What's In a Name?

Naming a child is not usually easy. Well, I guess I really can't say that. Hubby and I talked about baby names on our second date (almost 14 years ago!) and we chose Josh and Sarah. I know, I know. That's weird. So those, actually, were quite easy choices. Megan's name was not as easy to choose, and choosing a name for our new little guy hasn't been the easiest either. I've had many people ask about our little guy's name, so I thought I'd share it and how we got to it.

I am a total planner. I have a list (and most likely a spreadsheet to go with it) for just about everything. Seriously. I'm that lady. So it goes without saying that as we've talked about names over the past couple of months, if there was one we liked even a little, it went on a master list I had. One of these names was one that I've loved forever, but Hubby wasn't quite as sure. As I read through the big list, I got to that one and looked at him and said, "I'm assuming you don't want ***** on the short list?" And he surprised me by saying it was fine to put it on the short list. Love that man! : )

Well, we ended up with four names on our short list and I looked up the meanings of each of the names. When I looked up this particular name that I've always loved, it showed its meaning as "dark, bright." Our first thought was that that seemed contradictory, but then it dawned on us. He has this beautiful dark hair, eyes, and skin, AND he's such a bright spot in our lives! (Not to mention that finding bright spots is my blog title!!) It just felt perfect for our sweet little man.

That name is Blake.

Love it!

Now onto the middle name...

We not only wanted him to have a Congolese middle name but we also found out that he had to have a Congolese name as part of his name. So, we began looking for names in Swahili or Lingala. Lingala names aren't exactly easy to find. We did find two that we liked in Swahili, but when we sent them on, we were told that those particular names aren't used in Congo. Try #2. We found a few more Swahili and African names, and also included some French names on the list. Nope. Those wouldn't work either. We finally found a Bible Table of Contents in Lingala and really liked the Lingala version of Isaiah, which is Yisaya. We sent the name off to our attorney and she thought it sounded nice. Only then we found out that he has a name they've been calling him and were asked if we could include that name. We were first sent us two names. The second one we weren't crazy about, but we really did like the one they've been calling him, and the meaning is very cool. It's Omole (we think it's pronounced oh-MOLE-ay), which means "His choice." We completely feel like God has brought us all together, and that He chose us for each other. That name was perfect, too!

So that's how we came upon his name. Blake Omole it is. Our (beautiful!) dark, bright spot, who was chosen by God. We love it, and we love him!!