Not my responsibility anymore?

Today in church, we dedicated Kalina to God.

Whew, I thought in the middle of last night's gauntlet of wakings and feedings. I'll be glad to finally get some help.

Unfortunately, as God is not a woman, the help will likely be of a less concrete kind, and more of a "support" role, but I still greatly value it.

We chose God (in a Christian sense), as opposed to the various gods in existence, because we believe in Him as the only true one. Not only that, but we believe our faith in Jesus is vital. So although some would have us, instead, adopt a more open-minded approach, we think that would be akin to leaving poor Kalina in the middle of New York City alone and without so much as a guidebook, let alone a nice taxi driver to give her a lift. She's in good hands with this particular Taxi Driver because we already know he's the most loving and merciful one there is (these both come in handy during endless diaper changes, as well as other potentially messier situations in the future). Of course, the whole purpose of a dedication is to express our intent--it has nothing to do with what Kalina will choose, and she'll have to make her own decision someday. Choose wisely, Baby!

We admit that there were several secondary reasons to dedicating Kalina. For one, there's a page in her baby book entitled Spiritual Celebrations. Now we'll be able to fill it out and add a picture. What's more, my upbringing insisted that Kalina be dressed with the utmost cuteness for such an event, so I got to head to Target and buy her a new dress for the occasion.

I was happy, but not surprised, to see that Kalina was the cutest child being dedicated at today's service.

Poor Matt, being a responsible dad, volunteered to be the one to say the little speech about our intentions. We all won when the cute little girl next to Kalina started grabbing at her, making 1.) the audience laugh so no one heard Matt's speech (he was thrilled) 2.) Kalina less bored and squirmy in my arms 3.) me happy because my baby then ended up being one of the memorable ones (yes, I'm quite the proud mommy).

Afterward, it was off to the Cry Room for me and Kalina. It's not that she was crying--she was just antsy and occasionally vocal--but the Cry Room accepts all kinds. It's fast become one of my favorite places to take her.

Basically, it's a small (sometimes too small) soundproof box where parents can listen to the sermon despite their children's best efforts to the contrary. But that's not all that goes on in the cry room. It's a veritable marketplace of conversation, advice and all-too-common comparisons, including the silent "my baby is cuter than any other in this room (we all think it, right?)" and "why is the 5-month-old next to us sitting quietly on his mother's lap while my 4 1/2-year-old insists on doing the hokey pokey?"

Of course, before any chatting can go on, you have to determine whether the mother next to you approves of talking during the sermon. After a series of sneaky sidelong peeks, eye contact is made and the two never-fail standard starter questions are whispered: "How old is your baby and what's her name?" Then you're free to talk. Or not talk, if you'd still rather listen to the sermon.

I like the room because it's a place other than my living room to entertain the baby and as an added bonus, I get to listen to the sermon or meet other moms. Kalina kind of likes the room. As long as there aren't too many people and they aren't too scary, she enjoys watching the activity. But one baby too many and she gets a little shy.

I realized that instead of shifting the responsibility to God in a "she's yours now!" sense, today's dedication instead puts a greater responsibility on Matt and I. Should we have waited until we're all sleeping better at night? However, as the whole congregation publicly and vocally agreed to help out, we're glad to see that we have a much larger babysitting pool than we did a day ago. Maybe God's help will be concrete after all.

(By the way, we really are taking this very seriously. We don't mean to offend in any way by our candor!)

And special thanks to Uncle Tom for the videography!