Her name is Kaylee Hope

We received confirmation today that our little baby is a girl. We named her Kaylee Hope.

She has a favorite color and a scent too. More on that later...

Monday night was the first time during this pregnancy that we sat down and looked at baby names. We got through the top 500 boy names of 2009 before we got tired and decided to take a look at girl names the next day. Of course, the next day, everything changed.

Jamie loved Kaylee for a first name and I'd been thinking of Hope for a middle name. I pulled up the list of the top 1000 names from 2009 last night to review, just to be sure Kaylee was the right name. We went through the top 25 names before coming to number 26: Kaylee. I folded the laptop, put it away and just said, "Her name is Kaylee. Kaylee Hope." Jamie simply said, "Really? Thank you."

Her name was even more affirmed when we found its meaning. Kaylee means "slender." It seemed so fitting to honor a little girl who's currently so swollen with fluids that it's obvious on the ultrasound that her tiny arms and hands are puffier than they should be. She's our LITTLE girl!! She was so small, thin, and slender on that 8-week ultrasound. That's my girl! That's how I think of her. You don't remember a dying cancer patient as they are: crippled, immobile, gasping for breath. You remember them as the vibrant, healthy person who was so full of life. That's how I see my baby girl. She's thin, vivacious, full of life!

Additionally, the origin of her name is Gaelic. Keira, Carson and now Kaylee all have names that are Irish Gaelic in origin. (Some of the names have Scottish or English origins as well depending on which website you want to believe.) We love Gaelic names!

Her middle name, Hope, carries a lot of meaning for me. I'll list a few of them. Some of them were reasons I really wanted to use the name in the first place and others are simply observations that make the name make that much more sense to us.

• Hope is optimism. In difficult times I've often found comfort in Psalm 42:11: "Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him, the help of my countenance and my God."
• In my first blog post about our daughter's situation a couple of days ago, I used the word "hope" 5 times. We're holding onto a lot of hope. We have hope for the future. We hope for a painless journey for our little girl. We hope for healing - more spiritual and emotional than anything, though as long as she's alive we allow ourselves a small glimmer of hope for the "impossible" physical healing too! We hope for many, many things. Sometimes hope is really all we have.
• I received a Facebook message yesterday from a woman I hardly know, and yet her message left me feeling like I know her and her husband very well. She lost her baby girl 9 years ago in a very similar fashion to us, learning at 20 weeks that the baby would not survive and then delivering it at 40 weeks. She said something that stuck with me: "I can tell you, Joey - that even in the darkest moments - God is faithful. He will sustain you - hope and grief are best friends sometimes." She's so right. Hope and grief go hand in hand in ways I never realized before.
• In a blog post today, my mom - who had no idea what name we were using - said, "I am looking forward to putting a name to all of this love and hope."
• The church we've been a part of since the beginning of the year is called Hope Community Church. We've been so encouraged in our short time there and have felt a huge, warm embrace from the people of Hope CC during the past 2 days.

There are other reasons I could list. I simply fell in love with the name. We call her "Kaylee Hope," using her middle name when we say it. Both names mean too much to leave one or the other out. It sounds so positive, so optimistic, so full of life!

I've been surprised at how helpful it is to know her name. We bought her a Christmas ornament at a gift shop in Canal Park in Duluth today. It has a snowman with her name on it. (I may have to go back tomorrow to see if I can find another ornament with the name "Hope" on it.) We bought her a Sandra Boynton book, One, Two, Three. We hadn't read it before, so I read it to her and I laughed and loved the book. I know she loved it too. Plus, she's our third child. Our oldest two will also love the book and we'll always be reminded of Kaylee Hope as we count off the title: "One, Two THREEEEE!"


Kaylee Hope's favorite color is purple. It's her favorite color because her favorite scent is lavender. This probably sounds random and trivial, but there's a story to it.

Yesterday I sent Jamie to the spa. Normally Jamie is repulsed by the smell of lavender, yet at the spa, for the first time, the scent of lavender was calming. A few hours and 175 miles later we arrived in our room at a bed & breakfast in Duluth. All of the soaps and lotions in our room are lavender and we love it.

We decided lavender must be Kaylee Hope's favorite scent! Of course, that means purple (not necessarily the lavender shade, though) must be her favorite color. (Rest assured, she remains a die-hard Packer fan!)

We're having fun with our little girl today. It may be "OUR" anniversary, but it's also an entire day to spend with just her! I had Jamie jump on my back for a piggyback ride down the stairs because Kaylee Hope wanted a piggyback ride. I lifted Jamie in the air over my head and spun her around our room because it makes Keira laugh and laugh and I knew Kaylee Hope wanted to know what all of that fun was about. We fed her a Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory caramel apple since it's one of her mom's favorite treats and we knew she wanted a taste.

We're loving our time with Kaylee Hope! We love spoiling her. Through our time with her, we're learning to treasure our time with each other and with our children more than ever.

Kaylee Hope is special. She's teaching us more than we ever knew we could be taught by such a little girl.

She is beautiful. She is Miss Beautiful. She is Kaylee Hope.