The Bruffeys: Our Family: Reformation Day & Cute Bruffey Babes

We started blogging our life as best friends, husband and wife, in 2006 shortly after we got married. Once we had children, I created a new blog for our growing family. This is our blog sharing the story of our life: beginning with our first pregnancy and our journey as parents to our beloved firstborn, BB1, who arrived in our world perfectly on 11.5.2010 and his precious sister, BB2, born on 10.6.2012, our sweet third baby, BB3, born 2.3.2015, our 3rd vivacious daughter, BB6, born on 5.1.2018 and our 2nd living son and final Bruffey Baby, BB8, born 6.23.2021. We also love our 3 greatly missed babies in Heaven, BB4 (born in Heaven at 5 weeks 5 days on 10.8.2016) BB5 (born still at 16 weeks on 2.5.2017), and BB7 (born in Heaven at 7 weeks 3 days on 10.23.2019). I will share my stories of our family, of being a wife, a mother, a home manager, a friend, a woman, a Hope Mom, and a person pursuing hope in Christ through life and death, joy and pain. Welcome to our journey!

Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Reformation Day & Cute Bruffey Babes

I've long been someone who was described by close friends as "analytical" and "deep thinker".

I like to know why I do what I do or what the reason is behind what I do.

Being married to a preacher and not being a fan of Halloween in terms of some its history and origins, God found a great balance for me to avoid "humbugness" about various holidays and stay true to what "bugs" me about said holidays :-) Some of Halloween's history is harmless and just cultural customs, and some is based in pagan celebrations of fear and things that are dark. Josh, early in our life together as friends and those falling in love, understood that I've never liked Halloween - since a child, I did NOT like being afraid and found, in the deep south where I grew up, that Halloween was marked by many, including adults who were caring for kiddos (such as my girl scout troop leaders!), by local ghost stories and a celebration of fear... I didn't like that the closest holiday to my birthday was Halloween and just looked forward to November 1st and the start of the "real" holiday season that included Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's. Josh, having finished Bible college, said he preferred Reformation Day anyway! I didn't realize it fell on October 31st! We started watching "Luther" every year and just celebrating Reformation Day! I figured I'd one day have kiddos if God so ordained and we'd let Halloween just sail on past. We celebrated it when I was young, then, when I was around 11 or so, a pastor explained the history of Halloween and how it is still celebrated by many around the world and even here in the States and there is a lot of evil surrounding Halloween. It was then that my mother switched and started just decorating for fall. Even before this, she had stopped the trick or treating thing when, around the time I was 7 or so, people put razors in candy and we had to take our candy to the hospital to be scanned after trick or treating. At that time, Mother decided to buy us each our own bag of candy, whatever we wanted, and skip going out all together. We sometimes did fall festivals at church, but that was it. I think all these things, including the popular horror films of the 80's that I detested, made Halloween something I just did not like. Then, when pregnant with my son, I took a "spiritual development of children" class at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. At that time, I was grappling with celebrating any holiday, especially those with mythical creatures that mean we essentially lie to our children (just how it seemed to me)... this class helped me SO much before my son was born! It talked about not being a "scrooge" and being able to enjoy cultural events while still being true to the truth of Christ. Some families will play Santa Claus and enjoy Halloween while showing fidelity to God and His Word. Josh and I talked about specifically Christmas and decided to forgo Santa, but still enjoy all the cultural aspects of Thanksgiving and Christmas that include gifts, decorations and time with family. Then, after my son was born in November 2010 (I was so glad he came late, after Halloween, because I hadn't reconciled that one yet), when October 2011 came around, I just thought having him in a costume would be CUTE! So, his grandparents found an adorable duck costume, and he was a duck for the day! I realized then that I could still not enjoy the overall idea of Halloween in terms of fear and its history and I could not really celebrate it in our home, but we could enjoy the cuteness of kids in costumes! Josh and I still celebrate Reformation Day and watch Luther and will do so with our kids, but explain that dressing up in a costume (never something evil - this was my mother's rule - we could be anything from a fairy to a friendly cat to a dinosaur, etc. but never a witch or ghoul, etc.) is just fun and something our culture does. I like this balance and, for me, it reconciles the conflict of celebrating fear versus just enjoying cultural celebrations or customs.

I know most Americans really just enjoy the costumes and candy, but I had to come to this reconciliation on my own and like the balance of costumes for fun and studying the history of the Reformation!

This is just a piece of my heart shared here for my precious children to one day understand part of our family traditions!

So, here are my little Reformation-Day-Costume-Clad-Bruffey-Babes!

RUTH EVELYN BRUFFEY

10.30.12 (24 days old)

A cute little orange girl!

10.30.12 (24 days old)

A cute little orange girl!