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  • Copy By: Jaclyn Voran
  • Feature Epitome Past: @raven.vasquez

When both of my kids approached their start birthdays, I constitute myself unable to make it through one of our favorite bedtime books, On the Nighttime You Were Born, without crying. I began saving every piece of artwork sent home from daycare—fifty-fifty the ones I knew neither they nor I would ever want. I frantically printed pictures to fill their beautiful, silk-ribbon-bound, custom-monogrammed babe books (that nonetheless aren't completed), and I prayed that I would never, ever forget the style their chubby fingers felt wrapped around mine, or the feel of their warm, soft heads confronting my chest.

And and so I wondered, what would I do to make their first altogether party—something neither would e'er remember—actress special and meaningful? I settled on starting a new tradition of getting them birthday cards and writing letters to them almost that past year and all my hopes and dreams for their future. Now, I exercise it every yr, and I await forward to the day when we read them together.

Family traditions tin be one-time or new, only starting them early on is ane way to strengthen family unit bonds, celebrate across generations, and create lasting memories to reminisce about in the future. So, what better time to start than baby's first birthday?

Read on for ix ideas to beginning first birthday traditions.

1. Create a Birthday Fourth dimension Capsule

Find an former shoebox or jar and fill up it with meaningful objects from this moment in fourth dimension. Our printable fourth dimension capsule for kids is one way to record your little 1's favorite things of the moment. Fill the capsule with other mementos that your baby will discover fun to reminisce on in years to come.

Click hither to download our free, printable fourth dimension capsule for kids!

two. Glimpse Into Their Future

A tradition in some Polish families for their picayune 1'south first birthday is to place a coin (sometimes a silver dollar), shot glass, and rosary on the altogether boy or girl's high chair and see what baby picks. The shot glass is supposed to symbolize that they're outgoing, social, and people-oriented. The money symbolizes prosperity, that they're ambitious and driven. The rosary symbolizes religion and that they're spiritual and sensation-oriented. Beyond the Polish tradition, many get-go birthday celebrations tin include cultural elements meaningful to your family unit.

iii. Salvage a Special Outfit

Pick a special commencement birthday outfit to laissez passer down from kid to child or fifty-fifty generation to generation. If you happen to take an outfit from your own babe years that you can use, even better. Monogram the bottom of the inside of the hem with their name and the date of their get-go birthday. When you laissez passer it on to the next kid, monogram their name and special date every bit well.

4. Call up Them Small

Find a spot on the wall to mark their meridian or to take their picture starting at their starting time altogether and each year following. Not going to be in the same house the whole fourth dimension? Make it portable with a personalized life-size ruler to marking on. You could also do something similar with a canvas and their handprints.

5. Institute Something

Whether yous have the outdoor space for a tree or shrub or something smaller like some flowers, let your petty one dig into the dirt with you to constitute something that will be a great photo op for years to come. And for winter birthdays? Pick something smaller that you can go along indoors until it can be transplanted outside. And if outdoor space isn't in the cards for you simply yet, consider an indoor plant safe for kids and pets.

6. Write a First Birthday Letter of the alphabet

While they won't be able to read or appreciate it just notwithstanding, having a handwritten note from their parents detailing favorite memories from their first twelvemonth and hopes for the futurity volition be a treasured keepsake down the line.

7. Create a Photo Retentiveness Book

Enquire loved ones to bring a photo of the birthday boy or girl forth with 1 of their favorite memories with them or things about them written on the dorsum. Salvage all the photos in a emblem book to read when they're older.

eight. Donate on Their Behalf

While there's nothing incorrect with getting new toys to celebrate a first altogether, many parents find themselves already overwhelmed past a house taken over by baby things. One alternative is to ask for everyone to bring a bundle of diapers, a children's book, or another item to exist donated to a local charity for moms and kids.

9. Commission a Personalized Illustration of Them

While your petty one won't be able to appreciate it just yet, a personalized illustration is timeless for y'all or for them. We love the idea of freezing this special age in fourth dimension when nosotros all know the years become past too fast.

Read More than: 15 Very Special 1st Birthday Gifts That Aren't Toys