Naming ceremony ideas please!

[Charlotte4]

Hi, is there anyone that can please help? I seem to have baby brain at the moment and cannot think of any ideas.
I'm hoping to have a naming ceremony in August for my little boy.
I love the idea of writing it ourselves as it will be more personal and in years to come i can tell Thomas how special he is that we wrote the ceremony just for him.
We're not religious so we don't want that featured too heavily in the ceremony and in August Thomas will only be 5 months old so i don't want anything too grown up.
I'm really rubbish at being creative at things like this, the only ideas i've come up with are having a guest book that everyone can sign and leave messages in so Thomas can read them when he's older and i think i may have a vow for the Godparents to say. I just don't know what to write about anything, how to word things.
I read an idea on a webpage about all the guests having a flower that they in turn give to Thomas once he's been named-but does that sound a bit weird?
I'm really sorry to ask people to have to help me out but i just want this day to be perfect for Thomas. SO any ideas are welcome.
Many many thanks to anyone that can help. X

Hi Charlotte

We had a Naming Ceremony for our DD when she was 6 months old and it was perfect. We just had family and close friends and thankfully the weather was great and we held it in our parents garden!
Once everyone was in the garden DP got everyone quiet and then thanked them all for coming. Then he said a little bit about DD - why we had chosen the names for her that we did; the little characteristics that were coming out etc etc.
Then I said a few words, thanked DP for his help with stuff (I'd had a tough few weeks post-birth). Then my nephew read a poem (something about it not being fair being so small... can't remember what it was called )
We had a book too - we took a picture of everyone there and then they wrote a message on the facing page - so when we got the pictures developed we stuck the pic on the opposite page, iyswim.
Then basically everyone ate all the buffet and drank all the beer

hth xx

Thank you, that sounds a really nice ceremony.
We too are having it in my parents garden so fingers crossed it'll be lovely and sunny.
I'mgetting nervous already about speaking in front of people! Thank you! X

We had an arranged BNS for our first DC which was more formal but which we used as the template for the BNS we held for our DD and DS2. DS2s BNS was the most recent and I, basically did it.

I thanked everyone for coming and thanked people specifically for things they had done. We then explained why we had chosen the names we had given DS and who his non-Godlyparents and Guardian would be. DH did a reading and I read a poem and then we played a song and then cracked the bevvies open.

We had one for DS -- if you CAT me I'd be happy to send you a copy. We had a British Humanist Association celebrant and adapted the basic structure from ome examples she had, wrote some promises for the godparents and each drafted our own descriptions of what we wanted to do for DS and what we hoped for him.

we also had a humanist celebrant whom we met with 3 times before the event. we worked out the running order and opening speech with her - which really focused on welcoming our dd into teh wider family and friendship circles. teh 2 grannies lit a candle, the 4 guardians (or "odd parents") said a bit each on what they hoped they coudl give her throughout life, her dad spoke - reall ylovely on his feelings and the expereince. i spoke on what it was liek to be her mum. it was really lovely. we just toasted her receiving her name.
we also had the memory book for messages, with pics.
i loved it all. family & friends who hadnt been to one before also enjoyed that the whole focus was on her.

Hi - we also had a humanist celebrant for both of ours - fantastic. She gave us some ideas and we wrote bits ourselves. We had for DD, 3 angels who all had a bit of a poem to read. I couldn't talk I was so overcome. We gave all the important people little gifts too.

DS was just lovely too, 3 guys to look after him, John Lennon 'Beautiful Boy' playing, it was fab.

Do a search on Humanist Association and naming ceremonies, I cannot remember the website but there is one that has fantastic guides on there.

Even the most cycnical oldies about 'eeeuuw, they are not having a christening, some new age hippy thing' were totally overcome and loved it.

I'd second the humanist book to help plan a ceremony - has some great readings and ideas

Thank you to everyone for replying. I looked up that website and will be buying the book-it sounds like its got loads of really good ideas to help me. Thanks! X

book by Julia Watson is lovely and available from Amazon.

We followed a similar format to what others have mentioned and talked about our babe. My sister and my dd1 read a prayer and poem.

I really wanted a garden party so we had the table laid and a few games set up for the children to play. It was such a lovely occassion.

Good luck for your special day.

Get in touch with the British Humanist Association here. The site has a list of humanist celebrants so you can get one in your area to compose and conduct the ceremony for you, or you can order a book with enough info to do it yourself.
I'm a humanist celebrant but only qualified for weddings: humanist ceremonies are great because you can have them exactly the way you want them and they are all about the people concerned.

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