When you have family living on the far side of the world, and you have a tendency to be forgetful about birthdays, you run into two specific issues:
1. Just sending the requisite "belated" birthday card loses its appeal, because it won't get there for a few weeks after the date. Belated cards are fun and all when they arrive within about a week of the day, but 2-3 weeks and you're pushing it.
2. You feel the need to do something more exciting than just a card because you haven't seen these family members and given them hugs in quite some time.
Solution:
Birthday Videos!
Smartphone technology being what it is, I can now make terrible videos with the best of them. And I have taken full advantage of this form of art in all its cheesy-ness to celebrate the birthdays of family members across the globe.
Today is June 19, the day my nephew Zach, aka. Boy Blue, was born to my sister and brother-in-law five years back. I got to enjoy quite a few of his birthdays in person as they lived not far from here for about four years. But now they've traipsed across the globe again, and so, his birthday video: