pure of heart

Last Saturday was a glorious-for-Mama sort of day: my Marian Grace was baptized.

In our religious tradition, eight years old is designated as the "age of accountability", and children may choose then to be baptized. Both my mom and Nathan's parents were able to fly east for the event, bringing new scriptures and pretty white remembrance bracelets and a white handsewn dress to be baptized in (sometimes I get to thinking I'm a better seamstress than my mom and then I am HUMBLED).

Lots of her best local supporters came, some with hand-picked bouquets. Maryland superstars snuck in as well, to her delight. This is just the sort of event that has me glowing with love for my family and my friends and my husband (he baptized Marian and conducted the meeting and I always love seeing him teaching in whatever venue. I guess it's the professor in his soul I fell in love with in the first place--ah, the philosophy in those early 17-year-old letters!).

Three of her sweet church friends were baptized at the same service (my programs all lined up while the paint dried) and I loved seeing both their glow and the good folks who were there to support them.

We had root beer floats (a family tradition: Nathan's parents served root beer floats at our wedding open house in their backyard a dozen years ago) and cookies afterwards. She ordered "white hearts!", which I thought was very baptism-appropriate. Marian had such a hard time sleeping the night before (oh, the excitement!) that I finally invited her downstairs at midnight to help my mom & I decorate the cookies (that smiley face on the right is one of her contributions).Every event of Marian's is especially sweet to us. We know how close we were (several times) to missing our delightful journey together. This summer's craziness interfered with my fancy plans to prepare her spiritually for the event, but we were able to have some good family conversations and I had sweet evidence of her readiness:

I've recently started leading the mid-week activities for the 8-11 year old girls in our congregation. I gave Marian her little goal booklet at the first activity, and asked her to write her name on the cover. She wrote:

Marian Goates
I♥U, God.

I love you, my Marian Grace.