Doll Birthdays

A bit of a stretch for me. I forget all birthdays without any discrimination, including my own, my kids, etc. Dolls may hope for a birthday cake with candles only if l want to take photos of a birthday.

 

I do! All of my human dolls have ongoing stories and are fully developed characters with backstories. (Fantasy tinies mostly just get a name and basic story/personality, though.)

How I pick a birthday is...kinda random? In some cases, if they have real life inspiration, I might pick a date close to the real person's, but not the same. Sometimes, I go by which zodiac sign seems right for the character, or what season seems like their favorite time of year. Other times, I look at my birthday list and see which month seems to be lacking the most. For some reason, I seem to have almost no birthdays in October or January? But one rule I almost always stick to is that their birthday must end in a 3 or 6. I think my only exception is leap year day because it's a special day. And it can never be a 7, because I irrationally hate the number 7. (Oddly enough, my own birthday ends in a 7.)

I usually don't celebrate birthdays for the dolls, except in my roleplay, they might get a party or dinner or something, but physically, I usually don't. Unless they're a favorite, then they might get a new outfit or accessory and pics taken.

 

A lot of my dolls are also my OCs or gaming PCs in which case if played/flesh out enough they get birthdays. I also count dolly got you days as a way to keep track of how long I have had a doll. My first two male dolls will be 17 this month, which means been in the hobby about 18 years give or take. William will be 17 on the 14th, and Thaddeus with be 17 on the 31st. Both characters have different birthdays then their dolls, However William got his birthday as combining his doll got here day the 14th, with the month I felt fit him more as a character so his character has the B-day of Sep 14th.

I do not always do stuff for a doll's got you/birthday, but a few I try to snap a photo and/or play with them that day. Thad will have at least a photo taken on Halloween.

Edited to add I also have a doll whose character birthday is Halloween, but his doll Bday is like mid summer so it's random which of those if either I'll do stuff with him for.

 

Though they may have different in-character birthdays that I don't usually remember, I do celebrate my dolls' birthdays on the day they first came home (in case of hybrids, in the day the face sculpt came). In those special days, no matter how busy I am, at least I'll go to the cabinet where I store them and say happy birthday to them. If I have more free time, I try changing their pose and clothing to something fitting for a celebration and taking some pics.

 

All of my dolls have character birthdays in addition to a record of when I got them. Some birthdays are picked at random, some just because I like the date, some were pre-existing characters that already had a birthday picked out...but for my very favorites, the birthday is usually meaningful to the doll in some way. I'm grateful Whale Tower puts the casting date in their CoA because it made picking out Verdi's birthday a no-brainer!

I have the same philosophy for celebrating them, too - most I don't bother with, but the absolute favorites' birthdays are something I try to celebrate, or at least acknowledge. I actually took some PTO for Verdi's birthday this year and even made her a pre-photoshoot cake! It's a great way to bond with them.

 

My dolls' birthdays are the day they arrived home (for full dolls) or the day they were completed with head and body (for hybrids, so usually it's the day the body arrived). I'm usually faithful to those arrival dates, but I moved one doll's birthday a few days earlier because otherwise, I would've had 3 doll birthdays in 7 days, which is a bit much

I shell OCs (all angels) who technically don't have birthdays since they aren't born. But I do assign seasons to them, which is based on their season their birthday falls in. This adds a bit of fun chance to their character background. I have enough dolls now that they cover all four seasons and there's a good spread of birthdays throughout the year.

I try to celebrate birthdays with a photoshoot of the doll. They may get a present, but only if the timing is right for buying/sewing things. I suppose if I get tired of solo birthday photoshoots, I'll switch to doing a "season celebration" for everyone in the current season.

 

Sometimes. Ludovica (my MDD) has an off-topic 'mini-me' who is the first custom doll I ever made, and since I finished her on May 13th, I've decided that that is her character's "birthday". I try to get them little gifts, like new accessories or little trinkets/toys for their 'room', but at very least I make sure to take them out and spend time with them, and hopefully take some photos, too.

For my Minifee and OT Imomo, they're actually based on characters that are personas/self-inserts of me, so they actually share my birthday. I'm not sure if I'll have a ton of time on my actual birthday to dedicate to them, but it's a possibility.

Kuria, my DDP, I'm not really sure what I'll do regarding her birthday, I chose a joke date for the character when I first created her many years ago, but because of that I didn't keep track of the actual doll's completion date, and I wish I had. Maybe I'll try to see if the first photos I took of her are dated...

 

If my dolls have a date they were made written on their COA when they arrive, then I'll mark that down as their birthday on my doll spreadsheet I have to keep track but otherwise they don't have set birthdays.
In the beginning when I had under 5 dolls I used to remember birthdays and get them an extra outfit on it but now I've got 20+ that's gone out the window haha

 

I play fast and loose with birthdays. Often times it's whatever zodiac sign fits my dolls' characters, and I'll pick a random date within those parameters. Sometimes it's around the time I bought them, but most of the time it's not. I try to give them all different birthdays because I like to do something for them when it's their birthday. (When I remember their birthdays, lmao)

 

I have considered my doll's birthdays to be the first day they *truly exist, and are looking out at the world* -- this is the point after they have come home to me and are reasonably assembled to where I will imagine consciousness. For most I will have given them a faceup of their own already and put them on the shelf in some combination of wig and eyes and clothes. It's an arbitrary day because I decide it differently for different dolls. I just know when they have "arrived" into their body for lack of better explanation and the day I feel that becomes the birthday.
I try to honor their birthdays within my means at the time. This will vary year to year but I try to make sure everyone would feel well acknowledged enough.

