Birthday Parties 2 Weeks Apart

We had 3 girls - all 2 years apart. The first 2 actually have the same birthday, and the third shared her day with her grandmother, 4 days later. We solved the problem this way. We had the "kids" party for friends of all 3 on the birthday that was shared by the older girls. Then, we had the "family" party on the other birthday. That way they all got 2 parties, and family only had to come to one.

Hi S.,
If you rotate who's Birthday you celebrate it on (one year the younger child the next year the older child's birthday) one is not as likely to get as jealous of the other one. My birthday is close to Christmas so it was always hard to get together for a party with all the Christmas parties going on. I hated Christmas for a while since I couldn't have a party for myself and it seemed I always got one gift to cover both. =) My friend does the option above and it has worked most years, so far. As her daughter is getting older she does want her own birthday now. She is going to try it this year as a family party for the younger birthday and the older child gets a friend party a few weeks later. Watch for jealousy though. If you have them together and one gets "better" or "more expensive" gifts the other could get mad and ruin the party. (Remember kids don't care about the age difference, the younger one always wants what the older one gets.) Just my experience.
I hope this helps.

My three youngest who are still into birthday party's know that they must rotate their big party every year. Since their birthdays are one a month for three months, thy actually get a big party every third year. Big party being friends gathered either to go bowling, swimming, skating, etc. On their off year they simply have a small family birthday party at home.

S., We too have two boys, nine days shy of two years apart. They are the best of friends. We always celebrate with family on the actual day of their birthday's. We try to have joint parties for them when it comes to friends. We have seperate cakes, but since they are so close in age, a lot of their friends are the same. There is no right or wrong, especially when they are young. Good luck!

I am reading this with my eleven year old standing here. My boys are three years minus three weeks apart. Your boys really need seperate parties. I am speaking from experience. You don't have to spend a lot of money. Sometimes we do a clever pirate theme and go to the beach.....Have fun!

I think that sounds like a great idea. I would do the same, actually I will be as my two oldest (boy and girl) have birthday two weeks apart and I have done them seperately. Nightmare! I think when they get to be older though and have their own friends to invite that will not be an option so I am going to do it as long as I can!

My sisters birthday are 1 day apart (they are 1 year apart in age). We have always celebrated them together and after speaking to my sisters, they felt while it was nice to share they wanted their own time too. However as I say this, I think this really counted when they were a little older it made more sense to separate it but more so for the friends factor than the family.

Two of my child birthdays are two weeks apart and I keep it separate. Their birthday comes once a year and I feel for them this is their day. I have the same dilemma - family lives close by, do I want to go through this again - but I have decided that my children deserve their special day. I allow our families to decide whether they wish to partake in it or not. Here's the thing between my husband's and my family we have five birthdays in the the month of March and six birthdays in July. We celebrate everyone's. If it wasn't your child it could be someone else's child in your family having a party the next two weeks and it would put everyone in the same situation.

My kids are 2 years and 2 weeks apart exactly. My daughter is going to be 4 and my son, 2. In the past I have thrown them each a little party, pretty much just family but this year with a lot of new friends we are having a combined party the Sat between their b-days. I am throwing a Dora and Diego party, but with one cake, I am making a sheet cake and half will be yellow cake with pink dora frosting and design and the other half will be chocolate cake with blue diego frosting and designs. Since the party will have both boys and guests, I am making Diego party bags for the boys with boy toys in them and Dora for the girls. Also we are having a Dora treasure hunt before the cake and after the cake we are having a Diego rescue adventure. It is easy since they go together and I am not trying to mix barbie and transformers. You can also do a Spongebob party or a farm party, those things are good for kids of all ages. A few other ides: Pirates, football, batman or any type of rescue heros.

Good Morning S.! We have 3 boys who are all right at 5 yrs apart. The oldest 2 have always had a combined birthday party. My husband's parents live in GA. Since we didn't want them driving up in Oct and Nov, we just planned a combined birthday party.
On the child's actual birthday, we let them pick where they want to go to eat for dinner and we celebrate their birthday as a family over dinner. We get him a card with cash in it(at this age) that he can open at dinner.
We love to have family & friends over for cook outs, so we look at this combined birthday party as a perfect get-together excuse. LOL! Sometimes we will make it a "bring a covered dish dinner" where everyone brings...you guessed it, a coverd dish. We supply everything else.
Grandma (in GA), has always made their birthday cakes. That's part of the fun the day of the party. Grnadma gets up with the boys and decorates the cakes. Each one decides what theme he wants each year. The boys eat a ton of frosting that morning during decorating so running around outside is not a problem. LOL All the kids from the neighborhood come over and the kids play around outside while we grown-ups talk. We've done all kinds of games and goodie bags over the yrs. Last yr was a treasure hunt through out the house and yard.
I'm with you for the baby's 1st. We always do that one separate from the others.

