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July 2013 Moms
Dani428
member
Godmother/Godfather??
Dani428
member
Sooo unfortunately I'm already stressing out about who to pick for a Godmother/Godfather for baby to be. I'm an only child and my hubby's not very close with his sister. Anyway, I'm just curious...who are you all choosing to be the Godmother/Godfather and why?
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Re: Godmother/Godfather??
Is that something that only Catholics do? A friend of mind asked if she could be the godmother a little while ago and my response was "uh, sure. I don't know what that is though."
Is that different than a guardian? Cause she's not in the position to take care of LO if DH and I die or something.
Thank you for asking this! I am not a religious person and I had a friend as me the other day if I was going to have Godparents. I was like "Uhhh I hadn't even thought about that."
For our first, we'll be choosing my brother and MH's sister. He has another sister but they are not close at all and not speaking at the moment. MH is Godfather to his sister's son (the sister we'll be choosing).
If we have a second, we'll pick my best friend (I am Godmother to her youngest son) and MH's best friend.
My Pregnancy/Parenting BLOG TTC since 5/2011, BFP #1 12/3/11, M/C 12/7/11 @ 4wks 2d. Began seeing RE Sep 2012. October 2012 Metformin 1500 mg= ovulation on CD34 BFP#2 11/14/12 9DPO, EDD 7/26/13, DX Gestational Diabetes @14 wks, our angel born sleeping 3/24/13 @ 22wks 2d. BFP #3 7/4/13 8DPO EDD 3/22/14, DX Gestational Diabetes @14 wks. started insulin @16 wks. Our rainbow, born 3/19/14 @ 39wks 6d., we're so in love!
This--basically if you baptize your child, you'll probably have two people act as godparents that would assist with religious upbringing. However, I was raised Lutheran and I think it was an aunt and uncle that were my "godparents". I don't even know. It seems to me that a lot of people baptize and name someone a godparent for their child, but then nothing really becomes of it (although that's not true for everyone). It's almost like it's become "something you just do".
For us, to say that DH & I aren't religious is an understatement. So no baptism, no godparents. That's going to be a pretty foreign concept to a lot of my family.
ETA: I really want to reiterate that not all families treat the role of god parents flippantly. But among my family/friends, that seems to be the case. And that may be something to really think about if you're picking a godparent. If you want them to be really involved in the role itself and are looking for something that goes beyond "Title for a Day", make sure they're not part of the population that would treat the role as just a title and move on.
We are each choosing one, so I'm choosing the Godmother and my husband is choosing the Godfather. We don't feel it has to be a married couple. So I've chosen my cousin who is a little younger than me. I absolutely love her, she is amazing with babies/kids and she is beyond excited that we're pregnant. I always thought it would be my only older sister, but ever since I've gotten pregnant we are not as close and she keeps pushing me further away with arguments. So I wanted to chose someone who is neutral and I don't get in fights with, someone who can just be happy with it
My husband has a sister and brother-in-law, but he is choosing a cousin of his as well who he is very good friends with.
I do feel it should be family vs. friends, but that is just my opinion.
There is no right or wrong. Go with what's in your heart! Good luck!
Seriously though prob my brother and one if my nieces.
BFP #1 5/27/12- m/c 7/9/12 @ 10w2d (cytotec induced @11w).
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Godparents and legal guardians are totally separate. A godparents is involved in your child's religious education throughout their childhood. A legal guardian is someone that you name in your legal, notarized will to take custody of your children upon the death of both parents. A religious godparent is in no way legally obligated or entitled to take custody of your child upon your death. If you don't have a will, anyone who wants custody of your children can petition the court to grant it to them. Judges will usually give preference to whichever set of grandparents seems best able to care for the child in this case.
DS's godparents are my sister and H's brother. His legal guardians are MIL and FIL. We chose our siblings as godparents because we just felt it was right, given that he was their first nephew. We chose ILs as his guardians because both my sister and BIL are young and somewhat unsettled. As my ILs get older and our sibling settle down, we will eventually name BIL as legal guardian (assuming he agrees) because my sister has several chronic illnesses and I don't want to burden her with children when she frequently is bedridden. Nor do I think an ill caregiver is best for my kids, though I hope no matter who my kids live with, my sister and parents would be large parts of their lives.
We're not since that's not at all a part of our religion. DD doesn't have one and this one won't either.
I lost my angels 07/2010, 04/2017, 10/2017
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I hadn't even thought about that, but I'm glad I came to this board because I had a misconcpetion about them. I thought they were the guardians to take over in the event of our demise, not that they were just another active role. DH and I are Christians, so our faith and morals are definitely something we want our children to understand, but I don't know that I would "designate" one person or couple to be that for our kids.
