The Christmas Birthday

My Diva's birthday is just before Christmas.  She doesn't mind really except that she can never have her birthday with her friends as we are always on the road.  From the get go, I have done my best to make her birthday special.  With my mom's help, we order cakes, plan surprise parties, work travel dates, and do whatever we can to make her birthday a birthday rather than allowing it to be part of the holiday craziness. 

 This year... well, this year is going to be a challenge.  The original plan was to get the cheat tickets to Arizona and fly out Christmas Eve, thus the Diva would spend her very first birthday in her house ever.  She was thrilled.  Sure we would miss the huge family fiesta (nearly always Mexican food despite our not having a drop of Mexican blood) and our favorite church service, but it was a great price and a great flight.  But, we didn't get there in time.  Rather, we are flying through Chicago the day before her birthday.  This means that she will have to travel from Phoenix on her birthday so that we can have a family dinner etc before hopping back in the car to do the family wing ding - tamales and all.  Olay!

 The Diva just wants to stay in Phoenix.  The last thing she wants to do is spend hours in the car on her birthday.  She wants to climb rocks, socialize with people she never sees, and just hang out.  I am torn.  Part of me thinks that sitting pool side in Phoenix might not be a bad way to spend a day.  My parents can just pick us up on their way to the Compound.  But I know that this won't fly nor do I think it is what the Diva wants.  She loves being with my parents. 

 So, the solution - fun surprise breakfast so she can socialize with the friends she doesn't see and play and I can socialize and play before we hit the road!  But it isn't just a breakfast, it is a brunch!  It isn't even just a brunch but a special "we will customize it for you" brunch with a Happy Birthday message on the table, and she has no idea!!  The teahouse in Phoenix is willing to do what they can to make it work; to make her day special. 

 It is hard to have a birthday at Christmas.  Since having her, I have met so many who have birthdays around the holidays or have relatives with birthdays.  It seems to be a time of year when people bemoan having a birthday as it is lost in the celebration and stress.  My eldest nephew's birthday is Christmas day.  For the most part, and unlike his four brothers, he doesn't have a birthday.  With all I do to celebrate the Diva's life and special day, it won't come as a surprise that I make a big deal about his special day too, but I do it on his half birthday... a day that he has all to himself!

People have ways of dealing with these holiday birthdays.  Like the Diva, parties are usually held some other time of the year.  I have done early December and late January, resorting to play dates throughout the summer this past season.  Some families do not decorate for the holidays until after the December birthday!  While other families have moved to the half birthday celebration. 

Our situation is made that much more complicated as the Diva’s dad lives here – thus we work around so that he has a chance to do birthday and Christmas with her.  The original plan was that they would do birthday before we leave for the holidays… and Christmas on the 12^th day of Christmas (6 January).  We have the birthday part down pat.  She will have a “family” birthday this Wednesday about which she is very excited.  Christmas, on the other hand, turned into a catch-as-catch-can kind of affair.  Due to everyone’s schedules, it just doesn’t work the way we intended.  So, for the Diva and her dad… her birthday is primo!

Friends tell me that they felt as if they received less when they were little or as if their birthday was rolled into Christmas.  No one fussed over them after the holiday was over.  The Diva has recently voiced her opinion that everyone is more wrapped up in the paper and the gifts of Christmas to consider her pre-Christmas birthday.  She would probably suggest that couples just stop celebrating the longer days and the outset of spring to eliminate all future holiday births!