Blessing Day

Author's Note: I wrote this post back in January, and then saved it to my computer. I just found it today, and decided to post it as-is.

On Sunday we blessed Kiddo in Church. If you aren't a member of the LDS Church, when we use the term "blessing" in the context of a blessing in church, we are generally referring to an event that is somewhat equivalent to the christening of a child that is done in other religions. In our family, it tends to be a family affair. Both my sister and brother were there with my mom. C's parents are in town, so they came. Because C's grandfather passed away this last week, she had a number of paternal aunts and uncles in town who attended (large family). Additionally, every one of my dad's living siblings attended with their spouses (another large family). Add to that a couple of close friends and some other family, plus C's grandmother, and C's great aunt. C's also had some cousins and second cousins who attended -- well, there were a ton of people there.

As I think back on the blessing (which I gave), I don't even remember who was in the circle. The only people who I actually noticed/recognized by name were my father-in-law, and my bishop. I was so nervous about the whole thing that I didn't even pay attention to who was standing around me. I know that there were so many people that some couldn't reach into the circle.

I have conflicting feelings about this. I hate to cause a scene, which I think this kind of did. I served with a bishop previously who instructed new parents to limit the number of people who stood in the circle to 5-10. I can understand that. But in our case, the people who we invited to stand in the family were all close family members, with three notable exceptions. And how do you include some family members while excluding others? In the end, we decided that we were more interested in including people than excluding them, and we decided not to worry about the number of people, and just ensure those who came who were family were included.

We didn't want to leave church and go to our house for an open house. It was important to us to attend all our meetings. We decided to invite people to attend church with us for the entire block, and then to have an open house in the evening from 4 to 8 PM. This allowed us to put church attendance first, and then go home in the evening to celebrate with our families. This was a fun way to do it, and I'd do it again, although at the end of the day I was exhausted.

All in all, it was a great day. We loved having our family close, to celebrate this important milestone with us. Even if we did cause a scene.