It was a memorable day to start out with as we woke up to snow - on the 9th of April! Welcome to spring in Utah, it will never cease to amaze and surprise.
I laughed as the kids ran to the front window to see if there was snow out front too - as if it would just snow on one side of the house! They really make me laugh sometimes!
The night before his baptism, we gave Zach a brand new suit to wear since his old one was WAY too short. He looked so handsome all dressed up.
At 10:30am, we headed over to the church and Zach got dressed in his white clothes. I love this picture behind him - so appropriate to have him standing in front of the Savior on such a special day.
Even though they had practiced many times, I was worried he'd get nervous. But he was all smiles and happy.
Here's Jeremiah with him. Two of my three handsome boys. Tate was there by the way, sitting on the floor and grabbing my skirt as I was trying to take the picture, which is why it's a little blurry.
After that, Jeremiah and Zach headed for a little instruction and Tate and I headed to the chapel to meet up with the family. When 11:00am arrived, we had opening exercises with talks on baptism and the Holy Ghost, then a presentation of those getting baptized. There were 3 wards from our stake in our baptism session - a total of 8 kids getting baptized. We were one 1 of 3 sessions, so you can imagine how many kids were getting baptized in our stake - probably around 25 or so. We have a stake with a lot of young families, so this is pretty normal.
When it was our ward's turn, we all went to the font where the 3 boys from our ward were baptized and then confirmed. Zach did great. Jeremiah said he wasn't nervous until they got in the water - which they said was a touch cold. Anyway, even though there was much practicing, Zach panicked as he got to about his ears, then he tried to push back up. Since Jeremiah's hand was holding onto Zach's that was holding his nose, that was the only way for Jeremiah to push him all the way under. He said he didn't think he pushed that hard, but when Zach came up and then they were walking out of the font, he noticed that Zach's nose was bleeding slightly. It stopped almost immediately, but Jeremiah really felt bad. Zach didn't seem to care and he was all smiles when he came back from getting cleaned up.
Once all 3 boys were confirmed, we wrapped up the meeting. All of our family headed back to our house for lunch. The first order of business was for Zach to open up all of his gifts from everyone.
He got so many gifts and loved every one:
Hailey and Tate gave him a bible
Nana and Papa Downs gave him a triple combination
Nana, Papa, and Troy Hawks gave him a baptism book
Jon, Holli, and Family gave him a tie tac and toys
Michael and Afton gave him a CTR basketball tie tac
Michelle, Brian, and Family gave him scripture markers, book marks
Kylie, Jedd, and Libby gave him a scripture case
Both Great Nanas sent him $5
(I hope I'm remembering all the correctly, please forgive me if I've remembered this wrong!)
He wanted a picture with Nana and Papa on his special day.
(We missed Nana and Papa from California, but knew they were with us in spirit!)
After all that, everyone changed and had some lunch. The kids all had a blast playing together and the adult had a good time chatting and hanging out.
With much angst, I was able to force the family to sit down for a quick picture as we were leaving the church. It had been a long morning with lots of pictures already, but thankfully we were able to get a good one of us.
We are so proud of Zachary and his decision to be baptized. It was certainly a special day and one I will never forget.
