…but all the fun.
Because their late November birthdays usually fall on or very near Thanksgiving, Cate and Felicity’s parties often get wedged into the other festivities. They have dealt with this offense cheerfully enough, but still. For all of her life, and granted she is only five, Felicity has been lamenting the fact that she never gets an outdoor party complete with piñata and kids and fun and high fructose corn syrup.
“Well,” thought the doting mama, “I have so little to do with my time these days. Why not have a half birthday celebration complete with half a cake and a piñata between them?” (Cate and Felicity were born exactly two years and a day apart. I think that Cate has more or less resigned herself to “unique” or even dual celebrations, starting with the day that I was deep in the throes of labor on her 2nd birthday.)
And so we did. (Have a Half Birthday celebration, that is.)
Here are the girls with their purse piñata.
And here is Felicity struggling to carry it over to the lawn from the van. I make my kids do all the work, and half birthdays are no exception.
We had been at an end-of-the-year roller-skating party for our homeschool co-op. What providence! I easily convinced the girls that that party was being held in their honor—I’m kidding—and then talked several of the children into coming for the piñata after. It took me like, two seconds to convince them.
Here is Felicity going up to bat. Note that our friend Amy is wisely averting her face from any misplaced swings.
And here is a shot of our happy hostess, surrounded by mendicants in search of taffy. “Peasants!” I shouted. “My purse is empty!” Then I beat them back with the broomstick.
Despite the fact that she was the half birthday girl of honor and as such was supposed to behave honorably, Felicity couldn’t help cruising past the littler kids’ candy and wondering, “Hmm….if I make my move discreetly, I’ll bet I can score another tootsie roll.”
Not really.
Truth be told, there was plenty of sugar to go around–enough to last those kids well through their mama’s dinner prep and then some. Aren’t I sweet?
We closed by singing “Happy Birthday” of course, which in this case went like this:
Happy Birthday to you!
Happy Birthday, dear—”
And then we stopped. That was all they got.
I told you! It was a half birthday! The rest will come in November.
What fun! We celebrate each child’s first half a birthday (with half a cake and a half a gallon ice cream). The tradition was started by my older siblings when *I* was six months old because I was the first baby in NINE years and they couldn’t wait to celebrate my 1st birthday. 🙂
That is so sweet, Alicia! This was our first half birthday celebration and the older kids were like, hey! I reminded them (as is so often necessary) that we must never begrudge another man (or in this case, little girl) his/her good fortune. Such a hard lesson sometimes! In all things, though, we rejoice. 🙂
Your blog is a joy and a blessing to read. Good times, hard times, your love for Christ always shines through. What a wonderful witness you are! God bless.
That’s so cool of you! I really enjoyed reading about that!
SMB
What fun. That purse pinata is SO CUTE. Aslynn would love something like that.
I tried a half birthday for Aslynn. We made a cake that was so mangled that we actually could only eat half of it, so it was fitting.
Your girls are so cute, and your family seems like the life of the party over there in Minnesota! It seems that you always have friends around. Wish we could join you.
What a fun Mama you are!
🙂
Happy half-birthday to your two cuties.
My godmother did that with her girls! In their case it perked up a blah month in winter.
Beautiful. Thanks for sharing.
What a great idea! Looks like the girls had a great time!
Wow!!! I have celebrated my half birthday most of my life (birthday’s on a holiday) and I have never had half a cake before. That’s pretty cool!
How fun! Our second came three days shy of our oldest’s second birthday, and then our third came eight days before our second’s second birthday. (Got that? lol)
Then came Leo, five years and three months later. We’re all sort of bewildered, still, at the buying of birthday presents in Not July.