3 kids birthdays on the same week?

[Anonymous]

I have 3 kids and their birthdays are all on the same week (2 were born the same day, but 5 years apart). This was not my plan, but I guess I only get pregnant one week a year (we actually did infertility treatments for months). Does anyone else have similar and any ideas on what to do about birthdays? I've been trying to have them have a big party every other year, but the kids really want their own party every year. Last year I had the girls back to back, one on Saturday and one on Sunday. And my son the following weekend. I think I had to sleep for a month afterwards. All of them pretty much only want home birthday parties with bounce houses, magicians, water slides, etc. I could potentially combine birthday parties, but then the party size becomes unmanageable for me.

I tried so hard to convince two of them that a vacation would be incredible, but nope, they all want the party. I have started to really dread their birthday week because of the party pressure. 4 Grandparents and aunts and uncles all descend on us too, so I'm hosting all of them in addition to 10-15 kids at each party. For my younger two, they're still young enough that parents don't drop off so there's parents as well at the party.

[Anonymous]

I would combine one year for all and do different things on other years. You can't do 3 parties in one week all the time.
You can offer a kid a 1/2 birthday party. We have a friend who does that as she doesn't like her winter bday and wants a summer one.
Kids do t get to rule the house. If you only have it in you for one party, just have one. 3 flavors of cake or something. Or maybe a slightly longer one in an open house style.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have 3 kids and their birthdays are all on the same week (2 were born the same day, but 5 years apart). This was not my plan, but I guess I only get pregnant one week a year (we actually did infertility treatments for months). Does anyone else have similar and any ideas on what to do about birthdays? I've been trying to have them have a big party every other year, but the kids really want their own party every year. Last year I had the girls back to back, one on Saturday and one on Sunday. And my son the following weekend. I think I had to sleep for a month afterwards. All of them pretty much only want home birthday parties with bounce houses, magicians, water slides, etc. I could potentially combine birthday parties, but then the party size becomes unmanageable for me.

I tried so hard to convince two of them that a vacation would be incredible, but nope, they all want the party. I have started to really dread their birthday week because of the party pressure. 4 Grandparents and aunts and uncles all descend on us too, so I'm hosting all of them in addition to 10-15 kids at each party. For my younger two, they're still young enough that parents don't drop off so there's parents as well at the party.

While I totally get wanting to please your kids (it's a good thing!), you are the parent. You don't have to convince them. You can decide a vacation will be incredible and tell them that's the option.

My youngest's birthday - which is close to my middle's birthday - often falls in the middle of our vacation. Sometimes we do a family celebration on vacation only and go all out. Sometimes we do a party fairly separated from her actual birthday, up to a month away. But she doesn't decide our vacation timing, despite her birthday. We just do it.

You also get to decide whether 4 grandparents and aunts and uncles descend on you. You can tell them no, birthday weekend is not the right time for that and you want the parties to be friends only. You can set up a separate appropriate time. Obviously it would help if the parent who goes with the 2 grandparents who aren't yours talks to their own parents.

You can also do smaller parties. This will naturally happen as your kids get older anyway for most kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would combine one year for all and do different things on other years. You can't do 3 parties in one week all the time.
You can offer a kid a 1/2 birthday party. We have a friend who does that as she doesn't like her winter bday and wants a summer one.
Kids do t get to rule the house. If you only have it in you for one party, just have one. 3 flavors of cake or something. Or maybe a slightly longer one in an open house style.

I can't have 30-45 kids + their parents + all our relatives at the same time. Oh and then a lot of the kids bring siblings too.

No matter what I do it seem to be craziness around birthday week. The cake is the easiest part of the whole thing.

[Anonymous]

I would just suck it up. Honestly. Because they will change their minds in a few years, and then you’ll be nostalgic for the home parties. They are worth celebrating each year, it’s not their fault you had two other kids, and all three deserve to feel special one day a year.

[Anonymous]

I would not have 3 parties at home. I would have one party at home for everyone or individual parties at destinations (gymnastics, bounce house, arcade etc.). I would have a dinner for family for all the kids. Family doesn't need to come to the party for school friends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have 3 kids and their birthdays are all on the same week (2 were born the same day, but 5 years apart). This was not my plan, but I guess I only get pregnant one week a year (we actually did infertility treatments for months). Does anyone else have similar and any ideas on what to do about birthdays? I've been trying to have them have a big party every other year, but the kids really want their own party every year. Last year I had the girls back to back, one on Saturday and one on Sunday. And my son the following weekend. I think I had to sleep for a month afterwards. All of them pretty much only want home birthday parties with bounce houses, magicians, water slides, etc. I could potentially combine birthday parties, but then the party size becomes unmanageable for me.

I tried so hard to convince two of them that a vacation would be incredible, but nope, they all want the party. I have started to really dread their birthday week because of the party pressure. 4 Grandparents and aunts and uncles all descend on us too, so I'm hosting all of them in addition to 10-15 kids at each party. For my younger two, they're still young enough that parents don't drop off so there's parents as well at the party.

