TATE JUSTIN

Several of you have asked the significance of Tate's name and why we decide on it. You asked for it so, here you go.

Mike and I are both very decisive people. When it came to picking names for our children we did not buy baby name books or search online. Instead we talked about what we liked and disliked and came up with a list. Most importantly Mike wanted our first son to be named Carter William. When we found out we were having a girl we scratched our first girl name, Kennedy, and named her Bailey Grace instead. We decided that if we did eventually have a son we did not want Kennedy and Carter (obviously both Presidents). Little did we know at the time that EVERYONE we would ever meet would either personally have or have a neighbor or cousin who has a dog named Bailey! Grace after my best friend Alyssa Grace. Baby number two was easy. Brooklyn is my favorite girl name. We probably would have named Bailey Brooklyn but our pastor in Orange County had a daughter named Brooklyn and we did not want to duplicate. When Brooklyn was born we had moved back to Ventura so it was not an issue. Joy is her middle name for two reasons; I have a very special aunt named Joyce and also because of its meaning.

Are you still following? Ok, so two names down we still had several names on our list to go. Baby three was going to be a boy. Mike was finally able to use his favorite, Carter William. William after my incredible father. The name Carter was left at the hospital and our son became Buddy except when he is in trouble with Mike :). Baby number four was given my favorite boy name, Emmett. Michael is obviously named after Mike. Again, all of this was very easy for us. No major discussions just crossing used names off of our list. One thing I should mention is that we have always stuck with names that have an English origin. Partly because we feel they sound good together and also because they are the names that we LOVE.

Now to baby number five. This was the trickiest name of all. Next on our list for boys names was Hudson. Adoption added a whole new element. In the past we have not seen our children before we have named them. Hudson just did not seem to fit this sweet little one that we knew as 'Eugene'. Back to the drawing board after 7 years of using our faithful list! You might assume that we finally turned to search sites or a baby name book- NOT US. We sat in the middle of the Burbank Airport with a notebook and a pen. We talked about a few of our new favorites and literally 2 or 3 minutes later decided his name would be TATE (which means Cheerful or Happy). We felt the name fit the boy in the picture that we hoped to call SON. His middle name is Justin named after our close friend Justin Sparks. Justin and his wife, Rachael, are friends of ours from Westmont and he is also Mike's business partner.

Is that enough detail for you?