Take Care,
N. :) SAHM homeschooling 3 boys 12, 7 & 2 yrs old. Married to Mr. Wonderful for almost 15 yrs. Groceries for les money...check out www.angelfoodministries.com and let me know how you like it or if you have any questions. Email me at ____@____.com.

My son and daughter are three years apart and their birthdays are Feb.9&13.i usually have their birthday parties the weekend after the 13th to celebrate both. i do that just to have everyone come at once instead of twice in the same month,plus i have family in different states so i know it will be a inconvinence for them. it worked well for me,especially money wise. by the way my son is 10 and daughter is 7 now. hope this helped, goodluck!

I have a friend with two kids... I think they're 2 years apart... a boy and a girl. She always has a combination party for them. We get an invitation to the boy's party - he and my son are the same age and friends... his sister invites girls her age and we all have fun. They've done it at Pump It Up, Build-a-Bear, etc. Even though we often have playdates that include both of them and my boys, we all have fun together, but at the birthday party, my friend wants to make sure no one feels like we "owe" a gift to the girl, because we've only been invited to the boy's party. (even though it's all the same party!) Does that make sense? I think it's a very nice way to keep it simple with birthdays so close together, keep friends from shelling out too much in gifts, and teaching the kids to share... even something as important as birthday celebrations.

Hi S.,

Yes, go ahead and have a joint party at least for the next few years. My DD and DS are 5 years about but b-days fall 2 weeks apart. DD is only 2 and at some point I know she will want the full 'girlie' party but in the meantime we have one big party in the backyard with 2 cakes, family, friends and fun and call it day. It has worked out great for the last 2 years.
Take care, S.

S.,

Certainly while the boys are young you should take advantage of the fact that their birthdays are so close together and host shared parties.

As the boys age, it will become more difficult to do this. By the time your youngest is 5 or 6 and your oldest is 8 or 9, each boy likely will have his own ideas about what he wants, and blending the two can get tricky! :)

I think a shared party is a great idea - especially when it's the same group of people invited to both parties. My brother and I have birthdays 5 days apart and the family gathering was usually a shared party on whatever weekend fell in between the actual birthdays. As we got older, if we wanted to have our own friends over, then it was a separate event for each child. Even when we shared a party, though, we were made to feel special on our actual birthdays (by getting to pick what we had for dinner or whatever) so we never felt like we were missing out on anything. You can make a child feel special on his birthday without having to have a lavish party on the exact day.

As long as the special years are separate, the joint party will work fine until the boys are older. Once they are, you could still do the family party together but plan a separate event for each one with their friends (for example, a playdate at a park or play area for the younger and the movies or skating rink for the older one with a few friends). Even with doing the joint party, you may want to have a small cake/mini celebration at home on their actual birthdays.

I didn't have this problem but a relative does. She has 3 boys and 1 girl all of whom's birthdays are within a month of each other and the boys are each 11-12 months apart and the girl is two years younger than the youngest boy (3 years younger than the oldest). They always have a joint party for all four with one big sheet cake (each quarter decorated for each one). I don't know of them to do anything individually but they might.

I have 2 girls the exact same age difference as your boys. We had the first party separate for the youngest. Then together for their 2nd & 4th's and 3rd & 5th's. They loved their together parties!!! In fact, they were a little sad this year because I chose to do them separate because the oldest was in Kindergarten and had a whole bunch of school friends where as the younger one didn't. I will probably do them separate next year as well and then go back to another together party once the other hits school age too.

One note ... on the years I have had separate parties, the youngest was scheduled two weeks before her birthday and the oldest was scheduled two weeks after her birthday. This helped friends and family traveling with having a month apart for each one. Plus, it gave us a nice break in between too.

Good luck and remember what works for you one year, may not work well for you the next. You need to do what works for you and your family first above all else. Friends and family will make it if they can or schedule a visit at another time.

