A few weeks after I found out I was expecting my daughter my Grandfather unexpectedly died. He was not a religious man, so we chose to hold a humanist funeral to celebrate his life - all the goodness and richness his East-end character gave to our family. I wished I’d told him I was expecting as soon as I’d found out. From then on I vowed to never miss an opportunity to celebrate the good we have in this world. It only made sense to host a humanist naming day for our daughter and, three years later, one for our son as well.

Ideas for a Humanist naming day

Finding inspiration online for a humanist naming ceremony was tough. Everything I searched for seemed so impersonal. The suggested readings felt lacking in heart and individuality. The script felt just that - a script. We reached out to Humanists UK and got in touch with our local Humanist Celebrant. Guy come to meet us in our home, to see the life we were creating for our daughter, our hopes for her future and the values we shared. This is where I would suggest you start - use your values to guide your ceremony. Our love of nature, home and family shaped our choice of day. We decided on an informal ceremony held in our garden, where we could minimise waste and keep the occassion heartfelt and meaningful. I created a Pinterest board to help decide how we wanted the day to feel. It also guided us later down the line with aesthetics and general practicalities we needed to remember.

Low waste decorations for long lasting memories

When my husband and I got married, we did something that, back then, people thought was a bit ‘wacky’. We bought trees to decorate the village hall we held our reception in. Two of those trees now grow in our parents’ gardens. Two live in ours. One tree for our daughter, the other for our son. We call them their wishing trees, and as part of the naming ceremony we asked everyone to write good wishes for the children’s futures on to paper luggage tags which were hung on the branches. My daughter loves taking her little box of wishes from her drawer, too young to read the words but old enough to understand this is all love and hope for her. She understands the tree is where we wished good things for her and I catch her from time to time whispering her heart’s desire to its branches. Truly priceless.

For all parties, borrowing should be your best friend. We borrowed all the children’s cutlery and the vintage china for the grown ups from family and friends. Our neighbours lent us their garden furniture. Our son’s guidemother let us borrow her gazebo. The fabric bunting I’d made for our wedding looked glorious strung across the garden, and my mum made a special garland from the curtains I’d had as a child. The flowers I grew myself or stole from other people’s gardens (with permission) and used my milk bottles as vases. I brought out my collection of vintage embroidered table cloths too. We did buy a biodegradable paper confetti cannon from Ginger Ray that replaced a conventional toast at the end of the ceremony. Along with bubbles and paper wands, the children were kept entertained and danced through the shower of multicoloured confetti. There were no balloons and no plastic, except for the florist’s foam for the wreath we made in hommage to the childrens’ names (but which was reused from the previous Christmas too.)

Low waste catering for kids and adults

At my daughter’s naming day, we chose a traditional English afternoon tea but decided to make all the food ourselves to keep cost and waste as low as possible. On the morning of the ceremony I woke up battling a migraine and family had to step in slicing cake and buttering sandwiches. Catering yourself has the bonuses that you can ensure the food is to people’s tastes (and allergy requirements) but if something goes wrong, it really can ruin the occassion. For my son’s naming day we decided to keep everything as fresh and light as possible and thankfully discovered that the majority of Waitrose Entertaining options came in cardboard packaging. The salads sadly came in huge, sturdy, plastic bowls which we’ve managed to reuse.

For the children, we kept things as simple as possible. A variety of sandwiches, vegetable crudities, platters of fruit and some nature-themed cupcakes and coconut madalines. We kept the big ‘naming day’ cake (homemade by my mother, the same carrot cake recipe she used for our wedding cake) just for the grown ups. Since neither Mark or I drink alcohol, we kept the occassion alcohol-free and made peach iced tea with my own home grown borage ice cubes. It took me months to grow, harvest and freeze enough ice cubes, but it was such fun to make and the drinks looked so pretty!

