Turning 8 and getting baptized

Nini turned eight last month.  And somehow, amongst all the other goings on, I missed posting about it...

Although I've decided to really keep birthdays low-key this year (no friend parties and just one gift), she did get her "opening presents on mom and dad's bed first thing in the morning".

Oh, and did I mention, I'm trying to go for more "practical" gifts as well?  But trust this kid to get super excited over Elsa shoes.

For her birthday dinner she wanted broccoli cheese soup AND cauliflower with cheese sauce.



The beginning of this month was Nini's baptism.  She truly wanted to invited EVERYONE... like 100 people on facebook and 30 or 40 from school.  But since I understand that she relates to the world socially, I could honor that and support her in inviting EVERYONE.  We made a facebook event and I printed up a bunch of invitations.  Most of the people she invited couldn't make it, but she still had a lot of people come and it really made the day special.

Her favorite uncle, Curtis, came all the way from Seattle to baptize her.   She has loved him best of all, ever since she was a baby.  All the "Curtis is my favorite uncle" indoctrination really paid off with her.

She shared the day with her friend Autumn.  At first she was very bothered by Autumn rescheduling her baptism to the same day.  Nini really wanted it to be HER event, not something she had to share.  But in the end, I think it was a very good thing.

After the baptism, we everyone over for lunch at our house.  The weather was perfect for being outside, but my big tree was shedding like crazy and dropping things into everyone's food.  Early May just isn't a good time to host things in my backyard.

After a quick lunch, Beorn and I had to run to the temple for a wedding.  Our Griffin was finally getting married.  I struggle to appropriately categorize his place in our life.  Years ago he was in our Sunday School class.   He was 15.  We had two young kids.  It was a class of almost all boys and the boys would come to our house frequently to hang out with Beorn.  They'd play with leather and chainmaile and solve the world's problems.  As the years passed, most of the boys stopped coming by.  But Griffin still came.  Often.  He finished high school, mission, college.  Coming to visit, hang out, make stuff, get advice.  He's been a part of our family for as long as the kids can remember... being somewhere between a cool uncle and a much older brother.  So... he's not quite my child, not quite an adopted younger brother, maybe more of a god-child (if we were Catholic), but definitely family.  For years, he's been bringing over every girl he dated so we could check her out.  And the best one definitely won out.  We're so happy for Griffin and Alex.

It made for a wonderfully spiritual day.  To see two people so dear to me make the two most important covenants - to be baptized and to be sealed.

And then the next day, we went up to see my brother bless his new baby.  (Both of my brothers have new babies...  Samuel and Spencer were born just a couple weeks apart.  I hope they can grow up as good friends and be just as close as their birthdays.)


Whew.  Busy weekend!