Interesting thought though.
I'm Catholic, DH isn't and my problem is always that I don't know many men who are still practicing Catholics. Picking a godmother is seldom a problem, I have an endless supply of those.
My two BFFs are the godmothers for my first two. My uncle is the godfather for my first son, and one of DH's friends is the godfather for our second. I'm really stuck on what to do for #3. I'd like to ask one of my other friends to be the godmother, but have no option for the godfather then, although I could pick a non Catholic male friend to be a Christian Witness. My other option is to ask my cousin to be the godmother since her husband is practicing and he could be the godfather. But I certainly can't ask him w/o asking her, kwim?
I was just thinking today I have to sign up for baptism classes so I'd better figure this out soon.
ETA: The godparents are totally different than the legal guardians we have listed in our will. The guardians will be DH's child-free-by-choice sister & BIL. I'm sure they hope we don't croak together!
He's a good Catholic, I totally wish I could pick him!! He taught one of his children's First Communion classes.
Michael Moore would be a good back up option.
My godparents were more guardians, although I guess thinking about it now I could see them as the other too, but they do that more with their grandchildren/grandnephews than they did with me (their niece).
We played around with several before finally landing on my brother and SIL. Although we haven't asked them yet so we'll see if they are interested, we may end up with someone else. But anyway, here was my criteria for a Godparent:
1) Religious and of the same religious as us (i.e. Christian). I am Catholic, but do not plan to baptize my child in the Catholic church so I wasn't restricted by that. I just want someone who can actually fulfill the role of a Godparent, and not just someone I'm close to.
2) Someone who will always be in my child's life. H and I have a handful of friends who DO fall into this category. We've been friends for decades and I don't see it changing anytime soon. But many of my newer friends here in CA do not qualify here as we've only known each other a brief time and I worry that if/when one of us moves away the friendship will end or fizzle out over time. So a small group of friends and family were looked at.
3) Someone who's lifestyle reflects that of the one we want to raise our child with. If the Godparents are supposed to be spiritual role models, I want them to act like it! Which means no party friends. We do have two close friends that we have dubbed the baby's "Fairy Godmothers" (they are both guys, btw) and they love the title. It's our way to acknowledge them as special but not really who we'd pick as Godparents, KWIM?
We eventually narrowed it down to two of H's friends (both males, not a couple just single guy friends, my cousins, and my brother and SIL). What ultimately made the decision is that we are also going to ask my brother and SIL if we can include them in the will as the caretakers of our child (and any future children) should something happen to H and I. We figured at least for the first child they should also be the Godparents since we are asking such a huge favor of them. For any other children we have we will always have those other options to honor but for #1 I thought it was important for the Godparents to also be potential Guardians if needed.
B born 7/15/13, C born 3/2/15, #3 on the way May '17
I’m a modern man, a man for the millennium. Digital and smoke free. A diversified multi-cultural, post-modern deconstruction that is anatomically and ecologically incorrect. I’ve been up linked and downloaded, I’ve been inputted and outsourced, I know the upside of downsizing, I know the downside of upgrading. I’m a high-tech low-life. A cutting edge, state-of-the-art bi-coastal multi-tasker and I can give you a gigabyte in a nanosecond! I’m new wave, but I’m old school and my inner child is outward bound. I’m a hot-wired, heat seeking, warm-hearted cool customer, voice activated and bio-degradable. I interface with my database, my database is in cyberspace, so I’m interactive, I’m hyperactive and from time to time I’m radioactive.
Kind of in line with my response above... my older brother's Godparents were our assigned guardians in addition to being his Godparents. My Godparents are different from his and they were the ones standing with my parents when I was baptized (which is another role of the Godparent). If you aren't religious you don't need Godparents, although that's also the common term given to someone who's really special in your life that you want to play a large role, spiritual or not, in your child's life and they don't have to be the guardians. But they can be! Although many people will argue with me on that opinion.
B born 7/15/13, C born 3/2/15, #3 on the way May '17
I’m a modern man, a man for the millennium. Digital and smoke free. A diversified multi-cultural, post-modern deconstruction that is anatomically and ecologically incorrect. I’ve been up linked and downloaded, I’ve been inputted and outsourced, I know the upside of downsizing, I know the downside of upgrading. I’m a high-tech low-life. A cutting edge, state-of-the-art bi-coastal multi-tasker and I can give you a gigabyte in a nanosecond! I’m new wave, but I’m old school and my inner child is outward bound. I’m a hot-wired, heat seeking, warm-hearted cool customer, voice activated and bio-degradable. I interface with my database, my database is in cyberspace, so I’m interactive, I’m hyperactive and from time to time I’m radioactive.