The story behind the name

Emma's name is pretty straight forward. Emma Noel. Paul picked Emma, and I picked Noel. Anyone who knows me knows I love Christmas time, so Noel was a pretty obvious choice. Now Asher Huckleberry... that's another story.

Since before Emma was born, Paul has begged me to agree to Huckleberry Sawyer as our first son's name. Paul very obviously loved the story of Huckleberry Finn. I vetoed the suggestion. Poor Paul. My biggest concern is that our son would never be taken seriously with Huckleberry for a first name. We compromised and agreed Huckleberry made a good middle name. The Paul could have his "Huck", and I could have a son with a more serious first name.

We never could figure out a name we both loved, and luckily we had a little girl. This time around, I brought up the name Asher Huckleberry. Asher was a name I LOVED while pregnant with Emma, and I still liked the name. Paul wasn't sold. We toyed around with some other names. Tristan Huckleberry, Finn Alexander, Isaac Mikhail... none of them felt right. I kept my heart secretly set on Asher, and Paul still wanted Huckleberry to be a part of the name. When Emma says "hug", it comes out "huck". She came running up to me one night, yelled "huck!", patted my belly and hugged it. Paul and I just kind of grinned. Paul said, "she just called the baby Huck". I replied, "no. She said hug." But the memory stuck. Around week 36, Paul sent me a text. "Asher Huckleberry". I was afraid he'd change his mind, so I told him we would talk about it later. In the end, we both agreed it just felt right.

The meaning of Asher is fortunate, blessing and happy. He is living up to that name perfectly. We are fortunate to have him, he has been a true blessing to all who know him and he is such a happy baby who has made us all happy in return. I have no doubt that his middle name will show up in his personality as he gets older. I can already see the adventures he will have and the trouble he will get into. He's a little boy with a wild big sister. Adventure and trouble are inevitable, and I think it will be perfect!