Doing away with the big birthday PARTY Shoo Shaa!

This year we have decided to do away with the "Big Party" do for my cupcake's 2nd birthday party. You could call it an austerity measure or simply an attempt on our part to do away with the brouhaha affair that most birthday parties have turned into. Birthday parties have turned into large scale carnivals rivaling the scale of Indian weddings. Our idea was to make it a simple celebration rather than a carnival. To put it simply, the idea is to call a few close friends home for some good food, cut the cake, chat some more and have some dessert and not spend too much on creating the big "birthday" do! So hiring off an entire bowling alley, or getting that atrociously priced disney themed cake is completely off our menu from now onwards. Rather we would like to divert some money towards some charity we believe in. I would much rather have my little one be  around people she knows and have a bit of fun, than run around figuring if the magician, cartoonist, etc has arrived. So her Amma aka moi will be ensuring friends and family pitch in with food preparations, get decorations done in-house, get a baker friend to bake her a cake and clean up the backyard to set up the buffet table and hope to god that it doesn't rain that weekend.

The aim to go simple stemmed from a visit that I undertook last week to one of my company's clients for research purposes. I work for a micro-finance company and some of you maybe aware that micro-finance provides financial services to low-income households who do not have access to formal banking services owing to lack of proper collateral. In India, we grow accustomed to seeing poverty around us and somehow disregard it most of time unless it comes knocking at our car windows. Stands true for me as well, so there I was meandering through the by-lanes of a slum and encountered several kids. All looked happy, thankfully just as all kids should be. But would they have big birthday parties...can they afford such luxury? So why should we spend more than we really need to? Will it really make that much of difference to us or for that matter the birthday girl? I don't really don't think so. My cupcake of a daughter will be equally happy with home-made cake, as long as she gets to cut it!

I also know that given time and exposure my daughter's idea of celebrations are bound to change and she will ask for what she wants. I would want her to understand the beauty of small, meaningful gestures rather than pomp and ho-haa. Till she begins to clearly articulate how she wants her birthday to be celebrated, home birthday parties shall rule:) Later of course, some other convincing tactics would have to be involved to make her see what I see...we shall cross that bridge when we get there!