Big Announcement (and Moving)

[ianvass]

This is the week that we are moving out of our apt. One of our good friends is putting us up for the month it will take to get us into our new place, so I'm quite grateful. Sadly, we have to put almost all of our stuff into storage, but hey, it's only a month

Comments

[vesper_evensong]

WOW... CONGRATULATIONS on both counts!! I'm so pleased to hear that you've conceived, especially with how difficult a journey toward that end becomes with miscarriage losses, and struggles to get there. I know very well how difficult that is.. how hard it is to sometimes accept without worry, and what a blessing it is when it happens!

Jenny is due 3 weeks ahead of me. :) I'm only newly pregnant, hesitant, but excited. :)

I know what you mean about hanging out with younger couples. Jake and I are 31, and 35 years old. I'm not THAT near 40, but I have hit that ugly 35+ barrier with pregnancy now. I married a young guy. My best friend from home is done having kids. She has 5... her oldest is almost 12, and her youngest is the same age as my Riley (almost 3). I just have my 3 and am still going. Not everyone encounters the troubles of miscarriage losses and infertility though.

It made me smile that you like the name Yvaine. For a very long time I had a world of warcraft character (blood elf mage) named Yvaynne.. I different spelling of the same name from the same movie. She had pale blond hair too. :) She was often called "Yva" for short.

We have issues with names too. Doesn't matter the gender. With girls there are sooo many we like, and with boys we have used 3 good names so far, and because I had so many ex boyfriends, it rules out a lot of good names. It will be a process for either of us. I've thought of naming a daughter Rhyanna for a long time though. AFter the celtic goddess Rhiannon. Middle names for us are always family names, so I have decided what names those will be.. Christine for a girl (my mother), and either Wyman or Hardison for a boy (depending on first name.. this is my mom's dad). That would give us one child named after each quadrant of the family.

The house thing is such a blessing! I'm so very excited for you both to have such lovely things happening for you all at once!

Oh.. I"m adding a thought here..

Tell her Yvaine is not that different than the common name Yvonne... it's just prettier. :D

[ianvass]

Ha! I love that you love Yvaine, too. I need to remind Jenny about the Yvonne thing - it juuuuussssst might sway her. Not holding my breath, but maybe maybe.

And definitely congrats as well!

It's funny - we had a struggle to name our son as well. Kicked a ton of names around. Family tradition is the oldest son's middle name is the paternal grandfather's first name. My middle name is Anthony (my dad's dad's name), so his middle name was going to be Daniel (my dad's name). I've been cracking jokes for years about naming him Jack, and when we settled on Jackson, it really made me laugh. Not just because of that, but because it was also somewhat inspired by the SG character Daniel Jackson.

I think he's going to grow up with a sense of humor. :D

[vesper_evensong]

With our first it was somewhat easy. He picked his own first name. I was a lil shocked to learn it was a boy. Growing up with 5 sisters and 1 brother.. to me all babies were girls. I had been thinking about the name Brighton, but then as I stood there waiting for Jake to bring the car.. I heard a voice, "BRANDON mama.. not Brighton.. BRANDON!" And Brandon it is! Brandon Rowland Smith.. Rowland is his father's middle name as well as Jake's mom's maiden name. In my family my father gave his son his own middle name, so it followed that tradition as well.

Then when we learned we were having a second boy.. I remembered that I had always liked the name Nathan. Blame the work and the glory series. And we gave Nathan the middle name Steven After my father, Steven Paul Heap.

The third son was a challenge, but an interesting story. My mom (and then later me) was working on a family history angle for the Riley family who were originally from Ireland. Now, my family history is all at dead ends for the most part because I have heritage straight out of the doctrine and covenants.. Edward partridge, Amasa Lyman and so on.. Well I have always ALWAYS felt a deep connection with the Celtic peoples of the British Isles. This was no exception.. later I would end up learning A LOT about this family. However at the time we went through a process of eliminating names. I went through a book of thousands, and picked out around 20-25 names. I asked him to cross off what he didn't like, and we passed this back and forth for a few months. Finally we came down to 2... Riley and Dallin. Riley was one I hesitated about because my penpal from England has a little boy by the name Riley and I didn't want to appear a copycat.. silly I know. So when he was born I took one look at him and knew he was Riley. That name had kept resurfacing and throwing itself at me for a reason and I just couldn't get over the copycat thing for a long time. The Riley/Reilly family has become very dear to me and I did temple work for some of them. I think they did not want to be forgotten and hence why Riley had been thrown into my mind so many times. His name is Riley Raymond Smith.. middle name after Jake's dad Raymond Owen Smith.

With this fourth child.. girl or boy, their name will come from my mother's side of the family.. that will complete the quadrant. I debated about giving girls a middle name... my paternal grandmother didn't have one. My mother didn't have one. All six of us girls in my family didn't have one. I kept my maiden name as a middle name... I always wanted one though. And honestly... Smith is a really BLAH name to keep. So I figure that I will give them a middle name and they can determine how they want to arrange it when they get married. At least they will have more of a choice :)

[vesper_evensong]

I have always felt I could be a little more creative with girl names because boys grow up to need respectable names.. and girls can have a bit more frill without seeming to push the boundaries as much. For a girl I'm still contemplating Rhyanna (said Ry-anna) Christine (my mother). But for a boy it will be a whole new process of elimination rounds.. playing survivor to determine which name wins out unless I'm prompted.

With Alex.. the little boy we lost, we hadn't picked a name, we didn't know what gender he was until he was "born". It wasn't required that we give him a name as it was a few weeks shy of a technical still birth, but we felt we should give him one. It really didn't take but a few minutes for us to come up with Alexander.. Alex for short. His name is Alexander Bean Smith. The bean is the endearing part. Jake gives all our babies in utero a nick name. Alex's was "Lil bean". Bean also happens to be the maiden name of my paternal grandmother, someone who has watched over me closely since her death in 2000. So we felt it appropriate to give him a middle name that carried our love for him, as well as having a family name like the others. Alexander means "defender of men"... and he's certainly been our angel.. or at least mine.

I believe that Alex is post mortal life at this point, but I could be wrong. I have asked the Lord to let me know if Alex will be returning to us.. in that case we will give him the same name. My first miscarriage was an unusual situation I think.. I distinctly feel that child was Riley who came later. I had an umbilical hernia (near my belly button, and likely from Nathan's funny but weird birth), and I was going to have to have surgery that would include general anesthesia which would very likely cause a miscarriage. When I lost that pregnancy at 11 weeks spontaneously.. I was shocked, and the answer to my prayers was that it was a joint decision between that child and the Lord to pull back and allow me to fix my body first. I had the surgery just 2 weeks after miscarrying, and 5 months later I was pregnant again without even trying. If a situation like that happens again.. I've asked the Lord to let me know.

I am usually wrong.. but I keep imagining this child is a girl.

AS for Jackson and his sense of humor..? Yeah I'll bet he will. You seem to have a good one, and I'll bet Jenny does too. Eventually he'll get why his name is a little funny although Jackson Daniel is a really decent and good name. :)

(I got all long winded again.. sorry)