My favorite pictures

   I get my kids pictures taken a lot. I just had photos of Lilly taken at six months (when I get them back I will post some).  I dont ever want to look back and say, I wish I had captured that moment.  It got me thinking about one of my favorite series of pictures I have had  taken were the ones documenting who my children are named after.

 James Paul Willard.  

When choosing names for our children we wanted them to mean something to us and to honor our families.  When we found out we would be adopting a little boy we were pretty set on his name.  My sister had already honored my family with her children so we wanted to make sure we did the same for Rays Family.  James is Rays Grandfather(on his mothers side0, and Paul is his dads name.  It is also Rays middle name.  We were asked my James' birth mother to use Willard as a name to honor and important member of her family.  Although Willard is not my favorite name in the world we kept it as a second middle name.   When we went to take the series of pictures I wanted the boys to have a toy that would represent the person they were named after.  Rays grandpa loves golf so we got James a little golf set that he could be posed with.  My boys are  blessed to have some of their great grandparents around.  I love the picture of the two of them, it warms my heart.

James Paul with his Great Grandpa James.   

   Nicholas Taylor and Joseph Bryce.
 At sixteen weeks pregnant, just four months after naming James we found out that we would be naming two more boys in our family.  After trying to figure out if we should give them similar names, or names that started with the same letter, or some sort of theme, we went with naming them after people in our family again.  We  decided their first names would be family names but we would pick middle names that we just liked the sound of.  Joseph is named after my grandfather.  I loved and admired him and when I see Joe I think about my grandfather and how we would have been so happy to see me as a mom.  My grandfather was a WWII vet and a purple heart.  I picked one of my moms favorite pictures of her father in Germany.  We also had his purple heart and his dog tags.  I found and old bomber jacket for Joe to wear since my grandfather was in the army air corps.  After coming out of the military he worked for JPL on many of the Apollo missions so Joe got a toy space shuttle.

My little Joe with his a picture and memorabilia from his great grandfather

 Nicholas is named after Rays cousin.  They were very close as children.  Unfortunately he passed away when he was in his early 20's.  Ray wanted to honor him by naming our son after him.  Rays Great Aunt had given us a leather jacket that used to belong to Ray's cousin,  So we used that in the picture.  He also wore the style of hat that Nick is wearing.  They had huskies growing up so we found a cute puppy toy for Nick to hold.  The picture that Ray picked is a childhood picture that everyone in his family had up on their wall.

Nick with memorabilia from Rays cousin Nicholas

 Lilliana Michelle.  

Two year later we found out we would be blessed with a beautiful baby girl.  When we were adopting James we had a girl named picked out.  I wanted a little girl named Lilly.  Originally we were going to use Grace (my grandmothers middle name) but both my sister and cousin and used it as a middle name.  I felt like if a family member was honored then we didn't need to do it again so we were on the hunt for a new name.  I started thinking we might not use Lilly, afterall the boys first names were the ones that were honoring a family memeber.  But I could not get over not having my little Lilly that I have wanted since we were considering having children.  So we decided on Lilly. Then for her middle name.  My sweet Lilly takes her middle name from my sister.  I am so glad we could honor her in this way.  I am very close with my sister and naming my daughter after her made me feel so good, I knew it was the perfect name.  My sister loves Christmas so we thought it was fitting to put them both in Christmas hats.  Lilly has a cute Christmas tree toy.  The silly hats is a perfect representation of my sisters fun spirit.  Lilly is also wearing one of the dresses my sister use to wear when she was a little baby.  My mom had kept in in our doll clothes but it was just right for her size.

      

    These pictures have a permanent place on my wall.  I love that each of my kids has a special name that we picked from people we love and cherish.  I like to look at these pictures and remember all the people in our lives and how the actual person or the memory of a person can help shape my kids lives.  I think they are a great reminder of the importance of family.