Shirley's party advice thread part 2

[stealthsquiggle]

...can I take the liberty of starting another thread, since the other one filled up?

Sorry stealth i missed that, what'd you say?

What are you thinking a humanist kind of style anywhere you like? Religious type thanksgiving like im going for with godparents or an official naming ceremony with a registrar?

Oh FGS stupid stupid 'phone

Humanist-style was what we went for with DS, but he was a baby so it was a "welcome to the world" party as well, which clearly anything we did for DD couldn't be. I wouldn't be averse to a church element (we live "next door" (across a field) to the church) but I think our vicar is keen on integrating baptism into regular services rather than it being a private thing. I am intruiged by your mid-way option too [dither].

This, BTW, is as far as I get every few months, and have done for the last 5 years!

Stealthsquiggle - does your dd's name mean anything? Or does she have a nickname? Could you use that some way?

Or if you are into that kind of thing, could you use her birth stone or star sign some way?

Or is there some significance as to where she was born? Or spent the first few years?

Which month was she born in?

Or what about a colour or rainbow coloured party (discussed much earlier in the thread)?

It's a flower name, Blastoff, so it would be easy enough to theme a party. I guess the stumbling block for me is how do I position this (hypothetical) party? It's not a welcome-to-the-world like DrsW is planning for DC2, so what is it, really ?

Perhaps just say it's a celebration.

And if you feel you need to say more you could say it's because she didn't have a naming ceremony, or even say it's an excuse to get everyone together?

or that you really want an excuse to plan another party and make another cake

I've just read your post stealthsquiggle and realise that, despite you posting it three times, I hadn't read it properly at all, sorry

What i'm having/had for dd would work. Service of thanksgiving for a child. As parents we had to swear to provide a loving supportive home. With gods help we will. Godparents promise to support the parents. Extended guests promise to do the same etc.

I had two readings, one wishes for the child type thing.the other was a guide for parents. As its thanking god for your child you can hold it anywhere so long as minister agrees. We had ours in a chapel but its deconsecrated so could well have been a hotel room, garden, your own lounge!

I had that as i wanted a religious element but dh is a non believer. Even he could agree to provide love.

Any good for you?

Oh and i avoided baptism because it was part of sunday service and i wanted a private ceremony which this was. 20 people. I even had the minister who married us. Was lovely. She did say i could have had the service anywhere i liked.

The reason DS and DD had such big 2nd birthday parties was because we never had a christening/naming ceremony for them. Could you do a bigger birthday party next year maybe instead?

d'you think I could get away with combining that with her acquiring pseudo-godparents? I do feel that "special" non-related adults are an important concept in life and I feel awful at having provided them for DS and not for DD.

Is it important for someone to name those adults. I mean label them officially or could you ask them to act as godparents/sponsors and maybe do a reading or similar at the party?

I do feel bad that my children don't have named guardians for if anything should happen to us. DH's family are all far too religious for my liking, as are his close friends and none of my family and close friends live close enough for the children to know them very well. I do worry about it as I think SILs would be the ones who would probably want to take the children if anything were to happen. I just can't think of anybody I'd trust to bring them up the way I'd like

Could you maybe make the cake into a birthday/ceremonial cake with a candle each for DD and her "god"parents. Get the "god"parents to bring the cake out together and everyone blows a candle out at the end of happy birthday to signify them being linked?

It's a horrible thing to have to think about, Blathers, and TBH we haven't done the paperwork properly (whereas DGoddaughter's uber-organised mother did it before she was born!)

I need to think on this birthday-and-godparent-acquiring combo (we call DS's godparents to avoid confusion even though they made no religious promises) - I do have a while.

Meanwhile, we can concentrate on DrW's christening plans - and I can decide whether to do a Twelfth Night party this year.

Blathers excuse me if I'm stating the obvious but you do know guardians arent godparents? Please dont think im being patronising, its just not clear with the guardians verses naming day talk etc. Although we hadnt made our wills, we'd asked our friends and notified our families that DD is to go to our friends.

We only got round to writing our wills about 3 months ago as Dc2 made it more pressing. I've had to write a letter too enclosed in my will explaining why I choose friends over family as the decision can be overuled by the family court in the event of my death. My brother is a hippy waster and my SIL is evil personified. Wished me dead in child birth (which was nice). So no way do I want them raising my kids. Our chosen friends are also recently approved for adoption so in a worst case scenario they could end up going from no kids to about 4 in moments!

I'm loving the cake idea that blathers has suggested but would go to the lengths of them each lighting a candle for her. DH and I had the baby name talk for the first time last night.....anyone wanna play that game as no way would I dare brave the baby name boards. Wanna dissect the choices?

