We recently attended a birthday party for A’s best friend. On the wall, there was a super cute sign: “Happy 11th birthday! You are 10!”

At first, I was so confused. How was it her 11th birthday? That was funny math. And then I realized, they counted the day of their birth as their “1st birthday.” What a cool concept!

We have always celebrated births with cake- the hospital even provided one for our first- but we had never thought to count birthdays like this.

To me, this really emphasized that there was life before birth, life in the womb. In order to count to one, you have to have something before it. You existed before your birth.

I do know people who celebrate conception dates and count age from then, but my brain can honestly not handle keeping track of that. This is a much simpler solution to emphasize the same point- you had life before birth.

So now, we do the same. My son just had his 5th birthday where he turned 4! Confusing, maybe. Worth the lesson, absolutely.