Choosing His Name

I always like to record the story of how we landed on our babies names. And I like Davis' story!

Last time around, we had a hard time deciding on a name for Hudson, mostly because Ben kept shooting down all my favorites! This time from early on in the pregnancy I knew I wanted to name this baby either Cooper or Sawyer (both names I tried for with Hudson) and I was fairly certain if the baby was a boy he would be one of those two names.

 Then we found out it was a boy, and Ben pretty much vetoed Sawyer, but said he was open to Cooper, although not totally enthused about it. Ben came up with Blake, which I was kind of okay with, but wasn't loving either. I assumed it would be awhile before we came to a name consensus. Within just a few weeks of finding out we were having a boy, one night Ben randomly suggested Davis.

 It was like a little light went off in my head. I liked the name Davis! To make it even better, Davis is a family name on my mom's side. The Davis family joined the church in Wales and immigrated to America. They started the journey west, and their daughter Jane married a young man named William Lewis. Jane's parents stayed behind to help other pioneers build handcarts, and ended up dying before being able to come to Utah themselves. Jane and William traveled across the plains in an early handcart company nicknamed the "starvation company". William was a strong, young man, and was helping many other families with the journey as well. Their food was strictly rationed and they were limited to 1/4 cup of flour per person per day. Jane could see that William was struggling to maintain his strength, as many were depending on his help to make the journey. She started sneaking him her portions of flour (unbeknownst to him) and they both made it to Utah. Their story continues to be one of strength, courage and sacrifice. Once I told Ben about this story, it really cemented in his mind that Davis was to be this child's name.

 It's kind of funny, now that we've named three boys I figured that our subsequent boys would use a name we'd discussed for one of their older brothers, but both Hudson and Davis' names weren't even on our radar until that particular child came along. We had never talked about the name Davis before this conversation, but it just immediately clicked and felt like it should be his name. He just felt like a Davis.

 We decided to wait until he was born to pick a middle name. We tossed around a few ideas, but I kind of hoped when we met him we would know what it was supposed to be. I wanted to name him Davis Jack, since Hudson had been asking to name him "Jack went to Monkeys" since the minute we told him Davis was coming- and continued to suggest it as a middle name. When we realized that Davis was going to be born on the exact day Hudson knew he was coming, we both just knew he was supposed to be Davis Jack. While I was in labor and trying to deal with the pain of contractions, I tried to "connect" with the baby- and during those moments I just really felt he was supposed to be Davis Jack. Jack was Ben's least favorite on our list of middle names, but when I told him how I felt he immediately agreed- he was Davis Jack.

Shortly after Davis was born we sent a text to the family to let them know, and included his middle name it in. When my mom told it to the boys, Hudson was immediately in denial and exclaimed, "No, it's supposed to be Davis Michael Jack-went-to-Monkeys Hugo! Quick, someone FIX THIS before he gets any bigger!" There's a chance Hudson still thinks his middle is/should be Jack-went-to-Monkeys. Hudson was just so connected with Davis during the pregnancy (right up to guessing the exact day he'd be born) that we thought it would be a meaningful name for our little Davis.

We love his name, and love this baby even more! He's just the best.

(All these pictures I took when he was 5 days old)