Emilie’s Baptism

The last Sunday in June a whole slew of extended family descended on the house to see little Emilie get baptized. Okay so they started trickling in on Friday, but whose counting?

Kevin’s folks drove down from Moses Lake swinging through Walla Walla to pick up Beth Ann; Kevin’s “other” sister. Julie and Cory flew down from Spokane. My folks drove in from Hockinson. Since so many were coming we borrowed a camp trailer from our friend Ken (MANY THANKS!!!!) to put them all up.

The Baptism itself went perfectly. Emilie snoozed through the whole ordeal. Jack fidgeted as usual. Baptisms in our church are performed in the center of the church as a symbol of unity so the font is placed halfway down the aisle. Between Pastor Reinke, Kevin, Me, Jack, Emilie, and her three sponsors (Beth Ann, Julie, & Cory) there was quite a crowd jockeying for space around the font. When we got situated Pastor commented, ‘Well, we made it.” Referring to the fact we’d managed to get in place by the end of the appointed song. Hearing this my little mocking bird Jack loudly proclaims, “We made it Pastor!!!”  Thanks buddy.

The evening before the baptism we had dinner at our house. Pastor Reinke and his wife Betty came out and once again it was proven that all roads really do lead to Tonasket…well Havillah, in this case.

I was filling my dinner at the same time as Betty Reinke and she saw the 100th Anniversary plate for Immanuel Lutheran Havillah hanging on the wall. She looked at it a bit and said, “I think I’ve been there!” Turns out one of the Duchow cousins, Lynnette, worked for Pastor Reinke for many years and he had indeed preached there once. In further conversation it turned out that he had also gone to school with one of Kevin’s uncles. After Emilie’s Baptism we discovered another member of the congregation at Faith (our church) had that same uncle as a pastor for many years in Chicago (He saw Frank, and the family resemblance was to close not to ask if it was the same Duchow family ;-P). Small world huh?

Needless to say it was a wonderful weekend. A special day for Emilie, and a good visit with family. Below are some group pictures from the big day.

……one parting shot. Too funny not to share. He’s really not into wearing ties. Can’t say I blame him.