Wow it’s been a really busy couple of weeks at the My Borrowed Planet house and the icing (literally) on the cake was both my girls having their birthdays this week. Quite a few people have expressed their surprise (OMG!) at the fact there is only one day between each of their special days. Yes family planning was not my strong point, but one thing I know is that birthdays don’t have to be expensive.
I guess I am lucky in a lot of ways. My girls don’t expect a lot in the way of gifts – even my eldest who I must admit received far more presents in the 6 years before her little sister came along than she ever has since. In fact, my 10 year old is now soo anti-corporate it makes me smile. She can often be heard exclaiming “How much? What a waste of money for a load of plastic rubbish!” when she sees adverts for the latest must-have toy on the telly. My youngest is just happy, pretty much all the time.
I have what I consider to be a reasonably large budget for their birthdays of around £40 each. Their gifts tend to be a mixture of new and second hand and naturally include a lot of the home school resources we will use over the coming 6 months such as games, puzzles and books. By that time its Christmas of course so having their birthdays so close together actually works out pretty well. Our extended family and friends also tend to give gifts that will enhance our play based learning curriculum so I’m really grateful to them too. Crystal growing kits, flower presses and art materials are the perfect gifts and the girls are looking forward to a trip out to a rare breed’s centre where they will get to feed wallabies with their granddad as an extra special birthday treat.
The only downside to having two birthdays so close together is the slight overload of cake, but to be completely honest it’s not really a hardship. Their dad made some amazing creations this year (he’s gotten so into baking since he’s been unable to work) and made the TARDIS console for my eldest and a pink Dalek for the littley. They cost less than £3 each and tasted awesome (I must post some pics).
Of course, we should really be getting back into our normal homeschool curriculum today, but to be honest we’re all suffering with festival flu and are absolutely exhausted. The weather outside is rubbish too so I thought I’d catch up with some blogging and let them spend the day playing. After all, isn’t that what play-based learning is all about? I will go and join them in a minute, just as soon as I finish this post.
I’d be interested to know, however, what you think of our low cost birthdays. How much do you spend on birthdays and what do you get up to? Do you think I’m an old meanie for keeping things simple or is it a refreshing change in today’s increasingly hectic (and expensive) lifestyle? Please leave your comments below! x