Battin' for Our Team

Olivia got baptized yesterday and what a great day it was. We had oodles of cousins and friends to share the day with us and it made for a special time for Livvy. Our stake does baptisms on a ward basis and Olivia was the only one to be baptized from our ward. We got to plan the entire program. We didn't have to listen to one person we didn't know! Even better! Olivia's cousin Trent gave the opening prayer, her Uncle Ryan spoke on baptism, her cousin Isa played a musical number on the piano, her Grandpa Mark spoke about the Holy Ghost, her brother Mark gave the closing prayer and her Daddy baptized and confirmed her. I especially enjoyed hearing my father speak. He bore a strong witness of the Holy Ghost and I know it really had an impact on Olivia. I love that she and her cousins got to hear his testimony.

I also have to say that it is moments like these that make me love James even more than I already do. There are many great blessings in my life and certainly one of my greatest is a righteous man with righteous desires. James is a man who can baptize our children and bless them and I can tell he takes pride in being able to do so. I set my sights high years and years ago and told myself I would accept nothing but the best and I'm so glad I did. He is a blessing to me and to our children.

The best part of the day was seeing James blush a 100 shades of red. After he baptized Olivia, I went back and quickly got her dried and dressed and back to the font room. James wasn't done yet and so we waited for about 3-5 min. for him to return. He came back in, proud as a peacock to find us all staring at him. He said, "Wow! Livvy's already back?" He thought he had beat her back, thinking she was a girl and would take longer. He blushed and blushed. Big bad cops still get embarrassed! My brother-in-law Tim zinged him with, "I thought Olivia was the one with wet hair!" Keep in mind James has none! He claims he was working on his tie, which I do believe because I've seen him put on a tie and it is quite the process to reach perfection.

After the baptism we drove into to Twin Falls to go to Gertie's for some pizza and to celebrate Nate's 3rd birthday. The poor little thing had no idea it was even his b-day or why he was getting a whole slue of Transformers. He just cared about the fact that he now had Bumblebee, Jazz, Barricade and and a new Star Wars Transformer. In the chaos of it all I forgot candles for his cake and there was too many of us to rally to sing to him. Wow! I really let this one go. Of the three pictures I managed to get, the one pictured is his joy and best buddy Bumblebee. We need a new camera! He was tickled to death that night though to line up his new armada to watch him sleep. I guess that's all that matters. He was happy.