Why The Name?

I had an interesting chat with the receptionist at the eye clinic last week. I was making an appointment for my daughter and she commented on how she like the name. After confirming the birth date she again said, "I REALLY like that name!" I kinda chuckled, thanked her but she went on to ask how I came up with that name. I then briefly explained how we got that name.

I am often asked that question about my kids names. While they may be a little different, they aren't unheard of.

Our firstborn is named Boyd. I knew in high school that I wanted to name my first son Boyd after doing my family genealogy. The story goes that two young boys were sailing from Germany in the mid-1700's with their parents to settle an estate in the Carolina's. The parents became ill on the ship and before they died they turned their sons over to a man to care for them and the estate until the boys were old enough to take it over. Evidently the man was indifferent to the boys and did not treat them very well, so when they were old enough they ran away changing their last name. The two brothers were named Boyd (my 3x great grandpa) and William.

The name Boyd means yellow haired (Celtic), and he indeed was a yellow haired little guy! To add to coincidence, his first son is named William:)

Here is Boyd at 20 months in 1974

Our second son is named Blake. We had a couple of names that we liked when I was expecting him; Burke and Barron were our first choices. My husband said we could name him Barron Von Bodenburg- a good German name! We didn't intend to have another name start with a B, but those were the ones that just kept jumping out at us. About two months before he was born I noticed the name Blake in the baby book, and it just hit me. I must have seen it before, but this time it seemed perfect. I didn't know of anyone with that name, but it sounded so right. Years later there was a Blake Carrington of the TV show Dynasty, and I thought for sure there would be tons of Blake's after that. I have seen and heard of many since, but there isn't an overkill on it.

The name Blake means, Black or Pallid (Celtic), and once again, he had black curly hair!

Here is Blake at age 15 months in 1977.Our first daughter is named Kyrstin (pronounced, kearstin-long e, short i) There use to be a soap opera on called Love Of Life, which ended in the late 1970's after being on for as many years as I could remember. Towards the end of it's run, there was a little girl on the show named Kirsten. It was pronounced with the long e sound even though the Scandinavian spelling is with an i. Once again, I loved that name but the challenge was having people say it correctly. We played with spelling it phonetically- Kearstin - until a friend of ours suggested using a y instead. She had challenges with people calling her Kristin, but became good at giving her ear lobe a tug and telling them to think of "ear" when saying her name:)

The name Kyrstin means the Christian or anointed one, (Scandinavian) and is also a form of Christine. Coincidentally, we were visiting my pen pal in England when I found out I was expecting Kyr, and my friend's name is Christine!

Here is Kyrstin at 18 months in 1981.

Our next daughter, Tyne is the one the receptionist was commenting on last week. I think we had the hardest time coming up with her name. We went through all kinds of K names seeing the boys were B's, we may as well try to even it out. When the boys were little I had seen the name Tyne roll by on the credits of a TV movie and had kept it in mind. Finally, I suggested it, and even tho it wasn't a K name, we liked it. Later when the Cagney&Lacey show was popular on TV, I realized it must have been Tyne Daly's name that I had seen before she became well known. I also heard later that President Ford's daughter, Susan, has a daughter named Tyne. She gets many compliments on her name and often times has to spell it for them as they think she is saying Time:)

The name Tyne is an English nickname (Tine) for Christine, again, meaning Christian. Oddly enough, my pen pal from England lives by the Tyne River:)

Here is Tyne as age 24 months, in 1986.

Last, is our daughter, Kinsey. When Tyne was just a month old, I was shopping in JC Penney's, when I heard a mother call to her little daughter, "M'Kensey, come here." She probably said MacKensie, but I only heard what sounded like the "Kinsey" part and immediately said to my husband,"There is our second K name!!"

He responded with "Too late, and NO we are not changing Tyne's name.":)

At that point we thought we were probably done having children; after all 2 girls and 2 boys was a nice even number. Even so, I held on to that name just in case. Well, talk about the power of

thought...so when I was expecting #5, I knew that if it was a girl, I had the perfect name!

The name Kinsey means royal, victorious one, (Old English). Who know, maybe she will marry royalty someday...? If not, we are royally happy she is a part of our family.

Here is Kinsey at 22 months, in 1989.

Here is a more current photo of them.

Left-Rt: Kinsey, Tyne, Kyrstin, Blake and Boyd.