What's in a name?

What's in a name?

Naming a child is one of the hardest things we've had to do. As a girl, you play with dolls when you are little, or in my case, little brothers, and treat them like they are your own. When you are older, you make lists of boys and girls names for your future children. You practice writing them, imagine what last name they will have. You feel like it'll be such an easy decision. Well, it might come as a shock to most of my gender, but I was so hesitant to pick a name for baby girl Mac. In my defense, it WAS a while before we were 100% sure it even was a girl.

As a teacher we get all kinds of weird name pronunciations and spellings and it actually really helps us when it comes to naming a child because we know more what we like and don't like. I'm always anxious to see the names on my roster the first day of school. An all-time favorite moment was discovering I had one "Joe Montana" in class - a chubby, shy, Hispanic boy. :) Teachers get to see "names" in action on a daily basis. Every now and then you'll have a student that totally ruins a name for you, then there comes one that makes you entertain the thought of a neat name you'd never thought of before. Teacher criteria for a name - easy to spell, pronounce, and definitely "fool" proof. Kids are mean, and we'd hate to set our little one up for a life-time of embarrassment.

We've tossed around names for a while but didn't want to get serious until we knew what it was for sure. By the time we were 100% sure, it was time for baby showers and people were anxious to know. We've had a first name for a while, but couldn't decide on a middle name. Announcing this to the world still is a little scary. But we were able to pick a family name that we both really like. If you know us, we are both pretty traditional so it's nothing super creative and trendy, no weird spellings, or hyphenations. OK... here goes...

We've chosen the name Claire Caroline McPherson.

Claire - It's both mine and my mom's middle name. I think I always secretly wanted to be called Claire, so hopefully she'll love it as much as I do.

Caroline - Travis' mom's side has this name in genealogy quite a bit. His grandmother has traced their family trees back to the Revolutionary War and before that in Europe. Both his grandmother and grandfather had it in their family tree. We also mentioned liking this as a first name too, before we had chosen Claire.

If you'd like to pray for her by name with us, please feel free.
Can't wait for you to meet our sweet Claire!

Isaiah 43:1 "But now, this is what the LORD says— he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: "Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine."

Welcoming a new baby makes it fun to see where she's coming from... Enjoy the pics below!