Fun Family Birthday Traditions

Here are some ideas to make your birthdays special and unique:

Special Breakfast

Serve the birthday person their favorite breakfast in bed.

Birthday Place Setting

Decorate a chair at the table with ribbons and balloons. The birthday person gets to sit in their throne for every meal. Decorate their place setting as well with a designated “special” plate and cup you can use only for birthdays.

Surprise Decorations

Decorate their bedroom while they’re sleeping so they wake up to a surprise.

National Birthday Traditions

Find out what your nationality does for birthdays. Many birthday traditions come from different countries. Directly after singing “Happy Birthday,” my family sings “Lang zal hij leven,” the Dutch birthday song.

Opening Presents

Mix up your present opening routine so it’s not all right after another. What’s a present if it’s easy to get? Here are ways to have fun while opening presents and make it last longer:

• Set up a treasure hunt to find the presents. Have new clues attached to each present in a new location. Our hunts started around the house but have spread to around the neighborhood. A treasure hunt around town would be super fun, though, especially for a 16^th birthday since they get to do the driving!

• The classic “Heavy, Heavy Hang Over” is a great way to pause and think about the gift giver and thank them with a “wish” before thinking about the gift. It’s also really fun to see what creative things the kids come up with to “wish.”

• Lead them to their presents with the “Hot & Cold” game. Hide their presents before they come into the room. Guide them to their gifts by saying warmer…hotter…burning up, as they approach the hiding spot and colder…freezing…ice as they move or look in the wrong direction.

What are some fun and unique birthday traditions in your family?

Featured image courtesy of Flickr.

Strategies for Holiday Shopping on a Budget

Here are some strategies for making your money go farther when shopping for the holidays.

1. Compare Prices. This one step could mean the difference of a few dollars, but every dollar counts. Go to comparison sites online as well as check the sale circulars in your local Sunday paper. You do not have to pay the first price you see, but with pre-planning you can find the lowest prices and plan your shopping ahead of time.

2. Barter and Trade Services for Goods. Consider trading your service or expertise with someone who has what you need. Talk to everyone you know about your plan and ask if they know someone who would be willing to trade. If you have computer skills, you might trade cleaning up their computer in exchange for three gift baskets from a gift basket designer. The possibilities are endless.

3. Make a List of What You Want to Buy Early and Stick With a Certain Dollar Amount. Make a list, check it twice, and do it early. Planning ahead of time can save a lot of money. Have a set dollar amount to spend on each gift or for all gifts. You will stay within your budget and combined with comparing prices, you could come out with quite a few very nice gifts.

4. Agree to Limit Gift Giving to One or Two Gifts Each. How many times do we overload the kids on gifts that get broken the very same day or within a week? We even do this with other family members too. So decide to limit gift giving to just one or two gifts for the kids in your family and just one for your significant other.

5. Put Together Gift Baskets for a Family. In the spirit of limiting the gifts you give, consider giving family gift baskets to your extended family instead of individual gifts. This keeps the cost down and may foster closer family relationships. The basket could be a game or movie along with a box of popcorn, simple bowls, and matching cups from the dollar store or other discount store. Decorate it nicely and deliver on Christmas day.

Shopping for the Holidays doesn’t have to be expensive with a little pre-planning. Keep the gifts simple and limiting them are very good strategies. Try it this year and see the difference in your bank account and on the faces of your loved ones.

TodaysMama and Provo Craft are giving away a sleighful of gifts this holiday season and to enter, I’m sharing this meme with you. Did I mention this giveaway features $3,800 in prizes? For those of you that know me, you know I’m not exaggerating, because if I were, I’d exaggerate using an odd number. LOL!

Click here to check out the ginormous amount of goods.

To enter to win them, all you need to do is the following three things:

1. Answer the questions in this meme on your blog.
2. Make sure to post links back to TodaysMama.com and Provo Craft (using this link: http://bit.ly/4ikY3c ).
3. Tag your friends!

Create a Wishlist!

1. What 5 items are top on your holiday wish list?

• A piano
• A trip to India
• Maid service (even one a month would be heavenly!)
• A trip to New York City (I would love to get this gift early, so I can go this December!)
• A new printer like my old one (where the sheets feed into the copier)

2. What is your favorite handmade gift you have received?

Do my grandma’s banana cookies count? Honestly… there is no better handmade gift than that!

3. What handmade gift have you always wanted to tackle?

I’d love to knit a hat as long as someone else could do the knitting for me!

4. What was the best Christmas gift you received as a child?

Holly Hobby Easy Bake Oven… hands down the best gift evah!

5. What items are top on your kids wish list this year?

• My 6YO wants an electric guitar.
• My 8YO wants us to get a piano. He’s willing to forego toys for it!

