I attended the Syracuse Catholic Women’s Conference at the end of October and had the very great pleasure of meeting someone I’d only known by her handle — mommashaunie (and how hilarious is it when you’re meeting someone in real life that you’d previously only known online and you whisper self consciously, “Are you mommashaunie?” 😂) — who turns out is actually named Sharon, and she was selling the gorgeous wares from her Etsy shop Baby My Love (“Knit bonnets and hats, leather moccasins, diapers, wool covers, blankets, lovey’s, burp cloths, wipes, bibs, nursing covers, boppy covers, headbands, knit animals, and everything in between”) (on Facebook and Instagram as well) which, if I could have, I would have bought all of because they were all.so.beautiful.

We also had a little chat about, um, names, and I loved her kiddos’ names so much I had to share them here! Fortunately she was game — I think you’re going to love all these!

“Names…Names have definitely been something that Zeb and I enjoy when a new baby comes along. I truly believe that God has a name chosen for each soul He creates, and it’s our job to discover it. I take this job VERY seriously. 😉 

Our first, is Miss Gemma Agnes. I was determined to name my first girl after my grandmother, who was my world! Her name was Agnes Emma, but she despised her first name. So naturally I was going to go with Emma Agnes, BUT, one of my sister and Brother-in-law’s [named their baby] Emma 5 months before our baby was born. Zebulon suggested just switching to Gemma Agnes, and once I read St. Gemma’s story, I was hooked.

Our next girl was “going” to be Bernadette Marie, but I had a dream about a little blonde swinging at the park, and she did NOT look like a Bernadette, she looked like a Felicity (I ALWAYS loved the story of St. Felicity and Perpetua), so we went with Felicity Anne, and low and behold, she is a brunette. LOL!

My husband had requested the name, Nicodemus, for his first son, from almost the moment that we first met. Our next conception was a 13 week miscarriage, though we didn’t know the gender, we chose Baby Nic to be for either girls or boy (Nicholas or Nicole).

Next, we were blessed with a son, and he is our Nicodemus Joseph.

Our next conception was our dear, sweet, earth side saint. This little one was a sweet princess and at 30 weeks, I had still NOT pinned down a name, I was thinking Gwendolyn for a while, but it just wasn’t sticking. I had gone through the Butler’s Saint books, and still, nothing felt right. I kept badgering my husband and telling him that I NEEDED a name for the sweet little one growing within me. One night, when he had had enough of my nagging, he told me to grab the Bible, he kept perusing and mentioning different names, about 5 mins in, he said, ” Miriam” and I jumped on it! It was PERFECT! I was in love with it. We chose, Rose, as the middle name because her two sisters wanted it desperately. On Valentine’s Day, 2009, my water broke at 36 weeks. I delivered our sweet, Miriam Rose, unfortunately, she was only on this earth for 11 hours before God called her home. Her death was caused by septis, Strep Pnuemo that was not from me. She was baptized before passing, so, our sweet St. Miriam Rose has won the prize!

Next, our little Maximus Michael Patrick. He too was named with the help of a dream. We had planned on Francis, but I had a dream at 12 weeks that I was holding a little boy named Maximus, and that is how we rolled. 

Our next little one was an early miscarriage that we named Joy, we actually had already started calling the baby Joy when we found our about her/his coming.

Now, the next was our sweet, little Quintus Edmund. I was stuck on Edmund ( I loved the name AND the saint), but being that he was #5 here, and the fact I had once mentioned the name to my husband, he said it was too ironic that such a name fall on #5 (Quintus), SO….that is how we came to choose that one. 

Our next was Francis Fulton. Again, we loved the name Fulton, but since we had started the “-us” trend [for boys], we felt bound to it. 😉 Francis is a family name, one of our favorite saints, and since it’s also the name of the Holy Father, we felt it perfect. 

Evangeline Marie. For the life of me, even though she is the most recent, I can’t remember what moment or instance we received the prompting for her name. I had been wanting our next girl to be “Eden Marie”, but Evangeline Marie it was, and fitting as well, as Evangelist means, “Bearer of good news”. And being the first girl, since our Miriam Rose, her coming was definitely welcome news. 

Each child’s patron is the saint they are named after, (Francis is St. Francis of Assisi) (Evangeline, John the Evangelist).”

What beautiful names!! And such a beautiful family:

On the left: Sharon and Zeb with Gemma, Felicity, Nicodemus, Maximus, Quintus, Francis, and Evangeline. On the right: Sharon and Zeb with Miriam Rose.

Thank you to Sharon for sharing her babies’ beautiful names with us!! And with Christmas coming, please consider visiting her shop! She’s got a coupon code running right now: ZelieChristmas will get you 10% off your total purchase.

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