Baptism celebration?

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Viki63

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Hi all,
Are there any traditions or protocol for celebrating after a baptism? The child is 4 and a half, and I’m his grandma. My friend is having her 2 year old baptized and her family is planning a huge get-together, but we don’t have anything like that planned. (nor do we have the huge family)
 
For each of mine, we hosted a breakfast reception after Mass for the parish. I made crepes ahead of time, then heated them up on griddles and served them with strawberries and whipped cream. Other people will have a white cake or something with appropriate decorations-- white flowers, a gold cross, etc.

Then we went to our home and had a low-key get-together with friends/family who had come for the occasion, and did gifts, and things like that. We served them a nice lunch and had some good together time.
 
for both of my grandchildren we went to the ceremony

afterwards we had a backyard bbq; it was fun, low pressure & the baptismal child was the “star” of the show
 
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There are family traditions but no protocol. Many families have a meal or reception afterwards, just to indicate that baptism is something joyous to celebrate. Nothing is required.
 
We go out for pizza. I didn’t even get cake for my youngest. Very low key. Just close family and godparents.
 
For my daughter, we booked a private room at an Italian restaurant: apps and entrees w/ beer and wine, sofa and coffee… We mixed up a playlist and were able to play it over the music system and bought our cake separate. We had about 25 relatives or so.

We made little chocolate crosses and gave out photos of her in her baptismal gown as a favor.
 
My mom is official family cakemaker. She makes a cake and family and friends come over for a casual meal that usually ends in my dad offering everyone Scotch and my husband desperately trying to distribute the it’s a boy or it’s a girl cigars my dad always gets him.

I’ve been wanting to develop some traditions for people’s baptism dates but nothing yet. Like stick everyones baptism candle in a candleabra that day at dinner.
 
The usual practice is some sort of cake and a small party with family and friends. You can have it at a house or a restaurant. You can also decide how big you want it to be.

People often bring a small age-appropriate religious themed gift for the child.
 
There’s a Taco Bell near my parish. Many people from our parish go there.
 
For us it usually turned into some sort of BBQ or something (depending on time of year). Last one in the family, the invitation read for those that wanted to attend Mass that was at 10:30, for those that don’t baptism was about 11:30, and reception at the house to follow.
 
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For both of our kiddos, we had family coming in from out of town, so we felt obligated to have a nice reception. For our first, we had a gathering at our home. It was Thanksgiving weekend and we’d all been stuffing ourselves with rich food so I think I served a pre-ordered store-bought sandwiches and I made a couple different homemade soups the night before. I must have decided that was too much work the second time around because with my son, we had the reception in a restarurant near the parish.
 
Thanks for all the suggestions. I think we’ll go out for ice cream after. since it’s in the evening.
 
You can drive home and go about your day, rent a ballroom and a band or anything in between. In my circle of friends, a meal at home or at a casual restaurant with the family and godparents is the norm. And a cake, you must have a cake 🙂
 
According to Miss Manners, chicken salad is the main dish of choice at a baptism.

But we took our in laws and godparents out to lunch at a restaurant.
 
The godparents took us out for ice cream. I never saw that child eat so much ice cream. His white suit was blue! A good time was had by all.
 
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