On our road trip to Connecticut last summer I was 15 weeks pregnant. Names were definitely on my mind even though we didn't know the gender of the baby yet.
I really want our children's names to have meaning to us. Not just some name we picked out of a book because we liked it. I liked that Quincy reminds me of our time in Montana and our road trip to the Pacific Northwest. Quincy's middle name Aida is also meaningful- after her great great grandmother Naida.
Back to the story of Lucy. I was searching for something meaningful. Hoping that a name would stick out while we spent our summer on the East Coast.
We were in Palmyra, New York getting a tour of the Smith farm. Such a beautiful and peaceful place surrounded by trees and tall green grass. I was asked to read a quote from a marvelous woman of history named Lucy. As I read the quote I had a strong impression about this name. I did not mention anything of it to Jordan as we continued our tour.
Later that day in the car I asked Jordan "what do you think of the name Lucy?" All he did was look at me and say "you felt that too?"
I didn't think too much about it for a while, since we still didn't know the gender of the baby. But a few weeks later we found out it was a girl.
We chatted about names. But every time I tried to think of naming this baby another name I could not. I could not look at other names. It gave me anxiety every time. It was the strangest thing. I started to try and think of names that we could shorten to Lucy, and I brought up a few to Jordan. But he didn't like any of them. He just liked Lucy.
We had a few other names that we agreed upon, but those names were not for this baby.
I was frustrated. There were a few things that were holding me back from naming her Lucy. I did not like the repetitive endings of Quincy and Lucy. People were already confusing Tessi and Quincy. How could I throw another one in there? And I also did not like how popular the name Lucy was getting. These were the main reasons I wanted to find a longer version of Lucy. I also was really wanting to use the name Cherie for her middle name, which is my mother's middle name.
I wasn't fond of Lucy Cherie together. But I did like Lucia with Cherie. I brought up this option to Jordan, he didn't love the idea. It took almost the entire pregnancy and day in the hospital to convince him ;)
But he finally saw my reasoning. He liked the idea of naming her Lucia after his mother Linda (having the first and last letter the same.) Lucia is also a more popular name in Brazil, which is where he served a two year mission for our church. We had been wanting to tie Brazil into a name for one of our children. In Brazil they pronounce it Loo-see-ah which is how we wanted to pronounce it. Which also makes it an easier way to shorten to Lucy.
And so she became Lucia Cherie
Lucia means light (Loo-see-ah)
Cherie means darling (Sh-ree)
A perfect name and perfect meaning for this little darling who brings so much light and happiness to our family. We love you Lucy! Even if you tried to name yourself ;)
No comments:
Post a Comment