Birthday Traditions & Stories

[Aaryanna]

[COLOR=DarkOrchid]Yesterday was Mariskah?s birthday (yes that?s a shameless way to say Happy Birthday in a thread even though the day is done) and it got me thinking about the things people do on their birthdays. So naturally I started taking a look online to see a bit about the history of birthdays and associated traditions. And since a quick search showed that the last birthday thread was over a year ago..It?s time for another one! ^_~

What I found online was rather interesting. ^_^

[INDENT][SIZE=1]The tradition of birthday parties started in Europe a long time ago. It was feared that evil spirits were particularly attracted to people on their birthdays. To protect them from harm, friends and family would to come be with the birthday person and bring good thoughts and wishes. Giving gifts brought even more good cheer to ward off the evil spirits. This is how birthday parties began.

At first it was only kings who were recognized as important enough to have a birthday celebration (maybe this is how the tradition of birthday crowns began?). As time went by, children became included in birthday celebrations.[/SIZE][/INDENT]

Now I?m sure that many countries have different customs as to what they do, for example, here in the USA it?s fairly common to have cake and candles and then once you light the candles sing happy birthday to the person in question. They are then suppose to make a wish and blow out the candles and if they get them all the first try then the wish will come true.

This is something my family has always done. We always have friends over as well and have a great time. Sometimes it?s a movie and pizza party, sometimes we take off somewhere up in the mountains and have a outdoors picnic, and other times we?ve had a dress up party if it?s near a holiday like Halloween. ^_^ I?ve been to a number of those and it?s great fun to dress up!

So what traditions do any of you follow or do you have any fun or interesting birthday stories to share? I think the funniest story for my birthday was last year when I got a stuffed animal for a gift. It was a black dog that was as big as my own dog and when I opened that present she mistook it for a real one and went nuts barking and growling at it. Even when I offered it to her so she could smell it, she ran and hid behind a chair and kept growling. She?s since gotten use to it, but every know and then she?ll look at it sitting on my shelf and growl as if to remind it that she hasn?t forgotten that it?s there. [/COLOR]

[Andy]

[SIZE=1][COLOR=DarkRed]Well, as far as I know, I don't think my family has any special traditions that we do on eachother's birthday's. But I do remember a little story about my 8th birthday party. I think it was when I went to Chuckie Cheese's and had my little pizza party. And then when Chuckie came out I said your a fake and kicked him in the shins. And now that I look back on that I think about how funny that really is. Your welcome.[/COLOR][/SIZE]

[ChibiHorsewoman]

[color=#9933ff][font=lucida calligraphy]Birthday traditions?

We don't really have one. We just go out to eat on the person's birthday then my mom's family will come over.

Yeah boring.

Do you want to hear a birthday story? Okay hmm, let me think.

Well there was the time that I had a sleepover birthday and one girl froze another girl's bra and they threw grapes. It got so crazy that I just went up stairs and slept in my room.

Then there's my twenty-first birthday where my friend took me out for an early dinner and we had some mixed drinks and I thought I had gotten drunk.I didn't though[/color][/font]

[Sho Ayori]

Let see... traditions. I suppose my family's tradition is to go bowling every time it's one of our birthday. My sister and my birthdays are the times we do that, since our parents prefer to go out for the evening on theirs. In any case, my sister and I have to outplay each other in ten-pin bowling, which can get ugly sometimes.
If we have to have the sidelines up, my sister uses a sneaky move where she rebounds her ball side to side on the barriers, and she nearly always gets a strike. I, on the other hand, try her technique but it doesn't seem to work for me. :animesigh

[Panda]

Since I am the youngest member of my immediate family we have a boring "grown-up" birthday gathering. I hesitate to use the word celebrations since all this gathering consists of is my parents, brother, husband and myself. We usually go out to dinner. My birthday is January 3 while my older brother is January 4 so we end up celebrating our birthdays together.

As for stories I only have one about my brother's 2nd birthday. It kind of counts as my birthday story since it deals with my actual day of birth. Since my mom was in the hospital giving birth to me and dad had to work my brother had to celebrate his 2nd birthday with only my grandparents. All of his birthday pictures has him sitting there with a huge frown on his face. I joke with him that I am the best birthday gift he has ever received!

Truth be known I feel really bad when looking at his unhappy face in all his 2nd birthday pictures. On a different note he is the only one to have 2 birthday parties without having to share them with anyone else. When we had birthday parties we only had one cake with both our names on it. I have never had a birthday party just for me, it's always been with my big bro. It's like being a twin without the coolness.

[Papa Smurf]

Birthday traditions? My family engages in organized tournament-style hand-to-hand combat. Two men enter, one man leaves.

[Sangome]

[size=1]If you count the typical "blow out the candles and make a wish" thing as a tradition, then yes, that's my tradition. 'Cept the cake is ice cream cake, seeing as how I hate traditional birthday cake.

