His Name

In case you didn't get the memo, Zach and I have named our little boy...

Forest Daniel Athans

While I was pregnant with Finley, we had picked out the name Jay Daniel for if she had turned out to be a boy. We liked Daniel as the middle name since that's Zach's middle name, and we were planning on using my middle name, Elizabeth, for a girl. And Jay was a name that I saw on a baby name list that just seemed to work. So after finding out that Finley was a girl, we decided that if we ever did have a boy, Jay Daniel would be his name. 

Fast forward to last November when I found out I was pregnant again and I was absolutely convinced we were having another girl. Girl names were all I could think about and by the time we found out the gender, I knew exactly what name I wanted for her. I had barely even thought about boy names, just kind of being like, "yeah, we'll probably name him Jay if it turns out to be a boy," and secretly hoping and praying it would be a girl. 

Well, of course, we found out this baby would be a boy. And we were absolutely thrilled! Except for the fact that I had no idea what I wanted to name him! We still liked Daniel as the middle name, but Jay just wasn't our favorite anymore. So it was back to the drawing board. 

And do you know what I found out?

I don't like boy names!

I can go through literally thousands of different boy names and not find one single name that I really love. Every name is just... meh. I really don't know why I feel this way about boy names. But even when I hear what other people are naming their sons I rarely ever feel like "wow that's a really great name!"

Plus, if I ever found a name that I actually did like Zach would immediately say he didn't like it. Forest was one of those names. 

I've always thought Forest was a really nice name. I love woodsy names and forests have always made me feel very peaceful and at home. Plus it doesn't hurt that Forrest Gump is a great movie haha. And I don't even mind all of the "Run, Forrest, run!" jokes I know he'll get. So every so often throughout our name search I would bring up the name Forest, but Zach would always immediately say no. So I never really considered it an option. 

We finally settled on a different name around the beginning of April and we felt pretty good about it. We told our family and friends that that would be the name and it felt like we were finally done with our name search. But over the course of the next two months I just always felt in the back of my mind that that wasn't the name. I felt like I had just settled with it and didn't really love it or even like it all that much. 

So, remember how I said that when I hear what other people name their sons I usually don't love the name? Well about a month before Forest's due date I was scrolling on Instagram and I saw a random picture of a newborn baby. I clicked on it and saw that this random girl I didn't know had named her newborn son Forest. I was instantly so jealous! I immediately thought "I really, really want to name my son Forest!" I thought it was so unfair that this other girl got to name her son the name that I really, really wanted. 

After thinking about the name a lot, I decided to get our little letterboard that said the other baby name we had picked out and decided to have it say "Forest Daniel Athans." I loved it. It finally felt right. And after I was done I sheepishly walked out into the living room holding up the letterboard for Zach to see. And to my surprise he said, "Ok."

I was shocked! I asked him why and he said that clearly it was very important to me to take the effort to write it out on the letterboard haha. But he had also not really been loving the other name we had picked either. We tested out calling the baby Forest for a few days and we both knew that we had finally found the right name for our son. It sure was a journey!