While I totally get wanting to please your kids (it's a good thing!), you are the parent. You don't have to convince them. You can decide a vacation will be incredible and tell them that's the option.

My youngest's birthday - which is close to my middle's birthday - often falls in the middle of our vacation. Sometimes we do a family celebration on vacation only and go all out. Sometimes we do a party fairly separated from her actual birthday, up to a month away. But she doesn't decide our vacation timing, despite her birthday. We just do it.

You also get to decide whether 4 grandparents and aunts and uncles descend on you. You can tell them no, birthday weekend is not the right time for that and you want the parties to be friends only. You can set up a separate appropriate time. Obviously it would help if the parent who goes with the 2 grandparents who aren't yours talks to their own parents.

You can also do smaller parties. This will naturally happen as your kids get older anyway for most kids.

OP here- I meant a birthday vacation. Like a couple days at Great Wolf Lodge, overnight trip to NYC (my oldest likes Wicked so I thought that might appeal to her) or a beach vacation. We have our real vacations already (and definitely not during the heat of summer).

[Anonymous]

Rent one of those bounce house places for the entire day. Have separate parties for each kid on the same day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would not have 3 parties at home. I would have one party at home for everyone or individual parties at destinations (gymnastics, bounce house, arcade etc.). I would have a dinner for family for all the kids. Family doesn't need to come to the party for school friends.

OP here- like a combined family dinner for all the kids? Because our family plus grandparents, aunts and uncles is like 15 already. Hosting that in addition to 3 birthday parties also gets to be too much.

I do suck it up most years, but surely there has to be a better way? They really like at home birthday parties.

[Anonymous]

My friend has two girls with birthday within days of each other in September, which is arguably a much easier month than June in terms of competing events and demands. One year they combined, had catering, and invited family and adults- that was too much but we still all remember it as the most epic day ever.

She now has a party for one of them on Saturday and one of them on Sunday. Food and cake and setup is the same, even if the activities are different. The girls coordinate decorations (some years this was harder than others because of their age gap). All that has to be done in between is washing serving dishes and resetting paper goods. It's still a huge weekend of work every year and a lot of us moms end up coming both days to help. They do include family in both or either days, so that takes off the pressure of a whole separate family day. As the girls have gotten older, family will just arrive for cake at the end and join for a casual dinner after.

A third kid in the mix is hard, though! Unless you did it over Memorial Day weekend?

My DD doesn't like parties so we always go away for a 3-day ski vacation. A long weekend away and maybe a small outing with 1-2 friends over the course of a couple of weeks is probably a tradition that the kids can grow into once they're older.

[Anonymous]

I have twins whose bdays are this time of year. I don't really have a great answer to this because it feels like it's killing me too (and that's just 2, not 3!).

Some things that have helped a bit:

1) Obviously, if you can combine parties, that's great (mine have not wanted this since they were Kindergarteners, though).
2) Do at least one at a venue vs. at home. More, if feasible given timing, finances, kid party desires, etc. The last couple of years one kid has done a home party and the other has done a venue.
3) I do their "friend" parties a different weekend than their actual birthday. Like 1-3 weeks later. I can't get it together to do their actual birthday (gifts from us, dinner with grandma and grandpa, etc.) on the same weekend I'm throwing multiple kid parties.

[Anonymous]

My sister has three boys born within the same 2 weeks. Her oldest is 11. She does 3 friend parties and one combined family party. So on 3 separate days each biy invites their friends to a party and then on a different 4th day family comes over to celebrate all 3. I think it's absolutely insane, but she is so weird about separate but equal. She has conditioned her boys to expect this. You dont have to do that.

Honestly many families dont even host birthday parties every year. It's OK for your kid not to have a party every single year. But I think you would have to say no to everyone. Could you stomach doing 3 parties or 1 big party every other year and just a family dinner on the other year?

I would keep cake, special meal request, decorations, presents unique to each kid and just know you have to do it 3 times then youre dont until next year. But I dont think you should host parties every year.

[Anonymous]

Just spread out the parties.

[Anonymous]

I have three kids born in the same 3 week span (including a set of twins). To complicate things further, all were born during winter holiday season.

Has always been a challenge.

The twins are boy/girl and have not wanted parties together since they started kindergarten or 1st grade.

We simply have never done large birthday parties for every kid every year. Usually we only do 1 or 2 parties, and the other kid/kids do something else (like special outing & bring 1-2 friends or have maybe 4-5 kids over to the house for a small lowkey party) etc. We always tried to sweeten the deal for those not having a big party and it generally worked.

My last is finishing up elementary school, and I think each kid ended up having 2 or 3 huge parties? And usually those were scheduled weeks in advance of or after their birthday due to the struggles with holiday season.

Fortunately this issue starts to disappear around 3rd grade once kids start having smaller parties.

I think you could go either way…you could set limits as we did, or you could just suck it up/outsource/do whatever you need to do to make it work. Convincing any of them to do a venue party would take a lot of the work off of your shoulders. Or if you have the $, hire a party planner maybe?

[Anonymous]

how old are your kids?