New Birthday Traditions!

Today was Koda's birthday! He turned four years old, and we've had him for almost 2 years (September 22 was the day he became ours).

So we celebrated in the perfect way for our healthy, happy, athletic dog. Hiking!

He also got a special dinner that included chicken giblets (ew).

But it made me think of something.

We do not center our celebration of our dogs birthday with food (because he doesn't even know it's his birthday, ha ha ha, but I do know people who give their dogs cupcakes on their birthdays!).

And we don't do the traditional birthday cake on our birthdays, either!

I realize that the past several birthday celebrations for both me and Chris have not centered around food, and certainly not around cake.

Sure, we might have had a particularly nice dinner on the day of, but that's not the star. Chris always wants a hike much more than he wants a cake :)

We've gotten rid of a lot of traditions that are common in our society that just don't work for us, and it's kind of nice to be free to do what we want. We used to eat cake on my birthday because my dad wanted to celebrate in that way (and years ago, I did too!). But not anymore... Cake isn't quite grain free, now, is it? I asked for paleo pumpkin pie this past birthday, hehe- it's a protein bomb!

But really, I think the whole family prefers celebrating by being outside and being active a lot more lately than by celebrating with food.

So hiking it is - a new tradition!

Happy Birthday to my buddy <3