Sariah's Blessing

For years, my family has had a Labor Day BBQ with the same family. Their kids and our kids are pretty much all the same age, so everyone always had a friend to play with. The kids are growing up, and it's harder and harder to get together, but I got a wild hair in my hat on saturday, and i wanted to BBQ. So I emailed my mom's friend Kathi. Unfortunately, they had already made plans for Monday, and I was left without a large number of people to entertain. Well... It's Chad to the Rescue! He called his mom, and invited them over to the BBQ (he didn't know the other family couldn't come yet). And then he invited Uncle Lenny and family. And then he told his wife that he had extended extra invitations. At least I now had people to plan for! Love it!

Sunday came around and we met with our Bishop about blessing baby, and getting Chad's and Bishop's schedule to match up. Well, we had the perfect date, Sept. 20th marked on the calendar, until my mom said that we couldn't do that because she would be out of town on her sisters trip. So, we called up Chad's mom and asked her when a good day would be for all of the family to get together for Sariah's blessing, and she said that we should just do it at the BBQ. So, we made some quick calls to our family friends, and invited more to the BBQ and blessing so that they could stand in the circle. Seth and Ed (Chad's brothers from other mothers) came out, and so did the Olsen, Barker, and Bangerter families. (manda's Party tally just doubled!)

Monday morning was spent in frantic preparation. My Dad and Chad went out to make sure that the yards were suitable and the pool was blue. Aleah and I spent the morning making yummy deserts and mom made a couple of salads to complement the hamburgers, hotdogs, and bratwurst that the men folk would be grilling after the blessing. We cleaned and vacuumed the house, found extra chairs for the extra butts, and gave Sariah a bath for good measure (it was really a party for her after all!) We even kept her mostly naked just to make sure that any spit up didn't soak into her clothes and make her smelly before the big event. Four o'clock rolled around and all of our friends and family made their appearances.


Daddy blessed Sariah and gave her a beautiful name :) Sariah Poamaika'i Ahonui Nunes is a real person now (because according to the ladies at the store she was fake before ((I got asked twice if she was real or a doll that I was carrying around.. paaahleeease!))



There was so much food to commemorate her blessing and celebrate Labor Day. Lots of people swam in the blue pool, Eliana (belongs to uncle Lenny) and Rebecca Olsen made friends ("who can run around the fastest" was the favorite game, next to "share my chicken").


Everybody left after a couple of hours, and Chad and I decided that since Princess Sariah decided to sleep, we should do the same. And so we did.