Anyway, normally for my birthday, my parents try to take me out somewhere, if applicable. This year, I went to St. Louis. My father gave me 100 smackeroos (he DID buy me one thing, Kingdom Hearts II, for the curious), went to a mall in the suburbs, and went crazy. I bought two games (Katamari Damacy and Ys: Ark of Napishtim, again for the curious), three anime DVDs (Nuku Nuku TV, Angelic Layer, and FMA volume 4, again for the curious; the first two DVDs were only five dollars each!), went into a giant arcade and wasted money on Soul Calibur II: Arcade, and had sushi in the food court while my parents ate McDonalds, which is...rather sad, when you think about it. Oh, I also wandered meaninglessly in Borders for a good long while.

...Okay that story was rather boring. For a more humorous one -- on my seventh birthday, it came time to blow out the candles. My mother - bless her soul, she was only trying to make me a good party - bought trick candles instead of real candles, So we had to dunk the candles in water while I sat there wondering "What the heck just happened?". So yeah, that sums it up, heh.


...But MAN, that was some good sushi.[/size]

[ChibiHorsewoman]

[QUOTE=Sangome][size=1]If you count the typical "blow out the candles and make a wish" thing as a tradition, then yes, that's my tradition. 'Cept the cake is ice cream cake, seeing as how I hate traditional birthday cake.
[/size][/QUOTE]

[color=#9933ff][font=lucida calligraphy]Hey I get ice cream cake too. But I like regular cake as well. One of my friends who lives in Quebec gets something called Gardineir for his birthday.... That sounds good too. Man I need to stop talking about cake... actually I shouldn't because I have to go order one for Saturday.

I have another two birthday stories to share one is mine and one is my daughter's... the second one is like the birthday story Panda had posted... because it was my daughter's birth... so it was her birthday.

Okay well I turned twenty-five this year and we went out to the King and I- a Thai resturaunt in my area. That was good, really good. I tried to feed Abby tofu and she actually ate some... Anyways as it's tradition for my mom's family (my mama, papa aunt Marty (mom's younger sister), aunt Kathy (Mom's older sister) and uncle Dave (mom's older sister's husband)) to come over my aunt Marty brought the ice cream cake.

Well my mom had gone up to the grocery store to get me some birthday cards and my aunt Marty arrived with the cake (and my Dixie Chicks CD! and a card from my cousin that said: 1.) Forget about the past you can't change it 2.) Forget about the present, I didn't get you one.) and we left the cake out to thaw out a bit.

So it's July and warm out and my mom hasn't gotten back from the grocery store yet because she has high standards for humorous cards and the cake is starting to melt. My mom finally gets back and my parents get the bright idea to put twenty-six candles on the cake, one for each year I've been alive plus one for good luck. Nice idea right? Well it would be, but they had to light them too. So the cake is melting all over the kitchen table while my family sings 'Happy Birthday to you" and I'm expected to blow out the candles. Well I did, but not before laughing at the melted cake. Really they may as well have set the whole thing on fire instead of bothering to put candles on it.

The second story isn't as involved. I had been in labor for five real hours- I don't count the first twelve because the contractions didn't hurt that much- when my daughter's head finally crowns (is that what you call it?) As my OBGYN is saying that she sees the head I hear my ex whine: Eww I think something got on my shoes! All I can think of between the encouragement of my doctor and family is the fact that I'm almost done pushing an object the size of a toaster out of an opening the size of a tampon, I have had an epidural shot right in my back and I haven't eatten in twenty-four hours and you're whining about your shoes instead of being a proper birthing coach? Thank God for my mom and aunt Kathy! And good riddence.

Oh and Panda. My mom would really sympathize with you and your brother. She's a year and nine days younger than her older sister and she feels like everyone forgets her birthday since it's right after her sisters. There have been occasions where they've had joint parties.[/color][/font]

[SunfallE]

[COLOR=RoyalBlue]Well the story I?ll never forget in regards to birthdays is for one of my older brothers. For what ever reason he and some friends decided to buy several cartons of eggs on his birthday and go driving on Brigham Young University campus and throw eggs at the students. I?m sure you can imagine my parents surprise when instead of coming home for his birthday party, instead they got a call from campus police as my brother and his friends got arrested!

My mom was so mad and my dad was doing his best to not laugh. In the end they went down and picked him up and as a result his party was canceled. And my parents made him wait for a while before he could have his presents too. I think he also got his driving privileges revoked for several months due to that incident. [/COLOR]

[2010DigitalBoy]

[COLOR=DarkOrange]Birthdays. For me, a long and winding road.

The most memorable thing about each of my birthdays is always the cake. My mom is the golden goddess of cake building (I say building because she is levels above anyone who claims to 'make' cakes). My mom makes enormous cakes and back when she was really into it she would make them multi-layered. For my 7th birthday I had a four-story [B]Charizard [/B] the length of my kitchen table.

