Baptism

Last Sunday we joyously baptized baby Marek in our church.  We've found a spiritual home in St. Mark's Lutheran Church which we've been attending as soon as we found out we were pregnant.  Even back then, we knew we needed to find a church so we could baptize our coming baby.  Plus I think it is kind of special that Marek, which is the Czech form of Mark chosen to honor Dave's Czech side of the family, was baptized in a church that bears his name.

My sister Lisa and brother John and Dave's sisters Barb and Teresa served as sponsors.  After the luncheon I realized I should have introduced Dave's family a little better.  He has 7 siblings so you kind of have to say, "Teresa is the sister who helped us with the shelves," and, "Barb is the sister who gave us all the raspberries," so my family knows which one I'm talking about.  In our family, it is just the 3 of us so we just say, "This is my brother," and, "This is my sister."  Done.  I was kind of chuckling about that afterwards.

Here is the special boy on the day is his baptismal gown.  This was made by my mother 40 (!!!) years ago and is what I was baptized in.  My date of birth and initials are embroidered into the hem of the slip so I'll have to do the same with his now.

My mother loaned me the table linens and helped me with the spread and menu and my mother in law sent over her world famous chicken salad.  I set out a Lutheran baptism medallion and a rosary to represent both our family religions as well as a pewter christening cup I got from Etsy.  We got our cake from HyVee and I couldn't have been happier with it.

I thought this was such a special moment and glad I nabbed it with my camera.  I love all the profiles in the light.  Dave's mother hates having her picture taken so I had to do it quickly and stealthily.  Don't anyone tell her I put her picture on the interweb!

The day was kind of like a wedding because you plan and fuss and on the day it just passes quickly in a blur.  It wasn't until the next day I realized we didn't take any family photos together and I'm still kicking myself for that.  This weekend we dressed him back up in his gown for some glamour shots in our living room.

I'm pretty sure it's the law to include one of the baby having a total meltdown fit.

This was a sweet shot too.  Lisa gave him that block that has his initial, a cross, his date of birth, his date of baptism, his sponsors and a bible verse laser etched into it.  I just love it.

In our family we'd always wear a sølje pin on our baptism gowns but I didn't have a small one and I thought it might be a bit frilly for him.  I got this pewter pin years ago in Estonia because it's shape reminded me of a sølje pin.  I thought it had a nice nursery quality to it and was perfect for the day.

I made him a pair of felt shoes from the pattern in this book.  I made a pair of these for each of my sister's kids when they were baptized.  Holding true to tradition, I finished these at 0130 the night before the baptism!