Hi S.,

My family is in the same situation but it includes my dad, nephews, my bro, and my daughter. My dad's b-day is Nov. 6, brother (will be 31) is Nov. 15, my dd (1 yr) is Nov. 15, my nephew (4 yrs) is Nov. 17, and his little brother (1 yr) is Nov. 22. We live 4 hours away so we're just going to pick one one weekend to have all the birthdays @ my parents house. My dad loves the grandkids and doesn't mind one bit to combine his b-day w/ theirs. So as you can see, November is a BIG birthday month. Actually, if you add my b-day on Oct. 22, that's 6 b-days w/in 1 month. Of course, it's all about the little ones, it's their special day!

dear S.,
i've had this problem on two courts. first, i was the oldest of 3 girls and mom also couldn't afford to give all three of us a birthday party within 2 weeks time, within the last week of nov and first week of dec every year. soo, every year ONE of us had a big party, and the other two got to invite ONE friend over for the night.
Within my own household, I had two girls, two yrs apart except for 6 days, so same problem. I frequently gave one big party for both of them and they always enjoyed themselves immensely. It was only after the oldest one turned "16" we changed it to their own individual party and then every other year one had a "large" party while the other had a friend over for the evening's meal and overnight. no one ever seemed slighted. don't worry, i'm sure the boys will be fine.

My boys who are now 15 and 10 have birthdays that are three weeks apart. Christmas and New Years! When they were little (and even sometimes now) I used to combine their parties all the time. I tried to always make it special and used wording on the invites like "double the fun - two birthdays in one." I would always chose a theme they both could get into...one year it was Harry Potter - each guest got to make their own wands and the table was set like the banquet in the movie...they loved it! I only ever bought one cake and always matched it to the theme but we would put candles on both sides of the cake...a his and his. They would sit across from each other and both blow on "their" side. Now that their older we still do it and have themes like "a night at the movies" or "Friday Night Lights." They still love it and my kids have a big age gap. I don't know if it's becuase i started when they were small and they're used to it or the fact that I try to be ultra creative so they both feel special. I'll ask them!

Dear S., My two middle sons are also two years apart. After the youngest turned two, they had their parties together. They always had fun. I could have their parties at better places like Pump It Up. because I could combine the money for two parties. But I always had a seperate family party at home on their actual b-day. The parties together were inbetween the two weeks that seperated their b-days. The past two years they have had seperate parties, because of school and friends. It was great while it lasted. M.

i have a friend whose kids have close birthdays in may. when they were younger, she had a joint party. and now that they are a bit older (6 and 4) she asks them - joint big party or small party. so far they have always requested a joint big party.

I am not in a smiliar situation but have plenty of friends who are and they all celebrated the 1st birthday separately and following years had a single birthday party with two cakes. It works well!

S.,

I think one party for both boys will work fine. I have two boys who also are two years apart and their birthdays are 10 days apart. On their actual birthdays, we have a special dinner, cake, and presents just for the birthday child. Then we have one typical children's party for both of them with their friends (combined) somewhere around the date of their birthdays. It has always worked very well. We pick one theme and I make one cake. The boys are now 12 and 10 and don't mind the joint party. They have a lot of the same friends anyway. Good luck with your boys!

I am all about saving money and having a good time too! Your boys do deserve to be aknowledged on their birth days, maybe by having them pick out what they want for a special dinner with just the immediate family at home. Since they are so close in age and will be brothers forever, with the same family, and probably play with each others friends, there is no problem with having one big party that they work together on planning. They can pick out the party favors and theme. No need to make two themes. They are real young right now. Any day could be a birthday to them. Don't put too much effort into it right now. I have three kids with birthdays in Dec, Jan and Feb. Three parties in three months is hard and costly.

Hi S.,
My husband, son and I all have birthdays within 2 weeks of each other with mine in a different month from them. We do a joint family party on the weekend between their 2 birthdays. Since mine is in a different month, and close to another family members bday, we do a joint party the next month.

I know that its a bit different, but since you have 2 boys, it could work. Just choose a theme that could span both ages - dinosaurs, thomas the tank, spiderman, monster truck, etc.

For the cake, you could do 2, 1/4 sheet cakes, one vanilla, one choc., etc. Everyone benefits from having it on just one day, and in the long run you'll save money.
Good luck, Have fun!
M.

I have kids 2 years apart, although the youngest birthday is 1 week before my oldest. They are now 6 & 4, but a boy & girl. I've had their birthdays together each year with the exception of the last. I had 2 cakes, with different themes for each. It worked out fine. With the last b-day, my friend suggested to me that the kids could only invite the number of friends equal to their age. It was easy for their friends, but hard when it came to family friends. I think the boys would be fine with joint parties. My husband and his brother are 2 yrs and a day apart. They always had their parties together. He's older and said he was fine with it. I'm not so sure about his brother. When they get old enough, you should ask them how they feel about it. And make sure they know that you can invite whomever you choose...when they know how to count, they'll know how many 4 and 6 kids are!