Anyway, my first 9 birthdays were all the same, but awesome. We would invite all my friends (and neighboors) and my mom created all sorts of elaborate and fun games ([B]Pin the Tail on Squirtle, Ring Toss with Kia-saurus[/B]) and it was general fun.

My tenth birthday I was in cub-scout camp and my 11th birthday we were poor, so I just had a cake but no party. Was still grateful, though.

My 12th b-day was the last normal one as I had some friends come with my to Ocean Breeze Fun Park.

13, 14, and 15 have been different though. I still get presents, eat cake and act like I rule the world, but no more parties. [/COLOR]

[Japan]

[COLOR=DarkRed]For most of my life before I moved to England, I used to go to my dad's co-worker's farm to enjoy fireworks and have a BBQ. It was mainly a Fourth of July Celebration, but they celebrated it on my birthday which is the day before.

Anyways, we'd always set off fireworks, eat a lot of good food and just have fun.

After I moved to England, we always went somewhere fun for my birthday. In fact, whenever my birthday came around, my dad had these business trips to go to. So I got to hang out in Southern Germany once, got to go to Northern England near Scotland, and the first year I was in England, my mom took me to Legoland....yes Legoland.

Now, what we mostly do for all family members now because we are in the states and all adults, we go out for a nice dinner somewhere or my mom cooks the one who's one year older their favorite meal. Fun stuff and yummy too!

EDIT: Oh and I forgot to mention. My family also have thsi tradition where for your tenth birthday, you can go to anywhere in the US you wanted. My dad took my brother to Chicago for his and my mom took my sister and I on our tenth birthdays to California to see our aunt. Fun stuff.[/COLOR]

[AzureWolf]

[COLOR=maroon]I used to get the Carvel ice cream cake, but now I just don't have time (I still do that for my little bro, though, even if it does piss him off, haha). The only semi-traditional thing is going to a local cold stone creamery and getting the free birthday ice cream thing they have if you let them know your birthday on their website.

God, I feel like I'm advertising instead of telling people things, lol![/COLOR]

[SaiyanPrincessX]

[SIZE=1]I just celebrated my birthday last friday, and my brother's the sunday before that. ^_^

My birthday was usually always cake, ice cream, candles, presents. Yeah, the traditional, and it was always fun. My mom always made the cake, never bought it(except an ice cream cake a few diffrent times). Store bought cakes look fancy, but all taste like lard.

Sometimes we would get pizza or something, and of course have friends over. I remember most of my birthdays well. Its been pretty much the same even up to now, with occational changes. :p I remember one year, I think I was four or five, a friend of my mom dressed up as a lion, and I was terrified. We have it on video, its funny watching it; I looked like I was going to cry. One year I had a tea party.. I can't think of my 'real' exciting ones though.

Birthday's were so much more fun when you're younger, I really miss that. Not to say they arn't now, but its not the same. The awe and excitement isn't quite there anymore.

My recent birthday was with my dad and brother. Dad made speghetti. Someone I work with bought me a cassata cake, with 'Happy Birthday Becky' on it, from some really good bakery. Yeah, well it was like any bought cake, disgusting. So we had a little piece of it, then my brother and I literally destroyed it. Lol! It was mush wen we were done. Luckily my dad had some ice cream in the freezer so we had a little of that to make up for it. Then I opened presents, floor mats for my car, legos(airplane), yeah I asked for legos; and Gex 3 for N64. I also ordered two things online as part of my gift. I ordered them on the 9th, and they just shipped it today. o_O Cafe Press sucks.

Saturday my brother and I drove to my mom's to celebrate our birthday there. My grandma was visiting too, her birthday was the 19th. She made pumpkin pie, so that was my 'cake' over there. I prefer pie over cake anyway.

So that was my fun filled birthday. :p[/SIZE]

[Gavin]

[SIZE=1]Interesting, most interesting.

In a handful of words, my family's birthday traditions are summed up thusly, cake, candles, sing happy birthday, give presents and eat cake, then if there happens to be a good movie on, watch said movie.

Perhaps the only little quirk we have is that there's a Rock-Paper-Scissors competition to see who gets the second piece of cake, seeing as the first goes to the birthday person.[/SIZE]

[nezzyjean]

In my family, we do the cake and balloons and presents and all of that jazz, but the fun part is my grandma. She makes everyone (adults and children) in our family a "Goodie Box" which is any random box that has exactly 7 presents inside wrapped with the newspaper's comic section. They are usually gag gifts and are always from garage sales, the fun is all in opening them.

But, there are a few rules:
1) EVERYONE in the family must be there to watch you open them
2) You must ALWAYS open the card first
3) You must check every present before opening it to make sure it doesn't say "Open Last" on it.
4) The present is NEVER what the box its inside says it is.

Also, after singing the happy birthday song, we have the birthday person stand up and tell us their age, and then we sing them some song about an old gray mare..

My family is kindof eccentric.