What's In A Name?

I announced our little man's name on Facebook today without even meaning to, so I guess it is time to bring my blog in the loop as well. Most of you already know...but for those of you who don't, here it is:

Nolan Christopher

I had a reply from a friend after I spilled the beans saying she hoped I would share the story of how we came up with his name on my blog. I wish I could say I had a creative and thoughtful story to tell like she has with her little girl, but that isn't really the case. Here it is anyways!

We were one of those couples who talked about baby names really early in our relationship. We knew that one day we would get married and that we wanted a family, so why not? We've had a boy name and a girl name picked out for years. Sadly, the boy name we have always loved, Liam, has become insanely popular over the last year or so. When we decided we were ready to have children, we went back to the drawing board. I am not against "trendy" names, but I don't want my kid to be one of 12 Liams in his class either. 

I really like names that start with "L", so I started pulling up lists of baby boy names and just scanning through that letter. I spent a lot of time searching the meaning of different Hebrew names as well, since that is something that really appealed to us. I fell in love with the name Lyric since my husband and I have always been very musical, but decided he'd probably be made fun of. 

I am really into the meaning of names. I decided to focus my search on what different names meant, then see if there was one I liked based on that instead of just how the name sounded. I wanted something strong and masculine. I'm part Irish, so I started browsing that section of whatever website I was on. I came across the meaning "Champion" and saw the name Nolan attached. I loved it the instant I saw it! It was not a name that Chris or I had even considered, but as soon as I asked him if he liked it, we knew it was meant for our child. Chris was excited because when he was little, he had a collection of Nolan Ryan baseball cards that really meant a lot to him. If that was the association he wanted to make, I was all for it. I was just happy we agreed on a name!

Picking out a middle name was easy. It is a tradition in Chris' family to give the first son the name of the father as his middle name. I loved it because that way, Nolan will have a piece of his dad with him always.

So, there you have it. Our not-so-creative baby name story. On a more exciting note, little man was moving all over the place today! I was laying on my side after work and he was kicking away. As soon as I put my hand on my tummy where he was kicking to see if I could feel him, he stopped until I took my hand away. It was fun to interact with him, but I really wish he would let me feel him from the outside!