I can't wait to read the responses you receive. I have a 3 year old son and 1 year old twins (boy-girl) with birthdays two weeks apart and I had their birthdays all together on one day. We had three cakes but only sang "Happy Birthday" once. It was a lot bigger than our usual parties because there were three times the amount of friends. I liked it because we were able to knock it out all at once but I think it might have been h*** o* our guests having to buy 3 gifts. I think the gifts would have been better if they were separated. I wasn't able to do a theme based party because of the differences and I think when my children are older, they will have different friends, and want different parties but for now, I'm going to enjoy the time & money saving "3-in-1" party.

Hi S. - my girls are 2 years apart as well but my youngest is 3 weeks before my oldest with Halloween separating the two. Last year for their 5th and 3rd birthday I decided to have one party and used a Halloween theme. Both enjoyed having all of their friends there and I'm planning the same this year. Good luck - I'm sure your kids will love it!

For about the first 6 years of my life my parents did the one party 2 themes for my brother and I. It worked fine. I didn't mind it. it did make life easier on my mom.

Oh my, I found someone in the same predicament. I have a father's 66 birthday and daughter's 1st at the same time and they are both strong egos. What I decided to do was to throw them a joint party in MA, which is really his, since he lives there and we live in Maryland and it's with his older friends, but children are welcome. The other party will be a weekday evening for daughter locally, and will be held here in MD for mainly kids at the pool. It's a weeday evening and I hope enough people can come, simple cake, bbq and beer and wine......I' quite anxious about the local baby party, because I have put so much more into the one in MA......

we do the same thing and it works great!

This is such a timely question for me, as my children are 13 months apart (!) and I am thinking about having a joint party for them both. I feel like it's a bit much to ask people to come to two separate parties a month apart, and for my daughter's 1st birthday it's not like she'll know anyway. My advice is to say "no gifts please" if it's going to be a big party, b/c last year for my son's 1st birthday we got WAY more toys than we ever needed, and ended up feeling bad that people went out of their way for gifts.

The only thing I am having mixed feelings about is that my son's (and husband's) birthday falls on Labor Day, so it makes sense to have the party that day, but then it means we are celebrating my daughter's birthday when she's only 11 mos old. Not a huge deal, though. Again, she won't know the difference. ;-) And I figure we can have a small "family" party on her actual birthday to commemorate the occasion.

I love all the theme ideas, etc, that other Mommies have suggested! The Dora/Diego theme is fantastic, since my son is in a huge Diego phase right now! I hope you don't mind if I "steal" it! ;-)

Good luck with your party, however it goes.

I think one party with two themes is a great idea. When I was younger my mother and aunt would throw my cousins and I a party together. We had several birtdays in May. We would have a theme for each kid and that kid would invite all their friend. We all have different activites to do with our friends because of the age difference, but their were several activites that we woul all dp together. These were some of my best memories as a child. I had alot of fun and I am really close to my cousins because of it.

Hi S.. I know that it would be more convenient to have one party, but I think honoring our children and celebrating their birth is a very special occasion so I would have 2 individual parties.

I've got some wonderful ideas from this beautiful book: The Birthday Book (Crafts, Festivals and Family Activities Series)
By Ann Druitt
http://astore.amazon.com/motherrising-20/detail/190345801...#

Not everything in the book resonated with me, but I really liked the idea of a personalized birthday-eve story and I plan to do that every year while he's young enough to dig it.

Here's a link to what we did for our son's birthday this year:
http://motherrising.blogspot.com/2008/05/preparations.html

"We do not remember days. We remember moments." -Cesare Pavese
W.
http://motherrising.blogspot.com

I think its a great idea...you may need to reconsider when they get older, but for now it will work. If the boys are into the same thing, you may even be able to combine themes on a few of them. Right now both my boys (2 and almost 5) are into Kung Fu Panda...but their b-days are too far apart (May/Sept)....but it may work for you one day! happy birthday party planning!

I think it's a great idea. Kids aren't that picky, they're just excited to have a cake and some presents. My family combines birthdays when they're close.

My kids are three years and three weeks apart. For the last two years, we did a joint party for both of them as everyone invited to one would have been invited to the other's party. Each party was one theme which would bridge their various ages - last year it was Curious George and this year it was a farm theme. In both cases, I found it easiest to have one big cake and then I made cupcakes. The cupcakes came in handy because they could each get their own cake with a candle in it.

