Baptized

 We baptized little Mette Mary this past Saturday.

I don't know how much the reality of the step she was taking really penetrated her little soul beforehand. 

Or mine even. 

We talked about it of course. ("Mette," I'd told her. "Can you really believe that you are about to have one of the most important days of your entire existence! Who knows how many billions of years you were living with Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother before you came here. And you will go on living forever and ever. But this day! The day you will be baptized! It's one of the most important days of all!") But those conversations were all mixed in with all the usual business of bedtimes, and cleaning, and homework, and ordinary, and distraction. 

Even on the morning of her baptism there was rushing and readying.

But! When she came up out of that water, and I wrapped her in a towel, and hugged her, and while it was just the two of us for a few minutes before heading back out for the confirmation ... she felt it! Not in any type of words. She felt it in pure happiness. It was just bouncing all around her being. I could feel her happiness. Her spirit knew the significance and felt it so keenly that it burst past any mortal veils to fill her eight-year-old mind and body with the brightest joy. 

I wish I could have bottled it right up and put a stopper on it to keep it from ever leaking out, so I could just hand it to her to open just a crack throughout the rest of her life whenever she has doubts or worries. "But do you remember this feeling?" I'd ask her. And she would know it was all still true and still right.

It was a perfect little celebration. Our old stake always did the monthly baptisms for the entire stake together. They put on the program and you just showed up with everyone else. But our new stake gives each family their own time slot on the monthly baptism day, so this was the first time since Abe and Daisy's baptisms that we had a little program of our own! 

(As you can see I pulled out all the stops with printing up a very formal looking program. ...) Our bishop asked Alma to bear his testimony after the confirmation which was the perfect ending.

It was a fairly small affair. My mom drove up with Alma and Gayle. Melyssa from our old ward came. And Mike's Aunt Sarah and Uncle Garth rounded out the group of invitees. Luckily, Mette also happens to have nine siblings. (Abe and Dais drove up from Provo, so we were only missing missionary Goldie.) And those, combined with a few of her primary leaders who nicely showed up, made for a lovely little team of cheerleaders.

(Here we all are waving goodbye to the grandparents from our little rental.)

How lucky I feel to get to experience these events through so many children. I can hardly believe this was our eighth child to be baptized!