Birthday Parties are the theme for this month’s recollections, suggested by Irene A Waters.
(Baby Boomer growing up in an Australian capital city.)
When I was young we had birthday parties though nothing like the extravagant theme parties many kids have now. Most of our birthdays would have been celebrated within the immediate family but during my Primary School years I remember parties I attended at other girls’ homes. Boys were never invited and I don’t remember any boys having parties, even my brothers.
In my class at school there were cousins who lived next door to each other and I looked forward to their parties because they always had delicious cream puffs. I also remember seeing my first ice-cream cake at another party. During those years the party pies and pasties were all home made, nothing was available from a supermarket freezer then.
We played games like:
Pin the Tail on the Donkey
Musical Chairs
Pass the Parcel (only the last person got a prize)
Scavenger Hunts
We had fun with balloons and whistles which had extending paper ends with feathers on them.
Everyone was given a piece of cake to take home wrapped in a serviette.
Musings of a Retiring Person 
What fantastic photos you have of your parties. I would never have seen the boy if you hadn’t mentioned him and even then it was like looking for Wally. Your parties and mine seem to be very similar and I could see similarities with my German nephews celebration and your photo of your brothers fourth party with the table loaded up with presents and food. You reminded me of the ice cream cake. I had my first one at a birthday party also when I was a child and then hassled my mother for years after to have an ice cream cake for my own birthday. It didn’t happen. Thanks for joining in again.
I’m sure we didn’t get many presents but there was usually some kind of chocolate and there was always a chorus of, “You’ve got to share it!” That seems astonishing to me now but there were five children so it meant five times a year, at least, we all had some chocolate.
As a mother I appreciated ice-cream cakes, I didn’t have to make them, they looked great and the kids loved them.
A little meant so much in those days.
True, I remember my oldest brother liking condensed milk and as a little extra on his birthday he was given a tube of it, he didn’t have that!
I’m with your brother. We used to love condensed milk but not lucky enough on our birthdays to be given a tube. That would have been heaven. I remember when I left home I discovered the tubes and bought my first of many at age 18. For some reason I stopped and then my husband and I rediscovered it but soon forced ourselves to not purchase it as weight gain became an issue.
I loved the sweetened condensed milk as a kid but I’m sure it would be too sweet for me now. Mum used to make mayonaisse with it and we got to clean out the can.
Yes that is all we got to do as kids as well. I don’t know what Mum used it for in the early days (perhaps mayonaisse) but later she used to make some kind of cheesecake with it. Yum. Now I would probably find it too sweet also.
I must ask my brother and sister if they remember any birthday parties. I dont remember any birthdays not even my 21st when I was living at home so we must have at least gone out to dinner. There is one photo in the little country town where i grew up and I know it is someones birthday and it almost looks as if the whole class is in the photo. Of course when I was 12 we went to boarding school so there would have been no birthdays there. You do have a lot of lovely photos.
Surely at boarding school they did something to acknowledge birthdays? I remember Dad having a box Brownie camera and later a fancier one but some of our old photos were taken by a neighbour who was a keen photographer.