My Third German Birthday

Did you know birthdays are celebrated differently in Germany? As your day nears it is your responsibility to plan some kind of party, invite everyone and foot the bill or make all the preparations on the day. No being "modest" about your birthday--if you want to honor your friends by inviting them to celebrate with you there's no being shy about announcing that it will be your birthday soon! I have been progressively eased into this aspect of German culture, as you can read below. It wasn't until this year that I truly embraced the German spirit of birthday celebrating and planned/prepared/invited/announced everything myself. (ok, ok, with Grady's help too!) So because I have had the privilege of celebrating my last three birthdays in Germany I thought I'd take a minute to recap the highlights of each!
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2005:

The day started out great as my roommate Amy spoiled me with breakfast in bed and a cool H&M bag full of all sorts of goodies. Then Amy, Grady, Marion and I squeezed into Marion's Trabbi and drove to Chemnitz for the monthly regional singing afternoon. We went over to April and Karen's house afterwards, ordering in pizza, having a who-can-eat-their-cake-the-fastest-without-utensils-or-hands contest and playing Twister. It was a fun way to turn 23!

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2006:

Deep amidst wedding planning I decided to keep it simple: I invited whoever wanted to join to eat at one of my favorite Asian restaurants after church. We sat around this huge round table enjoying each other's company and the exotic food and drinks. Yay 24!

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2007:

This year I woke up once again to a wonderful breakfast in bed (thanks honey!). My birthday conveniently fell on Easter Monday (a day off of work for everyone here), so it was the perfect day to host everyone at our apartment for what I called an "Afternoon Brunch." I made a breakfast casserole and some cookies, Grady prepared and cut up tons of fruit and other hor d'oeuvres, and we were set to go. People brought beautiful spring bouquets (my favorite gift!--see first picture) and Kristi spoiled us all by making a strawberry cream cake. Many wonderful hours were spent visiting and just being together, especially as I realized that it was my last birthday before motherhood! A quarter of a century has come and gone, here's to making the next 25 years just as great!