There were a couple of kids invited last year who were only friends with my daughter and weren't family friends. In that situation, I did two different style invitations - one which included both kids and one with only my daugther's name on it. I didn't want them to feel as though they needed to give my son presents as well. I think this was probably the last year I will do a joint party for a while as we've just moved and I'd imagine most of my daughter's friends will be from school, rather than family friends who have known the kids almost since birth. I also think that as my kids get older, they will want more gender specific themes.

SAHM to a 5 year old girl and 2 year old boy.

we do the same thing as you are thinking. the first birthda as special the rest combined somehow. later down the road when they have their own friends i might have them pick what they want special with or without a party. say when she is 10 and decides shes like a day to go to busch gardens and invite one or two friends. that would be it for her. the other might decide a sleepover is what he want that year. but as for parties we just put them together and latter that could just be family party time with aunts uncles and such and the other for friends. this past year e got my daughter a hoel and we swam inthe indoor pool. her bithday is in the winter so not much to do outside.

My situation is a little different than yours. Mine are a daughter and son 4 yrs. apart, but birthdays only 2 wks. apart. Aunts and Uncles were not expected to attend, but that's because none lived locally. Grandparents decided how to handle it - differently each year - sometimes coming to the daughter's & other times to the son's or sometimes in between or neither and just sending gifts or bringing them the next time we saw them. The kids knew they'd always get something from their parents so it didn't matter. What mattered to them was to have a good time with their friends and to be able to have the kind of party that suited them.

My children's personalities might have been a lot different than your two boys seeing as they aren't the same gender, so your boys might be happy to have joint birthday parties. Still you might note when they're 10 & 12 or 11 & 13 or possibly younger that the older one might object since he might not want to have a combined party with his brother's friends and his friends who might not like to do the same things at that point.

- J. D

My children's birthdays are3 yrs & 5 days apart.One boy & one girl.
I firmly believe that the first birthday should not be shared.Make it extra special. Have the older one help plan this special day for his brother. Explain how he had a special day for his 1st and wouldn't he want his brother to have the same.
If family can't give up two days in one month they don't need to come.
After the first birthday I did share their birthdays. I made two cakes and as the children got a little older and understood more, I made sure everyone got a little piece of both cakes. Even if people did not eat it. You be surprised how many times one of the two would ask someone "did you have a piece of my cake. ONe year I would plan the party closer to my sons and the next closer to my daughters. I had they take turns opening gifts. They are now 30 & 33 and still remember the parties.

One little funny story to go with it. When my daughter was 3 she opened a present that had a pair of jeans in it. Her comment with that red hair and blue eyes wide opend was "Wow just what I always wanted.

My niece had her 2 boys b-day party at the sametime. It worked jsut fine. She had 2 cakes, one boy at a time opened gifts. I thought it was very nice & worked out very well.

I have two kids two years apart (will be 3 and 5), with one birthday in November, and the other in December. Parties in winter are more complicated with holidays so close, so we're having one party in early December for both, and they'll each have a cake, and they're really excited about having a shared party. We're also combining because of expense, as we're having the party at Pump It Up (can't really have a pool party in December).

When I was young, my mom had the same issue, as my sister's birthday and mine were less than 3 weeks apart, so we rotated years. My sister got a big party one year, and I got one the next. We still did individual things with family, but that was our friend party policy.

Good luck!

My sister and I have kids 1 day apart and have thought about combining bday parties. But, changed our minds because it just was going to be too much work trying to make them feel individualized. So, I think eventually your boys are not going to want to share bday parties. It doesn't really set a day apart for them saying..."this is your day and we are celebrating you!" it might work for the next 2 or 3 years but your boys i bet are going to start to want their own parties. Family and friends aren't really going to care. Parties here aren't all day affairs...they are a couple of hours. They come and leave...but, if they are from out of town that might pose a problem. I personally wouldn't do it. I have 4 boys and I can at least give them 1 day (their bday)that is set aside specifically for them.

We don't usually have the parties on their specific birth days, but a convenient time near their birthday. Since there are 2 weeks between the dates, can you do the first one a week earlier and the second a week later, making it a month between the two birthdays?

I think it's important for everyone to have their special day, even if it's not a huge birthday bash. Something simple is fine. People should understand. They'd have to 'give up time' to go to your children's parties if they were 4 months apart, right?

We usually do something on a Sunday evening or Saturday morning to try and avoid putting a crimp in people's weekend plans.

But I also don't think you're robbing your children of anything by combining a party. I think it could be a fun tradition.