We had Nathaniel baptized two weeks ago during the Sunday service. Ben's entire family came up and stayed with us for the weekend, and then Mom, Dad and Becky's family came up for the day on Sunday. It was so amazing to have almost our entire family there for Nathaniel's special day. Thank you to everyone who rearranged their schedules at the last minute and made the long drive up to help us celebrate Nathaniel's baptism! We are thankful to have such a loving family that values time spent together!
Amelia and Megan liked having Natalie and Noah join them at the front of church for the children's message, which was led by Mr. Sandy. The kids sang "The Wise Man Built His House Upon the Rock" and Amelia and Megan showed everyone the actions.
One thing I like about how the Methodist church does baptisms is that they invite the older siblings up to the front of the church so that they can see and be a part of the ceremony. Amelia didn't really like being at the front of church with everyone looking at her, but Megan didn't seem to mind. Megan tried to entertain Nathaniel by playing with his feet; he is always interested in watching Megan.
Nathaniel still has some stranger anxiety, so I was expecting him to scream the minute he was out of my arms, but he didn't! He only fussed a little when Pastor Scott took him to be baptized, and he didn't seem to mind having the water poured on his head, either.
Because another little boy was being baptized that day, Pastor Scott wasn't able to walk around the church carrying Nathaniel to introduce him to the congregation, which was probably a good thing! Instead, I carried him around while the church sang the Little Lamb song:
Little Nathaniel, Little Nathaniel, do you know who made you,
The blue skies up above, the green grass underfoot?
Do you know God made you to teach us how to love?
I really like what Pastor Scott says as he's introducing a baby to the congregation; it's something like "When people ask Nathaniel whether he has experienced God's love, he will be able to say 'Yes! Because I grew up knowing the people of Sun Prairie United Methodist Church.'" Next time I am there for a baptism, I'm going to write it down, because I know I didn't say it as nicely as he does. But it always makes me feel happy that my kids and I are part of such a friendly and caring congregation.
I wanted to get a photo of the entire Johnson family together, since we don't have one that includes all the new babies. I thought it would be easiest to get a quick picture right after church, before everyone went home to change clothes, eat lunch, and take naps. But it is always hard to get photos with so many little ones! I especially like this one because of the fun expressions that Anna and Becky have, and because Dan looks like he is trying to distance himself from all the crazy baby chaos.
We asked Uncle Brian and Uncle Dan Yarger to be Nathaniel's godparents, and we were so happy that they agreed. Thank you, guys!
It was much easier to get a photo of the Dueber family, probably because most of the kids are older and we waited until lunch was over and the chaos had died down a little. I think this photo turned out really well.
We ordered a chocolate cake from Costco that said "God Bless Nathaniel" with a cross on it, and so I thought he ought to get to try it, since it was for him. Mom gave him a bite, but he didn't seem to be very interested at first.
After a few bites, we discovered that he liked the cake, but not the frosting. Mom prepared a few frosting-less pieces, and he quickly gobbled them up and made quite a mess!
I didn't take any photos of the cousins playing over the weekend, but thankfully, Anna did and she shared them with me. Thanks, Anna! Abby really liked playing with Amelia and Megan, and my girls enjoyed playing with her, too. Megan especially liked to follow Abby around to try to convince Abby to play with her. I don't think she understands the short attention span a two year old can have!
Abby especially liked playing in our reading tent; she liked to hide in there and pretend that no one could see her. She warmed up to me pretty quickly, and we had a lot of fun playing together on Saturday. She also liked playing on our playset, so much so that she opened the porch door and escaped outside one day while we were all busy doing other things. She was happily playing in the little house when Anna ran outside to find her. :)
The girls even got to take a batch together on Saturday night.
The babies all seemed to enjoy playing with toys in our living room. They didn't exactly play together, but they all played near each other. Natalie liked to walk behind and push Nathaniel's little riding car, and she would even push it while Nathaniel or Rosemary were sitting on it. They liked getting rides!
And here's Grandma Jane and Grandpa Jeff with all their grandkids playing on the air mattress in the basement.
It was a crazy, wonderful weekend!
ReplyDeleteUm....that would be me feeding him his first bites of cake. Not sure why I get the privilege of dealing with your children's first experiences with cake.
ReplyDelete