When we got married, we asked some of our guests to make a cake instead of bringing a gift. If you’re hosting at a venue where you can provide your own food, why not consider asking your guests to do something like this instead? (Our cake table is still drooled about six years later…)

Plastic-free party bag alternatives

Children’s parties seem to have become synonomous with a plastic bag full of single use plastic and a squashed piece of shop-bought cake for your kids to relish on the journey home then discard as if it’s a used hankie. The only ‘party bag’ I remember from my youth was a framed photo of Take That from a friend’s Take That themed party (eye roll, I wasn’t into boy bands.) It is hard to go against the norm, I completely get it, no one wants their child to feel disappointed or left out, but there are so many alternatives out there that don’t cost the earth and have longevity and meaning. Instead of party bags, we did a little treasure hunt for the children. I used refillable wooden eggs, each one named and filled with a wooden spinning top. The children could then decorate the eggs and reuse them each year. Sunflower seeds for children to plant, gifted in paper sandwich bags decorated by your child to their friends is another excellent alternative.

readings and poems for your humanist naming

Throw away the textbook choices. Listen to your heart. Your celebrant will offer suggestions, some of which may ring true to your journey to parenthood. For us, we wanted to mark the ceremony with poetry we will share again and again as the children grow. We also knew we wanted all the women in our immediate family to speak at our daughter’s naming, and the men at our son’s. This decided how many readings we would include.

Our daughter’s names all inspired by flora so it felt the perfect opportunity to share some childhood magic. We chose three of Cicely Mary Barker’s Flower Fairies poems. The poems and illustrations now sit in our daughter’s bedroom, that little bit of magic for her to see everyday (and for me and my nostaglia too.) My sister read a beautiful poem called Thursday’s Child (Anon) and finally, I chose to read my favourite poem at both their humanist namings. It was deeply emotional to do a reading for your children, tears in my eyes and a breath caught in my throat. I am glad every time I re-read it that I managed to say the words to my children in front of our closest friends and family. My favourite poem is (of course) E. E. Cummings’, I carry your heart with me.

Having hosted one naming already, we knew the pattern we wanted to follow for our son’s. His name is inspired by the forest, and the path we took to hold him safely in our arms was a tumultuous one. Hearing my Father read The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost and my Father-in-law read Emily Dickinson’s Hope is the thing with feathers will stay with me forever. Every time a blackbird sings in our garden hedge, I will think of that moment. You’ll see they’re not particularly traditional poems - it felt personal and crafted and I urge you to do the same.

Choosing Guideparents (akin to Godparents) for your children

We do not know where life will take us. It can feel overwhelming to imagine the babe in your arms one day calling on a guideparent instead of you for support. Thankfully, the choice of guideparent was not one of difficulty for us at all. Our closest friends are like family to us. They build us up when we’re low, hold our hands when we waver and clap the loudest at our successes. Look for the people in your life that do this for you. Now your child is here, they’ll do the same for your little one too. (We chose two guide mothers for our daughter, and one guide mother and one guide father for our son.) I wrote a letter to each of them asking if they would take on this mantle, detailing why we chose them and the gifts they can offer that we can not. One of my daughter’s guide mothers carried that letter in her purse for four years. (It’s now safe in her jewellery box at home.)

Writing a humanist naming script and promises

If you’re working with a Humanists Celebrant, they will provide a structure for your ceremony with suggestions on how it should flow, it’s length and punctuation of readings. We put this to one side and I wrote the scipt myself. It was a humbling experience, but the personality it gave meant every single person at both our son’s and our daughter’s namings could be considered. It got to the root of the reasons behind why we were all there together, our unique, wonderful children. It also meant that when we wrote the committments we gave to our children, it came from our souls. These are the promises we vowed as parents:

Our darling son - you and your sister are the first things we think of in the morning, and the last things we think of at night, and we promise that this will always be so, even when you may no longer need us by your side.

We promise to dedicate our lives to your happiness – to put your wants and needs before our wants and needs.

We hope that you learn to love the world around you and we promise to help you see that change may bring great rewards as well as challenges.

We want your life to be fuller and richer than ours, and promise to teach you sound, honest ethics that will lead you to follow your own path.

We promise to always encourage the very best in who you are, as you already bring out the very best in us.

And finally, even if our days ended tomorrow, know this – that the greatest achievement in our lives is you.

Create life-long memories with humanists uk

If you’re considering hosting a humanist naming day for your child and you’re in the UK, I strongly recommend you reach out to Humanists UK and hire a celebrant to host the ceremony for you. Reading aloud to all your friends and family about the new life you’ve brought into the world is emotional and taking the pressure off yourself is worth the cost. Our celebrant Guy was such a soothing soul with the gravitas to command even the littlest ears to hang on his every word. It made the day feel relaxed, heartwarming and fun - exactly what we set out to achieve.

If there’s anything you’d like to ask me about either of the naming days we’ve hosted, please do get in touch or leave me a comment below.

Laura

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