Baptisms...

There is no set rule for a Baptism. You can have as many or as little people as you choose. At the church, I would at least have the godparents and immediate family if you are trying to keep it small.

For Luke's Christening, I invited everyone to the church and dinner after. Most people came to the church but a few made it just to dinner, like a wedding I guess. We had about 40 people and had it at a restaurant. It was in a private room so there was room to mingle (and all my nieces & nephews to run around)

With the next baby, I think we will do something at home. Money's a little tighter so it will be less 'formal' probably get the food catered in so we dont have to worry about cooking. Either that or it will be just immediate family out to dinner.

Of course you can go bigger, my SIL & BIL had a party of about 100 people for my nephew's Christening.

My brother & SIL did their last one at home and it was very nice.

Hope this helps.

We are inviting everybody to the church, but are only expecting the immediate family since the church is in NYC. We are going to have a party after at a restaurant we frequent.

My sister always had the party at her house - cake and coffee and it was always SO nice. I hate the big Christening gala, but my DH family is all Italian and they make a really big deal over it. Everybody is really looking forward to it so we are going to do the big party thing. Probably around 100 people.

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Posted by jenny11.9

DH family is all Italian and they make a really big deal over it.

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Jenny I KNOW that feeling


Melissa, to answer your question.
On the invite, I put the time and location of the church as well as the restaurant.
Directions to everything were included.
In my case, since there was a far stretch of time betw the 2 I had some food at my house also. so I had to include that on my invite.

Church 1pm.
Refreshments at our home 2:30
REstaurant 4:30
For those that traveled far, I would have felt bad if they had nowhere to go in that interim time. I made sure to include directions from each point to the next incase someone came to all 3, and about 40 of the 65 did

This time around, since the weather will be nicer, Im also considering doing something at home/backyard... but Im also dreading BAD weather that will force us to move it all inside.. havent decided...

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Posted by jenny11.9

my DH family is all Italian and they make a really big deal over it.

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Sorry to butt in here, but I never realized that a baptism was such a big thing (pretty much like a wedding all over again) until I married my husband. I don't want anything big, and my husband insists...

We just had our families and we had it at my sister's house. We got food catered in. Since I'm not working right now and it was in January(Brrrrrrr) we decided that we would have a big blow out for his first birthday and keep the Baptism smaller. Our friends all understood (In fact a lot of us have opted for smaller family only baptism's for our children )

I am Italian but decided against the wedding-type christening party.
We invited parents, siblings,aunts/uncles and very, very close friends. We had about 30 people in total. I invited everyone to the Church and the resturant for dinner afterwards. But I have also been to home christening parties that were lovely. You should do what is best in your situation.

We sent invites that had the church info as well as the party info on them. We were fortunate enough to have a private baptism for Ryan in the chapel of our Catholic church so we were fortunate that not everyone we invited showed up to the church - but many people did...

We had about 50 people at our house for a party. It was August (the weekend of the blackout) and I had a tent and had it catered. We included family and friends. I think it's totally up to you what you want to do - there's no set rules...

i hear you about the Italian Factor, my dh's two cousins just had there childrens Baptism at the Watermill and the Swan club My cousins have had smaller affairs, without cocktail hour and dj's.....