A couple of weeks ago, I celebrated my 42nd birthday. As usual, I received hundreds of wishes through LinkedIn, Facebook, and various other social media sites and newsletters. One thing I noticed is how people write “happy birthday” varies.
A common method was “Happy Birthday Kim”.
In extending a grammatically correct birthday greeting, there are 3 things to keep in mind.
- Birthday is a common noun. This means you don’t capitalize it. It’s not like Christmas or Hallowe’en, which are specific holidays so are proper names. One’s birthday, on the other hand, is not a specific holiday—everyone has one—so it’s treated as a common noun.
- Happy is capitalized sometimes. Happy also isn’t a proper noun (Heck, it’s not even a noun.), so it’s capitalized only as the first word in a sentence or perhaps in the title of a song.
- Use a comma. Whenever you address someone with their name, precede it with a comma.
Using those 3 tips, here’s how to write a grammatically correct Facebook birthday greeting:
Happy birthday, Kim!
or
Have a happy birthday, Kim!
Now you know.
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Let’s see how many people wish you a happy birthday next year…
Ha ha! Maybe I’ve alienated everyone.