Bryson's Baptism

Bryson's 8th birthday was November 2nd, and his baptism was scheduled for November 14th. 

I put Matt in charge of taking some baptism pictures in the front yard.

Thus a "baptism" picture on his new jeep.

The picture we used for his invitations

Bryson's baptism program

A few family pictures

We were grateful to all our friends and family that came! 

My favorite part of the baptism was singing together. The Spirit was so strong as we sang "Gethsemane." It has just been so long that we have been able to sing in a church building! Drew and Ariane did a great job on their talks. Matt's family was not able to join last-minute due to an exposure to Covid-19. 

Bryson is our child who is often in "La La Land" during Come Follow Me discussions/scripture reading. We are constantly bringing him back to attention. Even though we thought we had covered all the information to prep him for his baptism, we realized not everything sunk in when Bryson couldn't answer what faith is during his bishop's interview. 😆

Carter's Baptism

Carter chose to be baptized a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on April 14, 2018. 

This is the picture we used for his baptism invitations.

Such a handsome boy.

He and his friend Kate were baptized on the same day.

In trying to correct a mistake we made at Caleb's baptism, we made sure to take a lot of pictures! We should have changed up the scenery though...

Matt's dad said the opening prayer and Caleb played the opening song, "If the Savior Stood Beside Me." Kate's father gave a talk on baptism and then Jared and Ariane played a piano duet, "The Spirit of God." Matt baptized Carter and Jared and Zane stood as witnesses. Drew gave a talk on the Holy Ghost and Matt confirmed Carter a member of the church and Carter received the gift of the Holy Ghost. Jared played the closing song, "Baptism" and Kate's grandma said the closing prayer. We had some cookies and fruit for refreshments.

After the baptism, we ended up having my family over for games and pizza since Carter's baseball game was cancelled due to weather.

I hope that it was a memorable day for Carter. He is such a sweet boy. We are proud of the decision he made and hope he continues to follow the example of Jesus Christ.

Other May Happenings

Our nephew, David Earl, was baptized. We were so happy to be there and share in his special day.

We did an Escape Room date with all my siblings (minus Lindsey). We were 2 minutes away from beating the record. :(

 Memorial Day we got together for Poison Ball and a Star Wars game at the church with some friends + lunch. Later that night we went swimming with friends as well.

Baptism

Caleb's baptism day was scheduled for Sept. 12th. I really felt like I was going to have an August baby, so I thought Austin would be around 2 weeks old at Caleb's baptism. My younger brother lives 3 hours away, and he planned to be there at the baptism to play a musical number as well as participate in Austin's baby blessing the following day. Because Austin arrived so late on Sept. 10th, we cancelled both events.

Instead, Caleb was baptized on October 24th. There was a hurricane happening in Mexico that day, so we had some very rainy weather with predictions of flooding. I was a little concerned that we might have trouble getting to the church building due to weather! I thought it was symbolic that the earth was cleaned by rain on the same day that Caleb's life was cleaned by baptism.

Caleb and Carter both had sports games scheduled that day as well as pictures, so we thought it was going to be a super busy day. Fortunately the rain cancelled everything except Carter's pictures, but it still ended up being chaotic as Carter's pictures were an hour before the baptism. Matt and I split up to divide and conquer, but some things got forgotten--Carter's church clothes that I had set out and a towel to dry off. Both important items! So Carter attended the baptism in his soccer uniform and Caleb and Matt used paper towels to dry off after the baptism. :)

Here are some of Caleb's baptism pictures that I took:

This is the one we used to display next to the programs.

It's taken me so long to post about Caleb's baptism because I want to recreate this picture. It's a little fuzzy and Caleb's eyes are closed. We've tried twice to recreate it and something came up both times that prevented it from actually happening.

Caleb was baptized with two other children from our ward that day. Both of Caleb's home teachers spoke since they were the home teachers of another girl getting baptized that day as well. Brother Pennington gave the talk on baptism and Brother Sivula gave the talk on the Holy Ghost. Jared and Ariane played a piano duet, "The Spirit of God," as a musical number. Matt performed both the baptism and confirmation. It was a special day especially because Caleb had been looking forward to it for such a long time! Caleb has the sweetest spirit, and we feel so blessed to be his parents. We are so proud of him and this decision that will influence both this life and the next.