08 November 2011

Katerina's Baptism

This is a long time due, sorry Aunt Jeanie, I have been a little lax in my blogging. Katerina had her baptism on October 16th, she pretty much screamed the whole entire time, as pictured above. Her godmother is Ero, she is 26 and can speak 4 languages, she works on an Island during the summer in a hotel and this winter she is taking foreigners up to the mountains to ski.
Struggling to hold on to Kat as the priest prays over her.
Finally calmed down a little bit because she was allowed to walk around, she is wearing a dress that was mine when I was a little girl. Amanda (my half-brother's wife) gave it to me when I was in Denver, she helped the family clean out my grandparents house and gave me a few things that were mine when I was little.
Arthur trying to distract her with his phone, this does usually work but not today.
Ahh now the dunking, in lukewarm water covered in olive oil, not the favorite part for the kids, Nik also was quite upset during this part.
The priest tried to pry the pacifier from her hand but she had a death grip on the thing and would not let it go, so it was also baptized with her.
This photo was taken before the dunking and you can't tell but she was actually trying to leap out of my arms because she wanted to get in the water. Ero on the left, her mother, Nik and myself with Kat.
Before she was undressed and very interested in getting in the water.
Nik trying to protect his sister, he was a very good boy during the ceremony.
The below picture is after the dunking and the priest is trying to anoint her with special oil, he also took 4 snippets from her hair in the shape of the cross. She has been dressed in her new clothes provided by Ero and her father is required to hold her, once again not happy about any of this.

Finally we are done, the below picture is taken just inside the church, Vaso (godmother's mother), Ero the godmother, Katerina the grandmother, Arthur, Mara and Katerina the baby. Above we are outside and she is happy to be eating a cupcake that I had made to hand out after the ceremony for all of the people who attended.
Vaso and her son George (the brother of Ero), Vaso and Ero live in Larissa, George lives with his wife in Athens.
We had the after party at KokaRoka, Grandma Katerina and Arthur did all of the cooking with a little help from Nik's godfather's mother - Nikki.
So happy to be on familiar turf, we had a cousin who was one year older than Nik and also a family friend who has a daughter who is 2 years older than Nik so the four kids had a great time running around the table of adults eating. We had pork steak, potatoes, coleslaw and little burgers.
Arthur and I finally kind of relaxing, that is Nikki to the right (Niks godfather's mother) or you could say she is family also.

4 comments:

Jon said...

Congrats to the family. Interesting stuff. Mara, your hair looks good, I liked your baptism outfit too. Kat's eyes are always so pretty. What does it mean if the paci was baptized too? Holy Pacifier Batman!

Kelly said...

Mara- love your hair! It is so interesting to read about the Greek customs/ culture! Love seeing all of the pics!

Jeanie said...

Mara, you look so pretty~ Love reading about your life and seeing your cute kids! Is that a picture of Arthur hanging in the KokaRoka?

Mara said...

That is a picture of Arthur's father, they look a lot alike.