Three for Three

When Oskar was born Martin and I had a lengthy discussion about birthday parties and what we expected for our kids. We decided to hold off on big parties until they asked for one and we should live by the rule of one friend invited for each year we were celebrating. So for the past two years we have celebrated Oskar’s birthday at the Lake with just the family (including Oma and Opa) and a small gathering for cocktail, appetizers and dinner on the deck. But this year, after attending a few birthday celebrations, Oskar informed us he wanted a party and he wanted chocolate cake. This year was also the first year that Oma and Opa wouldn’t be there (we were to see them two weeks later in Germany, where we would celebrate a belated birthday). So this year we officially celebrated Oskar turning three with three separate birthday parties: at the Lake, in Germany and in SF.

Cocktails and dinner on the deck at the Lake was rained out on the planned Sunday, postponing the party until Monday, his actual birthday, for huevos rancheros. As a side note, Germans are super strict about not celebrating birthdays until the actual day, so the delay of the dinner was actually a good thing and avoided the awkward “come over for cocktails, appetizers and dinner but to “not” celebrate Oskar’s birthday”.

The German celebration lasted all of the 20 minutes it took for Oskar to open up his presents.

And between the two family celebrations we went big with a kids party in San Francisco. With the general rule to invite all of your classmates to your party, the “one friend per year” rule Martin and I had previously discussed and agreed on went out the window and with it the flood gates opened... 20 plus kids and 30 plus adults, a trip to Costco and a large last minute order from Amazon later, we officially celebrated Oskar with coffee, croissants, muffins, mimosas and chocolate cake at our local playground. 

It was a blowout and I think Oskar was happy with the results.