First off – happy, happy birthday to Carrie Ann Ryan! Her birthday falls squarely on my wedding anniversary, which puts me in a celebratory mood, which then benefits you, dear readers.
Since it’s a birthday blog hop, I’m going to talk about a birthday tradition in my family. This started with my mother, and we’ve carried it forward through the years with our own children.
I don’t come from a family with a lot of money – and I still don’t have a lot of money. So when you’re talking shoestring budgets, going out to eat for everyone’s birthday – and taking the entire family – is a financial burden designed to topple the precarious house of cards known as personal finances.
So Mom would make us our favorite meal for our birthday, along with our favorite kind of dessert with or without our favorite ice cream. Now, I have a lot of favorite meals as an adult, but as a kid I was a pretty picky eater. One vegetable I’ve always adored, even when I was young, is cabbage. So frequently, my birthday dinner would be cabbage buns, or as my dad called them, kraut buns (even when they weren’t made with sauerkraut but with fresh cabbage).
What is your favorite birthday tradition? Tell me in a comment below. One lucky commenter will win a pair of handmade (by yours truly) clothespin angels, the perfect accompaniment to my novella Malakh.
The blog lineup ( stop by Carrie Ann’s blog first because, yanno, it’s her birthday. ;-)):
Writer Unleashed 
My favorite birthday tradition was basically my mom, my brother, and me celebrating with cake. And presents, of course. I was raised by a single mom, and she sometimes wasn’t sure how she was going to buy groceries, but she never, EVER let my brother and me know that. I didn’t actually know that until fairly recently. We didn’t know we were poor. LOL. And there was always cake and presents even if there wasn’t a big party with bunches of people. Just family. It was awesome.
I love the “just family” birthdays – so much less pressure. I hated it when one of my kids wanted to have a birthday party – I’m definitely not a natural hostess. LOL
My favorite birthday tradition is on their birthday I spend the day with my child. I take the to their favorite restaurant and just do fun stuff with them.
Thanks for participating!
Happy Birthday Carrie Ann!
slinkydennis@yahoo.com
My favorite tradition is the birthday cake! every year I get chocolate with peanut butter icing my grandmother makes cakes for a living, so my cake is always amazing lol.
brandon_savannah@yahoo.com
We didn’t do a whole lot for birthdays when I was little but the one thing we always had was a cake either made by my mom or grandma. I think that’s why my sister does so much for her girls birthday parties.
sstrode at scrtc dot com
I loved it when my mom made cakes. She had taken a Wilton’s cake decorating course and she made some fantastic cakes – and we got to eat a lot of frosting while she was practicing making flowers. lol
family b-days are wonderful!
diannaandpaul@yahoo.com
My favorite birthday tradition is having my favorite cake made.
My favorite birthday tradition is for the birthday person to choose what we eat all day. It can be anything!! Dinner is usually someplace that is my favorite. I love having burgers for breakfast, dessert for lunch, and then mexican for dinner. All my choice.
Mel
bournmelissa at hotmail dot com
The homemade cake:) We always get to pick the cake we want and grandma would make it. I do it now…mom kind of got skipped because she HATES baking but I love it. I make my daughters cake too!!
viajeradelmar@aol.com
We do birthday cards, birthday cake and a nice meal. And Homemade is better. 🙂
Deb P
R.d1@myfairpoint.,net
My favorite thing about my birthday is being with my parents and siblings. Its just us and we cook dinner (usually my favorite) and my dad (who cant cook at all) bakes me a cake, that is actually great awesome! 🙂 We eat dinner, pop in a movie, and eat cake and ice cream. I hate when theres a bunch of people. So starters, i hate being the center of attention and i hate that my family fights on both sides. So when its just my immediate family, its nice. I really enjoy the bonding. Especially when we talk about “back in the day” stories. lol Thank you!!
shadowluvs2read(at)gmail(dot)com
When I was growing up, our birthday celebrations were pretty much the same as yours. Family dinner, cake, etc. I always asked my mom to make peanut butter fudge for my birthday instead of cake (I love it).
June
manning_j2004 at yahoo dot com
Your birthday tradition is very sweet. I don’t have any special tradition. My hubby will take me out to a special dinner–restaurant of my choosing. His birthday is more special because we got married on his birthday. I give him a birthday gift and he gives me an anniversay present–so we both enjoy the day!
catherinelee100 at gmail dot com
My favorite tradition is letting the birthday person choose whatever they want for dinner on their birthday!
Happy Birthday Carrie Ann!
