifts, and we don't mind.
