Birthday Time Comes

At the Wrong Time!

By Jill D. Montgomery

At our house the Christmas presents are all opened and stacked in odd corners of the house while we make room for the new without totally getting rid of the old. The leftovers are in the fridge to be enjoyed in the days to come and the special holiday dishes are washed, dried and put away for another year. The tree has been de-decorated and un-tinselled, (moving the tree out Christmas night does NOT make me a scrooge; I’ve had it in for three weeks and it looks sad now the presents are gone) and most of the furniture has been re-arranged in the pre-Christmas fashion.

You would think that now would be the time for relaxing and enjoying new books and Christmas movies, but in our family, even before the last present has been unwrapped, we are making birthday party plans. When can everyone find a day, evening, or even two hours in their busy lives to squeeze in a 23^rd birthday party?

Our youngest daughter was born just 11 days after Christmas. Not very good planning on my part, she informed me. Not any planning on my part, I informed her when she was old enough to bear the truth! I realize that there are many Holiday children out there who would love to have a birthday after or before Christmas, to have a day of their own instead of having a few presents under the tree that are wrapped in birthday paper rather than Christmas bells and holly.

But this daughter also has the "misfortune" of being the youngest of three girls, with an additional four older female cousins and a mother who loves to go to yard sales and thrift shops. Coming up with ideas for Christmas presents wasn’t too bad, but try for brilliant ideas just 11 days later when it’s birthday time!

We have tried scrimping slightly on the Noel gifts, thinking she would never notice and that way we would have something left over for her birthday. This worked briefly until she learned how to count and compare her pile of goodies to her sisters’.

We have tried putting small presents in big boxes and exclaiming to her how much fun it was to look for the gift in the big box. Again the comparing piles was our downfall.

One set of grandparents solved this problem by giving her savings bonds. This was a huge help when our youngest daughter got ready to head off to college but didn’t seem to excite her much at the age of nine.

Eventually money proved to be the perfect present as far as she was concerned. It was perfect in high school when shopping was a favorite pastime and then easy to send away to her at college. Money could be used in a great assortment of ways and the color went with everything. Unfortunately 11 days after Christmas I’m usually pulling the couch cushions out to find enough change to use for gas to get to work!

This year though, the birthday dilemma has been nicely solved with the advent of a new apartment and the need to completely furnish the kitchen! Let me see, there’s silverware, juice glasses, regular glasses, special occasion glasses, drink glasses, coasters, dish towels, well I could go on and on but I need to find a piece of paper and make a list. I know how to fill a kitchen up, I’ve had 31 years of experience. I wonder though if I should save a few ideas for her next birthday.

Jill Montgomery and family live in Braintree, with a branch in South Royalton, Bethel and now North Carolina.