Birthday traditions

March 14, 2025 1:54 PM

It's my son's first birthday in early May and I'm starting to think about how to celebrate/mark the occasion.

We'll do a normal party with friends and family but I'm looking for something we can do/give on the actual day, probably just with the three of us. What birthday traditions do you recall from your childhood or have you done with your own children? I'm thinking of something I could do each year - could be something meaningful and poignant or entirely whimsical and fun. I guess the only requirement is that it can be done every year in some form. Could be a gift, experience or something we can do together. I'm purposefully leaving it quite open as I'm not too sure exactly what I'm looking for and I want a variety of ideas!

posted by toebeans to Human Relations (15 answers total)

Take the same picture every year?
posted by St. Peepsburg at 2:23 PM on March 14 [5 favorites]

For what it's worth ... I shot a can of whipped cream into their mouths at pretty much every birthday party we had for our two daughters. Got to be a thing. Their friends really talked about it.
posted by lpsguy at 2:54 PM on March 14 [7 favorites]

You could perhaps plant a tree and photograph your child with that tree each year as they grow together. (This is something my family did for me.)
posted by reren at 3:01 PM on March 14 [10 favorites]

If you have a family home, now is the first opportunity to notch the chap's height on the kitchen door-jamb. If renting, get a 6 ft = 2 m lath, slat or dowel. Hand- foot-prints ditto.
posted by BobTheScientist at 3:05 PM on March 14 [4 favorites]

We took a photo every year of the kid standing in front of their father. In the first year, they are wedged between Dad's feet. Eventually,they got so tall we had to shift to a side angle so you could still see their father. The sequence of photos is precious!

My husband's family had a tradition of lighting a life candle that burns throughout the day of their birthday. (You can put a second candle in the melted remains of the first if the candle burns down too fast.) We bought thin sheets of colored beeswax to decorate the candle - a fun project once the kiddo is a little bigger.
posted by metahawk at 3:17 PM on March 14 [5 favorites]

Couple of things that can be nice (that I didn't do myself but have seen people do):

Hang up a nice banner. A banner with felt letters is cute and you can take a picture with it each year. (I borrowed one one year for Covid birthday.)

Another family I know had a special birthday plate. I looked for one I liked and never quite found one that I loved. But it was sweet.

Another family I know does a fresh flower crown, which is also sweet.
posted by vunder at 5:00 PM on March 14 [1 favorite]

I know a person who took the same picture every year-- and, starting in year 2, holding the previous year's picture in a frame.
posted by blnkfrnk at 5:26 PM on March 14 [3 favorites]

This sounds simple, but we keep gifts hidden until the morning of the birthday. That morning (or really the evening before, once the bday person has gone to sleep) I set out the gifts and some decorations (a happy birthday banner and normally a few balloons or some streamers) displayed nicely in the dining room. The gifts are part of the decoration for the day. We open gifts in the evening. This is very basic but it’s not exactly how my family did it growing up and I like it.
posted by samthemander at 6:11 PM on March 14 [1 favorite]

You know I still have a tall paper crown that my mother made and that I and my sister decorated with stickers and drawings from a very young birthday party. It's a sweet and special thing that I so appreciate still having. Other family members also got handmade and decorated crowns over the years, including my dad when he turned 75!
posted by brookeb at 6:37 PM on March 14

My family tradition is that after you sing the Happy Birthday song and blow out the candles, somebody feeds the birthday person the first bite of the cake.
posted by creatrixtiara at 2:25 AM on March 15

growing up i had a birthday tablecloth, which was a plain white tablecloth that friends/family at my birthday would sign and decorate with fabric crayons each year. over time it became a record of everyone important in my life: it has messages of love from my grandparents, a drawing of toddler me done by my first best friend, jokes written by friends who have moved across the country. it's an amazing memento of my childhood, and i'm so glad my parents thought to start it and that i still have it.
posted by emmling at 4:00 AM on March 15 [4 favorites]

You might like this book - I have a similar age baby and am also thinking about traditions, the book has lots of ideas. It is called The Book of New Family Traditions: How to Create Great Rituals for Holidays and Everyday.
posted by AnnaRat at 8:16 AM on March 15 [2 favorites]

Here's a tradition from my family. We're Dutch.

On your birthday, you get the very special Birthday Boterham (that word means a slice of bread). It's cut into as many pieces as you are turning years old, and each piece has something different on it. This makes it very festive.
When you are turning six, this is easy: you'll get jam, chocolate sprinkles, cheese, apple syrup, liverwurst and peanut butter.
When you are turning twelve, weird things like sugar, a slice of pickle, or a smear of mayonnaise will start showing up and it's probably about time you're declared too old for this tradition.
posted by Too-Ticky at 9:19 AM on March 15 [5 favorites]

In my family, before my birthday, I’d get to pick a box of sugar cereal to have with breakfast starting on my birthday morning. Cocoa Krispies, (what was then called) Super Sugar Crisp, Honey Smacks, Frosted Flakes, anything was fair game. We’d all eat it, and once it was gone, it was back to the usual lower sugar choices like Cheerios, Kix, or Chex… until the next sibling’s birthday. Prosaic but memorable for all of us — my sister carries on the tradition with her kids now.
posted by daisyace at 10:53 AM on March 15 [2 favorites]

One from my family: on your actual birthday, you get presents in a treasure hunt. You wake up and there is a card with a clue in it, and that clue leads you to a present that has another clue, etc. It would probably not work well at one, but even at two you can read the "clues" and send the kid running.

When we were little they were just rhymes with instructions (Go get a drink and look under the sink. It's not up in the air, it's behind Papa's chair) As we got older they became harder (It's not up in the air, it's behind Papa's _____) and then more abstract (Brush your teeth and wash your face; you'll find this gift beneath that place)

A friend's tradition: on your birthday morning you wake up to your bedroom full of balloons. She'd blow up a dozen or two 12-inch balloons (not helium, just scattered on the floor and furniture. A huge pile of balloons is INSANELY fun for kids of almost any age (again, not totally safe for a one year old, but fun to look at).
posted by gideonfrog at 5:51 PM on March 15