Christening/Dedication/Naming Day - What was yours like?

[hockeymum]

What did you do that was special for your childs christening/dedication/naming day. What works well?

I'm getting ds dedicated next month and I was looking for good ideas.

No help here from the chat section so thought I'd try general topics

just a bog standard c of e christening here. all the family and close friends at the church and then back to our house for a buffet lunch and drinks.a nice christening cake and champagne for a toast.all very usual but also very nice.

same as alexsmun - both times a C of E service at out church and lunch for everyone here afterwards.

and for me. though with dd2 might do it on her birthday (1st) so we're have party and games for the older children

Thanks - do you provide all the buffet or do you ask people to bring things?

If you ask them, how do you broach the subject? I dont want to put anyones nose out of joint but the thought of catering for 20 people all by myself is not pleasant!

I found people in my family offered. I invited them, and they said "Oh, I'll bring my cheese scones shall?", and I of course said yes please!

Catholic christening - on our wedding anniversary. DD was only 4 months. Immediate family only so my Mum did the catering. It was just nice to celebrate with all DDs cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents. We had the priest that did our wedding concelebrate as he is a very good friend. Personally I feel this type of event is all about family and maybe some very close friends - champagne and cake definitely required!

We had a catholic christening the day after we were married We threw a huge party in our garden, very informal. My dad, a chef made ahuge buffet and we did a booze cruise to France and got loads of champers, etc. We hired tables and chairs, decorated them with balloons, and party favours. It was a fantastic day, well it went on til the early hours.

We had a naming ceremony at the local town hall, then food and drinks back at the house for about 20 people. It was lovely. I reckon keep it simple.

oh and bizarrely, lots of our mates just turned up with home-made cakes, without so much as a hint required.

I would say, if you are going to ask people to bring stuff, make a list and ask them for specific things so you don't end up wth loads of green salad and nothing else (I went to a christening party like that!)
For DS1 we had huge party on Easter Sunday - he was only 10 weeks old and we had 100 people back to our house after mass - it was crazy especially as we did all the catering (hot buffet) ourselves.
Fr DS2 it was a bit more low key - less people and we got Safeways to do loads of trays of sandwiches which was fine.
For next one, I would do something similar to DS2's

We had naming day and 1st birthday at local leisure centre, the kids went swimming after the ceremony and we then had a birthday lunch.

Children had healthy party food (cos was for 1st birthday) and adults had ham on the bone, quiches from Sainsburys and pasta salad etc. Catered for 65 people including kids on my own and was not the nightmare you would imagine!