What's In A Name?

  I remember a long time ago, when Jacob and I were still dating but knew we were going to get married someday, we were talking about kids.  We were talking about how many children we wanted and what some of our favorite names were.  We made a short list of 2 boy names and 2 girl names that we really liked and those were going to be our kids names.  I kept up with that list in my head over the next few years, hoping  every time a friend got pregnant that they didn't use one of the names we had picked out!
  Then the time came when it really mattered.  We were having a baby, the pregnancy was moving along great, and it was time to pick our boy/girl names.  I mean, picking out names is something all moms and dads have done...it is easier for some than it is for others.  I remembered a friend and she and her husband, named their first child based on the names meanings and she said that they gave their child that first and middle name because that was their prayer for them.  I thought that was a really great way to name a child.  We poured over baby name books and then finally came back to our first choice name for a girl...Anna Elizabeth.  It just sounded so beautiful and just brought that smile to our face.  We knew we would call her Anna Beth.
  When our first little surprise came along just a few months after AB was born, we had no idea where to start for a girl and, of course, we still had our first boy name.  We originally had a second girl name, but since coming up with it, I met and spent a lot of time with someone who had the same name and - to put it nicely - I didn't want my child to share that name and risk me being constantly reminded of this person.  So, we played around with several name combinations, but nothing seemed right.  Nothing gave us that "smile" like it did with AB.  Then, while we were taking a walk around seminary campus on afternoon, I asked Jacob about the name Lynnsie - spelled L-Y-N-N-S-I-E.  There's so many ways you can spell this name, but we really liked this spelling because it incorporated Jacob's mom's middle name, Lynn.  Jacob asked about a middle name and I said I really didn't know.  Then he wanted to know about "Dale" for a middle name.  Dale is his middle name - and his dad's middle name - and I couldn't think of anything sweeter than our little girl having her daddy's middle name.  My youngest sister has my dad's middle name and I've always thought it was precious!  So, there we had it - Lynnsie Dale.  And it worked out perfectly, too, because Lynnsie "looks" like a Lynnsie and not like the other name we had originally chosen!
  Now, we're doing it again!!  We still have our first boy name, which we will use if this is a boy, and we've chosen the first name if this baby is a girl...still working on the middle name.  This will be a post all to itself once we know boy/girl for this baby...so check back at the end of the month!