Do you know what variety DC2 is, DrsW, or are you debating both?

Yes, DW. It has all got a bit mixed up hasn't it! DH has Godchildren and we're not their guardians, I'm aware they're not the same thing :)

Let's hear your baby name options then - I have a feeling DSis is thinking of using DD's nickname for her baby which is going to annoy me no end if I'm right

debating both! DD is adament that its a girl. So I think its a girl but I'm not sure if thats legitimate feelings or DD rubbing off on me. She absolutely never waivers, girl girl girl. Screaming abdabs in the shop when I wont let her buy her pink baby some pink shoes. So we're debating both sets..

Here goes then. Right it may get complicated. Firstly DH loves the name Percy for a boy (his great grandad) I said no way as its a euphemism for penis. So he now only likes Henry. Henry was my grandad's name so I'm okay with it but I really love Elliott.

So we have
Henry Elliott
Elliott Henry
Henry Charles
Henry Albert

(old names that are wild cards I suppose but Charles was my grandads middle name so i havent challenged DH on it, his grandad had charles so assume its where he pulled it from)
I should add that it is expected that any son will be called John! I have said no way. Its his family name of 6 generations. Still no. So their could be ructions about using Henry but not John. I'm quite okay with this!

Girls at risk of outing myself DD is Sophie Ella.
Top names are Lucie, Katie, Lily and DD has taken to calling her girl baby Percie! Now DH is turning cartwheels as i vetoed it for boys but in my hormonal state its growing on me with DD keep saying it. Not one girl in 2010 was named Percie, Persie etc i have told DH there is a reason! Although its short for Persephone that is not twee enough for DH. he likes sugary names like Milly, Ellie, Sophie etc. I wanted to name her Lydia!

Now i love Lucie Emma, but its sounds like I'm matching it with Sophie Ella.
So Lucie Emma
Lucie Lydia
Katie Lydia
Katie Emma and so on...

or Percie!

I love love love Henry. I'd have gone for it but dh vetoed it. I know a lovely little Elliott! All the middle names are nice too.

I really like Lucie and Katie. I'm not sure about the alliteration of Lucie Lydia, but I do like Lydia per se. I think it's very elegant. Emma is nice and classic too. I liked Lucy if we had had a girl, although I would have spelled it Lucy as I think it's less likely to cause confusion when other people are spelling it, but I can understand that it's more 'unusual' as Lucie.

I think you've picked lovely names. Great taste!

Ah yes the alliteration isnt a problem as our surname is "s" so sophie is "SS".
DH wants to use spelling Lucie rather than Lucy as mirrors DD's spelling.

I quite like it as its the spelling of Lucie who met mrs tiggywinkle!! Im an old fart me. we have a nephew lewis is that too close both likely to get called "lu/lew" Lucie is my favourite so far though.

My vote would go to Henry Charles for a boy, and Lily

We had a Henry round here this morning! :)

I know a little Elliott too but he's French. I think they're both lovely but if I were choosing, I think I'd pick Henry. All the middle names go really well too. I'm not really helping here am I?

Girls - I'm definitely keener on Katie but then that is the nickname of DD's that I think DSis might like for her new baby. I know it really doesn't go with the fact that we chose to spell her name with a C but I was hormonal at the time and it just felt right-er spelt that way - and if it's good enough for Kate Middleton, it's good enough for me

DD's middle name is Emily too which means my choice is easy.

I agree with BlastOff that Lucie Lydia is a bit too alliterative for me and I'd probably spell Lucie as Lucy to make misspellings less likely.

I wouldn't worry too much about matching the names. It's only going to come up when you fill in official forms and might be nice for them. I have 2 sisters and Mum finished all of our names with the same 2 letters and started all of our middle name with the same letter too so we properly match. It's never been a problem and I actually kind of like it. Depends on how many more children you're going to have though I guess. By the time Mum got to my DBrother, the choice of names that matched was so limited that the name they ended up with as the girls option was truly terrible, I was relieved when he was a Boy and I was only 6.5!

DS and DD 'match' in that both their names are Greek with 9 letters but that was purely accidental.

Emma is a female family name on my dad's side and so I'd be quite glad to use that actually .

Henry I do love too and having done the family tree I've seen that its my family name going back about 8 generations. I'm really relishing the chance either way to announce "It's not John!" to the in laws. Callous cow. Actually it just dawned on me. If I do family tree theme christening, they'll see quite openly that the names are from by side and John was clearly not good enough for me. eek.

Blathers I have exactly the same illogical name/nickname combination as your DD