Birthdays for us were about family dinners. Maybe a present, usually a card and our favorite meal.
suz2(at)cox(dot)net
My mom did the same thing. I would always ask for roast beef, mashed potatoes, gravy and creamed spinach. To this day I prefer a cheap rump roast to a prime rib roast.
Anne
acm05atjuno.com
Omg, we have the same tradition I started with my kids. We have 9 and eating out is very costly unless we do McD’s dollar menu. We have two birthdays next week and the one turning 18 picked tacos and the boy turning 16 hasn’t given me his choice yet.
Happy Birthday Carrie Ann.
Z
Seawitch Reviews @ yahoo.com
Oh and I forgot, Happy A-Day to you too.
Z
I can’t say that I really have a tradition but the last few years my twin and I have made it a habit to go out to lunch and a movie on our birthday. So that’s about it.
Thank you for celebrating Carrie Ann’s birthday by participating in the blog hop and for the giveaway as well.
Pam
vanillaorchids69(at)gmail(dot)com
It sounds like you have a great birthday tradition. Who better to share it with than a twin!
On my birthday we always got to go to the beach after a party. Then all of the family had a big picnic
Oh, I love the beach. Couple it with cake & presents – paradise!!
My family didn’t celebrate my birthday when I was growing up – so my favorite way to celebrate now is when my husband insists on me choosing some kind of decadent dessert for my birthday. He’s a sweetheart 😀
Thank you so much for participating in this hop and for the wonderful giveaway chance!
Happy birthday to Carrie and to everyone celebrating an April birthday!
Gena Robertson
robertsongena@hotmail.com
Awww, that IS sweet! My kids got me this death by chocolate cake once. OMG OMG!! It was sooooo good. Sinfully rich – I felt naughty eating it.
Usually my daughters take me out to lunch for my birthday and I really enjoy that. I don’t care a lot for cake, unless it’s cheesecake, so I always tell them not to get me a cake.
Linda
seriousreader at live dot com
No cake? *dies of shock* I adore cake, as my well-rounded figure confirms. But cheesecake is good. Awesome, in fact.
Blog Hopping! Woohoo! Happy Birthday Carrie Ann!
What a great way to discover new authors/blogs and visit with old friends. Everybody wins this way!
Thanks for being part of the hop and for the chance to win such a fantastic prize!
reneebennett35(at)yahoo(dot)com
My favorite birthday tradition is getting a cake.
bn100candg(at)hotmail(dot)com
I LOVE store-bought cakes-something about the frosting. I would skip dinner for an extra slice of cake. 😉
Thank you for participating in Carrie Anne’s birthday celebration!
bas1chsemail at gmail dot com
My pleasure! Unfortunately life happened in a big way this week, so I wasn’t able to be on top of this like I usually am.
My tradition was pretty similar. My family used to have a BIG family dinner every Sunday, and if it was someone’s birthday, that person got to pick the meal and the cake, and whoever in the family was the best at those dishes did the cooking!
elizabeth @ bookattict . com
I wish I could find someone to do the cooking! But it’s usually me or the hubs. *sigh*
We don’t have any fancy birthday traditions–just some of the birthday person’s favorite foods and sweets–our youngest usually chooses ice cream but not the cake, for instance 🙂 Happy anniversary, Sharon! And happy birthday, Carrie Ann!
f dot chen at comcast dot net
Birthday Blog-hoppers! I’m in the middle of attempting to make Random.org do what I want and pick me a winner from all your fabulous entries (it is NOT cooperating!). In the meantime, I’m making a pair of fabulous clothespin angels with real feather wings for the lucky winner.
Thank you for participating – I think Carrie Ann had a great birthday! 😉
Sorry that your having so much trouble.
Dang technology! Those angels sound so pretty! Will you take a picture when your done to show us please? Im so curious to see how they look! Those feather wings sound awesome! 🙂
I absolutely will – I had no time to assemble any before the blog hop. 😉
🙂 Great! Cant wait to see what they look like! They sound so pretty! 🙂
Lovely blog commenters,
I apologize in the delay in announcing the winner of the clothespin angels. Random.org kept choosing the control number – without fail – leading me to believe that there was no randomness happening. I finally chose a different venue and have assembled the angels (see blog post above, for the photograph).
The winner of the clothespin angels is Pam (VanillaOrchids). I’ll be contacting you, Pam, for mailing details, and everyone else to offer a consolation prize, at the email addresses you provided.
Thanks for participating and thanks for your patience!
Sharon