Dedicated

This weekend was our Baby Dedication at our church! Our church does it a bit differently and I love it. Basically it is a completely separate church service for the babies being dedicated and their families. We were given a few 10 minute talks to listen to and then challenged to come up with five values that we wanted to instill in our children. 

CT3 and I did this in advance. The talks are about everything from the marriage being the foundation of your family and your children to how thinking through these values helps you define how you parent.

When CT3 and I wrote our list of values we probably started out with 18-20 words and then had to narrow it down to five. That was hard. We prioritized and then determined what could fit into multiple categories and narrowed from there. 

If you had to tell me your five values for your kids, what would they be?! 

We finally settled on love, patience, faithfulness, honest and respect. The next runners up were along the lines of dedicated, hardworking, caring, giving, encouraging, and on and on. It was hard to narrow it down and I think we will go through seasons. Right now, AM LOVES to encourage others but all of our patience is thin! I know where we will go through times when we cruise through respect, but struggle with being honest. 

Our goal is to train our children with these values in hopes that when we {with the help of the Lord} lead them, we are leading them back to these - and that we will be diligent about praying and thinking through this early on so that we can teach good habits versus having to retrain in the later years for bad habits formed.

Its a big charge and something CT3 and I pray about daily. 

Anyway, at our baby dedication, us and our family sat at round tables. There was a brief message and then we were asked to share with our families our five values. The thing I loved about this is that while it was a bit weird sharing our parenting values {as if we even know what they are or if they will work!} with our families, it really does take a village. This way, our village and those that are closest to us know our goals and are able to talk us through them, keep us accountable and walk with us through the trenches. 

After that, someone from our church spoke briefly and then we closed with a time of prayer. We just kind of all prayed together but it was however the families wanted to do it. 

The dedication was great and we enjoyed having our family and friends down for the day to celebrate our little man! I used Paperless Post and sent out an email that included this invitation to invite everyone. We ate a pot roast lunch, followed by the dedication service at church and then ended the day with family pictures. 

{Have you used Paperless Post before!? Its awesome. Think evite but cuter and fancier!! Use the link above to create an account and I will get a few free credits and be your best friend! I LOVE it! You can print real invites from there or do email ones or take screen shots like I did for this one and just drop it in an email.}

For CT4's dedication, I knew he would probably wear the dress. Its really a christening gown but inevitably I call it a dress. You remember the whole dress gown debacle when AM was dedicated...CT3 and everyone in his family were dedicated in the dress gown but I wanted to shop and pick out something special for my littles....hubby is traditional, wifey is not - that whole deal. 

Well, not wanting to rehash all of that, I just assumed CT4 would wear it. That said, I still had a hard time putting my little man in a dress gown and I still wanted to buy him a little something so I splurged on him and got something too. CT4 wore the gown at church and then at home for a few pictures and wore the other little knit outfit that I got him for the rest of the time. He is manly enough to pull off even the frilliest gown and tradition, right!? ;)

In all honesty, I didn't really care that he was going to wear it...it did get under CT3's skin that I kept talking about "the dress" but it made me giggle and when I feel awkward I like to giggle, so I called it a dress and laughed most of the time - with the exception of the one time I almost cried. 

A friend walked up to me at church and asked a simple, "how are you" and the water works almost began. I was tired, exhausted, tired and AM was being a handful. Top it off with my little guy in a 90 year old gown from France and me in Texas cowboy boots and emotions hit the fan. As I got dressed, I realized that CT4 was super formal and traditional and that me nor my church is. I didn't have clothes that I could wear {or that fit} and I didn't want him to stick out like a sore thumb. I about lost it, but after throwing something on and having Kristin tell me that it looked fine {though casual} I decided I was going to go with comfort and not stress.

As for AM, thankfully, her turning off all of the printers in the church, standing in time out, and tee teeing in her pants were not that big of a deal and all got handled. I regained my composure and thought to heck with it. CT4 looked cute and I was comfortable in my skinny jeans and cowboy boots. It probably looked a bit awkward but we were all comfy and we rocked it.

After all, the entire day wasn't about what I wore or what he wore or how we would look in our pictures. The day was about family, Jesus and our little boy - and THAT is what was important.

P.S. Kristin was a champ and took all of the photos for me. I couldn't have handled one more thing so I didn't even pick up my camera knowing she would pull through! Thanks sis! 

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