6. What is your favorite holiday food?

Where to begin?

• Reindeer cookies
• My MIL’s sugar cookies
• Saurkraut
• My mom’s prime rib roast
• Caramel Apple Spice from Starbuck’s
• Hot chocolate
• Veggie trays (especially if I got to chop the veggies)
• Olives (especially when eaten off my finger tips… tell me you did that as a kid too!)

7. What will you be hand-crafting for the holidays?
Thankfully, nada (unless making reindeer cookies as neighbor gifts counts)!

8. What is your favorite holiday movie?
All of them! I love holiday movies!!! If I had to choose just one, I would probably say How The Grinch Stole Christmas, especially the part when his heart pops out of his chest!

9. Favorite holiday song?
I can’t choose just one:

• Oh Come All Ye Faithful
• We Three Kings/Star of Wonder by BNL & Sarah McLaughlin
• Bring the Torch, Jeanette Isabella
• That one by the Osmond’s that @troypattee dies for (can’t remember the name… not Puppy Love though!)

10. Favorite holiday pastime?
Giving!

Tag! You’re It!

Now, it’s tag time! I’d love to see answers to these questions from all of you, but since the task is to tag some of you and since tagging all of you would mean the rest of you would have no one to tag, here we go!

• Amy from Mom Spark
• Niri from Mommy Niri
• Robyn from Pensieve Robin
• Melissa from Isly
• Carissa from Good and Crazy People
• Angie from 7 Clown Circus
• Elizabeth from Parenting Pink
• Kim from Crafty Mama of 4
• Holly from June Cleaver Nirvana
• Jenny from Jenny on the Spot

Prize

Three lucky winners will receive the following prizes in this PBS KIDS gift pack (retail value $100 each):

• Electric Company Backpack on wheels
• PBS Kids baseball hat
• Curious George plush
• PBS Kids T-shirt
• Steve Songs CD
• Music from Dinosaur Train
• Sesame Street Playground (Songs and videos from Around the World)
• Martha Speaks book
• Super Why book
• PBS Kids Color Foil book
• Super Why Hidden Word Puzzle
• PBS Kids USB port
• Sid The Science Kid Toy Microphone
• PBS Parents photo envelop

Entry Requirements

To enter for a chance to win, you are required to do the following three things. Make sure to leave a comment here linking to each one:

1. Check out the http://pbskidsgo.org/lunchlab site and leave a comment here about your or your child’s favorite part of the site.
2. Comment on the PBS Kids Healthy Eating for the Holidays Whrrl story and leave a comment here, letting us know you did so.
3. Retweet and/or post the following two messages on Facebook and Twitter and comment here, linking to your update/post:

GIVEAWAY! Enter 4 chance 2 win $100 gift pack from #pbskids (3 Winners!). http://bit.ly/3PlZta PLS RT

Visit http://pbskidsgo.org/lunchlab 4 gr8 healthy eating/cooking w/kids tips just in time 4 holiday cooking/baking! #pbskids PLS RT

Extra Entries

You can earn up to two extra entries this week. Leave a comment for each one on this post!

1. Follow @pbsparents on Twitter.
2. Become a fan of the PBS Kids Facebook page.

The Fine Print

No purchase necessary to enter. Winners will be selected randomly through http://random.org. PBS and Mom It Forward employees are ineligible to participate. All entries received after Wednesday, November 18 at midnight PT will not be considered. Entries that do not follow all of the entry requirements will not be considered. Winners will be notified and will have 24 hours to confirm receipt of the e-mail. If they do not reply within 24 hours, another winner will be selected. Open to participants in the US and Canada 18 years and older. One entry per person.

Join us at the #gno Twitter party this Tuesday from 9-11 p.m. ET as we discuss creative holiday gift giving with our friends from Crayola. They, along with other amazing women in our community, will be sharing shopping tips and highlighting the latest and greatest from Crayola (like this project created with the new Glow Dome, left)—just in time for the holidays.

Also, join the #gno Whrrl story to share your holiday shopping tips! Click here to join, contribute to, or view.

What: Crayola is sponsoring this week’s #gno Twitter party (Click here to learn about #gno!)

When: Tuesday, November 10, 9-11 p.m. EST

Where: Click here to party with us on our custom Tweetgrid. (Use hashtags #gno and #crayola.)

Topic: Creative Gift Giving

Who: @carissarogers @cerisecheri @crayola @gograhamgo @jollymom @makeandtakes @noflashcards @skybluestacy

Party Favors: Click here to enter for a chance to win products from Crayola just in time for the holidays.


RSVP: Please leave your Twitter ID in the comments to follow and be followed (on Twitter, of course!) by other #gno gals. The best format is as follows: http://twitter.com/jylmomIF.