My son is obsessed with birthdays (I suppose I am too since I love to bake). The little guy is only two and his own birthday experience is quite limited (I doubt that he actually remembers his first birthday). However, he has helped celebrate many birthdays in his short two years (and nine months) … sometimes the same birthday twice! Since we have moved back to our home town where most of our extended family lives, we have had lots of birthdays to celebrate. Birthdays of aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, and mom and dad and himself. There is one thing that every single birthday celebration has in common (and no it is not the cake or presents): CANDLES! On his first birthday our son did not really know what was happening. He knew that there were a lot of people (I threw him a birthday party with aunts, uncles, and grandparents) and that he was the center of attention. He knew that there were a lot of brightly wrapped packages (although he got tired of unwrapping after the first gift). His first birthday was his first intimate experience of burning birthday candles even though he was too little to blow them out or too even care. Within the last year and a half his interest in birthday candles has exploded. At every birthday we celebrated, he wanted to blow out the candles. Most of his aunts, uncles, grandparents and even his cousin (older by ten months) would let him help blow out the candles. He even plays birthday. He will find my stash of candles (votive and tea lights mostly), ask me to light them, sing happy birthday (usually to himself), and blow out the candles. His third birthday is just around the corner and I might just have to find some trick candles for his birthday cake so that he can blow out the candles again and again.
