Drew Birthday Traditions

This year we had the privilege of considering the way we wanted to celebrate birthdays now we have children. I am grateful for Dave's leadership in saying that he wants the children to receive only one toy from us for each birthday. Why? "Life does not consist in the abundance of posessions", as Jesus said, and we don't want birthdays to become more focused on "getting" than they need to be. Also, family give us lovely gifts so the child already gets more than one present. Since I could only buy one toy, I put a lot of thought into which one! We ended up getting the Plan Walker (pictured above).

The tradition I'm most excited about, though, is our decision to also give away a gift at each birthday! We chose God put us on this earth to be givers, to remember the poor and to promote the gospel. How exciting to be able to do that at each birthday! We chose  iThemba Lethu for Nate, as we already support this orphan/HIV care ministry. Elnathan has visited there while in South Africa and had his picture taken for our album. I think that when he is old enough he will enjoy choosing his own gift recipient. Dave chose Door of Hope orphan care ministry for his birthday. In October it will be my turn. Yay! Of course, we continue to give throughout the year but this is something special for the birthday person to choose.

In addition to this, I started a small book to write notes of thanksgiving about the birthday child. We want to remember what God has done over the years and give thanks! Birthdays can be another way to remind ourselves of what our true life purpose is. We have some precious messages in Elnathan's book already. For more ideas on birthday celebrations, see Green and Simple Birthday Parties. How do you like to celebrate birthdays and praise God for the gift of life?