In with the New~

In 18 agonizing short days I will no longer be able to say "I have 2 under 2". My "oldest" is in fact getting older & will be 2! As much as we love to see them grow & learn new things, we secretly wish they would never grow up. Le Sigh.

So here is my newest plan to distract me from the inevitable, birthday traditions! When 'J' was turning ONE, we didn't think about it much, because lets face it, they don't have a clue whats going on. We threw him a huge 1st Bday party (It was a Little MAN 'Stache Bash by the way & freaking awesome. Complete with 'little' food!). It was more of a celebration for us for passing the 1st year as parents than it was for him.
This year we are taking him to the African Safari Drive-Thru about 2 hours away in Ohio. Then staying the night at The Great Wolf Lodge. We are considering that as his 'gift', since we have a large family & he will be getting lots of gifts from others at his birthday party. A themed birthday party, because what's a party with no theme? Not one of MY parties that's what! To take a gander at some of the fun, click HERE.

So now he is going to be TWO, much different from ONE, as I'm sure you all know. He actually has an understanding of what is going on around him, so I think we need to make it EXCITING!

Now is the time, folks.
Now is the time to start Family Birthday Traditions that will carry through over the years to come.
Now is the time to put on our thinking caps.

Just to recap- The time...is NOW.

Here are a few that I have seen around or come up with:
*Every meal is a celebration! Put candles on a stack of pancakes in the morning, on a sandwich at lunch & finally on dessert (CAKE!) after dinner.
*Hang streamers from the bedroom door so as soon as they get up the party starts.
*When a little older add balloons to the bedroom floor during the night while they are sleeping.
*One we already started with 'J' last year is that we have him paint a small canvas & it goes on display throughout the year until his next birthday.

Here's his first Masterpiece :)

*A tradition from my family- you get to pick your Birthday Dinner. Whatever you want is what we have for dinner.

*A 'surprise adventure' on the day of. Like trip to the zoo, or putt-putt golf. Mini day trip if the Hubs can takeoff of work. I guess it depends on the weather & such, but something to add later on when a little older.

*I do have a tradition I do/did for myself, even though I don't care much for celebrating my birthday (Click here for my view on that)I refuse to work ON my Birth Anniversary. I can't really stick to that now, seeing as how I'm a "Homemaker, Child Rearer, don't get paid to WORK worker", but in my hayday I always took that day off. I guess it was more of personal principle than tradition. But all the same, that was my "thing".
And that's all I have so far.

What are your birthday traditions? Did your parents do anything special when you were little? Did you carry that through to your little ones?
Help a friend out, throw some ideas my way, pretty please?