 

I gave my first BJD Silas (in my profile pic) a true birthday party. I got him a little cake with his name on it, lit a candle, lined up all the other dolls and cut the cake and gave out little pieces of cake for each party goer, which I later ate. I took a ton of photos. This was so much work that I never did it again! One other doll got a story post photo with acknowledgement that it was his birthday, but that was it. I base their birthday on the day I received the doll.

 

My dolls all have birthdays! Almost all of them came to me whole, so I just used their arrival date. I wasn't sure what to do with the one that came as a floating head 13 years before I got his body. I did end up deciding to use his completion date rather than original arrival date due to it being the day before another doll's (his cousin's) birthday. I have one doll with a CoA date and it looks like I was celebrating his CoA date and not his arrival date for many years. Now I can't decide which is correct!

I always try to take a photo of the doll on their birthday, but there have been times I haven't had the doll with me. For the last double birthday, I just drew them instead because I couldn't hold them. I've made them a present once or twice, but mostly they just get a birthday photo.

I made this thread a while back to share birthday photos! Feel free to post your celebratory pictures in it to share
/posts/13137884/

 

{laugh! } Same! One of my sistyers once contacted me seeriously concerned that something was wrong becaus eher birthday card from me arrived on time!!!

I don't even have records or detailed memory of when my dolls arrived let alone randomly assigned birthdays.

Teddy

 

If I happen to be in a doll mood and it's one of my dolls' birthdays, I haaaave been known to celebrate it by making them a party hat and forcing them to wear it for photos. For some reason my Migidoll Jina, Peter, is the one who has had to suffer this the most, which is very amusing because he is also the character that would appreciate it the least. He is my birthday grump xD

I base my dolls' birthdays either off their completion date or arrival date. Whichever one feels more momentous.

 

Unfortunately, I've forgotten the exact gotcha dates (as most of my dolls are second hand) very quickly and now don't really try to keep track and celebrate. I do still recognize when it's the vague time of the year where they've clocked in another year with me, though, especially if they've been a bit of a rescue project (as that is just more memorable) and give them a pat on the head for being such a good trooper :3

 

If you take photos of the doll when you get it, the photos will probably have exif data with the date! I've had to go off that a few times with my older dolls. Things I thought I would remember forever did a good job fading. I should have just written everything down!

 

She immediately knew you were a changeling!

 

Only if you have them timestamped in some way - back in the mid 2000s when I started getting BJDs my camera wasn't set to do that automatically, I never saw a need for settitgn it (I probably wasn't even aware it could be done) and the place I stored my pictures online is not the smae one I use now so many of my photos were either transferred across en-mass or shifted to a na external drive in the hopes I'd ever get around to sortin g them, so most of that sort odf data that might have been on the original photo host site was lost. Even the forum I used to share my doll stuff on back then is defunct so I couldn't check back on muy old posts for an idea of when I first posted about them, even if I had the time and mental energy to spare for that sort of detective work.

My dolls will have to resign themselves to being birthdayleass - or at lerast for their birthdays to be celebrated "off-camera", referred to but not shown. Some of them have been the same age for over 20 years now - so I think they know the situation by now.

{LMAO!!!} The law of averages says I had to get the card posted on time at least ONCE.

Teddy

 

That's so cute!!
Maybe I'll do that some time when I want an excuse to bake/eat cake, haha

 

That would be me, if I ever got as far as the party in the first place.

Teddy

 

My Delf Moon is my oldest doll (old enough for a license and old enough to vote here now), and I remember his character birthday because he was a written character long before he was a doll. I also remember his arrival date in January because it was a Big Deal that I got myself a whole SD back then. It was something that felt very meaningful for me early in the hobby.

Unfortunately for the others, I have a crappy memory and I’ve had a lot of dolls over the years so he’s the only one who gets that anymore.

 

I have been giving my dolls birthdays based on when I receive them! So if my doll comes in March 16th, then that becomes that characters birthday. It makes it easier rather than deciding when they should have one separately. I'd like to start doing something special for each birthday, but for now I just have the dates recorded in my phone calendar.

 

Great idea!

 

All of my dolls have birthdays but not always I'm able to celebrate them due to lack of free time. I use the date of arrival for birthday. As for hybrids, I use the date of the head arrival (because the face is what makes the character). I have all the dates written down in my characters' bio charts. I tend to post photos of a doll on his/her birthday, sometimes they get props or clothes as gifts.

 

Sometimes I wish I did something for their birthdays and I definitely wish I had kept better records of when they arrived, but this is pretty much how it goes with me too.

Sometimes when I hear another person talking about their doll's birthday or it's about the time of year one of them arrived I think about trying to track down everything from photos, posts, etc (mine have also gotten spread out different places and devices by this point), but I know I'm probably not going to actually do that.

 

All of my dolls’ birthdays are their Gotcha Days. The only one that really holds significance to me is my first doll’s, March 6, since it’s basically my anniversary for getting into BJDs.

 

I pick my doll's birthdays based exclusively on vibes.

I'm pretty bad about keeping track of when I've received a new doll, especially with how much life seems to get in the way of things these days. I usually take a significant amount of time to create a character and then "complete" the doll once the shell is actually in my possession. Many of my dolls are secondhand and came in separate parts. Rather than fuss with all of that and try to find a happy middle ground, I just go "[Character] feels like they were born in June to me" and go from there.

 

I more or less give them random dates so I can work out their ages. I really need to acknowledge them more. XD