Ivy’s naming ceremony

On the 12th September we had a naming ceremony for Ivy. Many people hadn’t heard of this before, so I thought I would write a post about it. Essentially a naming ceremony is a non-religious christening, because to be fair, if I was religious and saw someone having a christening just for the party, I would be annoyed! 

A naming ceremony is not legally binding, meaning you can have the ceremony exactly as you wish to have it and it can be hosted by anyone. We had a lovely lady called Margaret, who is a registered celebrant, but I know her from being the amazing librarian at my old school! 

Our naming ceremony followed a loose structure. We began by explaining what Ivy’s name means and why we chose it. We listened to a song that means something to us, ‘you are my sunshine’, my Mum used to sing that to me and my sister when we were little, and now we sing it to Ivy. Matt and I then made our promises to Ivy as her parents and I read her a poem. After this Ivy’s grandparents made their promises and her Nanny read her a poem. Next up were the guide parents and their promises/poems. As you can probably guess from their title, these are Ivy’s godparents, but in a non-religious sense. I love the name guide parent as that’s exactly their role throughout Ivy’s life. Finally we gave Ivy a gift from us (the whole set of Peter Rabbit books) and made our promises to each other. For us this was important, so Matt and I know what promises we want to make as parents. 

After this the guests were allowed to explore the grounds of the beautiful Port Lympne. We were so lucky with the weather, we had sun and bright blue skys! Whilst people enjoyed the scenery our amazing photographer was busy snapping away and creating precious memories for us. It is so lovely to have photos of Ivy with her family and guide parents, photos to treasure.

Later on we all sat down for the buffet. I had decorated the room in a botanical theme as the place we were hosting the ceremony is a nature reserve. I had sage green table runners, foliage, a little wooden log with the table numbers and our favourite photos of Ivy on them. I had also created a little ‘wishes for Ivy’ card for guests to fill out and give back to us after. I thought it would be great for Ivy to see what her family and friends wanted for her in the future! Finally, we cut the cake for guests before they departed. The cake was made by a company called Sweet Majic in Kent. It was delicious and exactly as I had described! 

It took me about 5 months to organise the event fully, even doing it before Ivy was born, but I thought it would be nice to share for anyone who’s thinking of doing the same! The great thing about a naming ceremony is you can do it whenever you want. I’ve heard of some people doing it when they have had all the children they want and doing a joint one, some people doing it as a celebration for their child’s 1st birthday etc. The possibilities are endless!

Jess x