Saturday, July 21, 2012

Celebrate Name Days and Baptism Anniverseries



celebrate name days and baptism anniverseries

When each of my children was born, I fully intended to celebrate their name days and baptism anniversaries yearly.  I imagined our children becoming familiar with the stories of all of our patron saints and building anticipated traditions around these.  I envisioned simple, yet powerful celebrations to honor the promise of their baptisms.  I longed to create memories tied strongly to rejoicing in the gift each individual child is as well as the blessing that our communal faith is.

What I did not foretell was six years and counting of letting distraction override intention.

Our family has yet to celebrate a name day ,and I can count on one hand the number of baptism anniversaries that we have commemorated.  In fact, I am ashamed to admit that this morning I could not even recall the dates on which Jack, Nina and Luke were baptized and just spent hours trolling through recovered computer files trying to jog my memory.

Why all the effort?  Because this (school) year is the year I am committed to making my initial dream a reality.  I am fully intent on getting both Name Days and Baptism Anniversaries on the calendar so we will be more apt to prepare for and celebrate them.  I am absolving myself of past neglect and focusing myself on yearly rhythms of fun with faith and family to come.

So, tell me, does your family celebrate Name Days?  How about Baptism Anniversaries?  What favorite traditions have you developed around these?  And, how about St. Anne’s day?  Do you have favorite ideas for observing her (and Joachim’s) feast day?  It happens to be a Name Day here and I’ve got but four days to prepare for it...

Traditions are unfolding... 

3 comments:

Unknown said...

Hi Martianne! I want to respond to your question on my blog about reggio and why we stopped relying on that methodology by email, but I can't find an address for you. Care to send me a note? amongstlovelythings-at-gmail-dot-com.

(lovely blog, by the way!) :)

Elisa said...

Good luck with your new schedule; it is a lovely idea. BTW, I sent you a couple of e-mails about meals; let me know if they are helpful.

Thank you for continuing this link up every week.

Unknown said...

I wasn't able to join the linkup, but I had a few ideas:
Scrapbooking the Sacraments (this helps keep track of those dates!) http://www.equippingcatholicfamilies.com/2011/06/baby-book-and-journalturned-catholic.html
Also...my newest series: I Spy...the Saints (great for all the saints holy cards and medals we collect)
http://www.equippingcatholicfamilies.com/2012/08/i-spyaugust-saints.html

lots more to link to your awesome post!
Converted 2 Catholic board games ....and my most recent post: catolguing holy cards.
Too difficult to link them all with the computer I'm using right now. =) I hope to check in again on your blog soon!

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