Today I’m posting over at She Teaches Fearlessly about God’s love for us.

I’m so excited to share more about STF next week, but for now, go check out the website!

I have a love of baby names. I always have. And along with that love I have always enjoyed hearing the meanings and reasons behind why parents name their kids the way they do. I’m sure there are others like that out there, so I thought it’d be fun to share the meanings behind our kiddos names, starting with Eliza. (Abe’s turn will be up next month!)

Obviously Kyle and I like the classic and biblical type of names. Ever since we’ve been married I’ve been making lists of names, and getting Kyle to agree with them (or disagree, so I could scratch it off my list ? I have always loved the name Emma, and so has Kyle. However, it’s been getting so popular in the last few years, that when we found out we were having a girl we weren’t sure if we wanted to use it anymore, so I was searching for a similar name, and of course, Eliza came to mind.

One reason I love the name Eliza is because of Eliza R. Snow. Eliza has a prominent place in LDS church history, and you can read more about her here. She was a contemporary of my great-(x4) grandfather, Joel Hills Johnson, and both wrote extensive poetry in their lives, so I like to think that they led similar lives and had similar inspirations. Anyway, I just think it’s a beautiful name, and fell in love with it during my pregnancy.

I will say, that we had another name in mind, and that was Rosalie, and we’d call her Rosie. We’ve actually loved Rosie since we first heard it the summer we were first married, and have always said we would name our first daughter that. However, like I said, I fell in love with Eliza, and was pushing that a little more at the end of the pregnancy. Ultimately, we went to the hospital with Rosie and Eliza in mind, and decided we would make the decision when we saw her.

Right after Eliza was born, when they were cleaning her up across the room from me, Kyle asked me what I thought about names. I told him I wasn’t sure, and wanted to be able to see her more, first. He went over to watch as they cleaned her, weighed her, etc., and then came back over and said, “I think she’s an Eliza”. I was kind of shocked, since I knew he liked Rosie more, but once I got her back in my arms, I agreed with him. (We’ll use Rosalie for our next girl!)

Lynn doesn’t have as long of a story attached, but it’s still special. Lynn is my dad’s middle name, and I’ve always wanted to use it as a middle name, to honor him. And so we did

What did you name your kid(s)? Do the names have any special meaning? I would love to hear about it!