Rose Teresa - Behind the Name

I recently read a blog post by I blogger I really enjoy following, Emily Fossier from Little Fossi Way. She wrote a post about why she named her new daughter what she did, and I absolutely love thinking/talking about names so I thought I would also write a post about how we came to name our little babe Rose Teresa.

A whole bunch of little things inclined us towards the name Rose and those things slowly (it took 9 months...) led us to feel certain that that was her name. Of course, it took seeing her for us to be completely sure.

I have been thinking about names I would like for my kids for as long as I can remember. I used to love the name Selina when I was really little and then as a little older kid I was all about the name Millie. I also wanted girl twins so I could name them Alice and Alison (no). I had a little baby book that I would underline my favourite names in and me and my childhood best friend Olivia would sit writing lists of all the names of our future kids... it was excessive. Also, we thought we would probably have eleven kids each. We'll see if that happens :).

So naturally, it was a big deal for me to finally get to name my real life daughter that I had always been dreaming about (we found out she was a girl at our 20-week ultrasound).

The first time I remember registering that the name Rose was a really beautiful, romantic sort of name was while reading the book The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton (one of my favourite books). I can remember having the thought, "That's a really pretty name."

Different things inclined me to it originally. It's a really feminine and sweet name, it's old-fashioned but I don't associate it with old people (haha, sorry if that sounds harsh). I had an amazing experience volunteering in Peru and St. Rose of Lima is the patron saint of Peru (she's from Lima, Peru, as her name gives away), so I thought it would be really beautiful for Rose to have a connection and maybe special devotion to St. Rose of Lima and that little link with Peru. I loved the idea of St. Rose watching over her and interceding for her. I also really like short, simple, sweet names and I really love flower names, so I loved that association with flowers and nature as well.

At the beginning of the pregnancy, I casually mentioned that I really liked the names Lucy, Rose, and Adeline (pronounced Ad-e-lin). My dad hooked on Rose and called the baby "Rosie" for the whole pregnancy.

Matt and I found it pretty easy to agree on boys names we liked, but a little harder for girls names. He also thought it would be no problem if we just waited til the last month to decide on a name, but I was of the opposite opinion I thought we should have it decided by the first month ;). I was also happy to just talk about it constantly the until we had it figured out. Right at the beginning of the pregnancy when I asked him which name he liked best out of Rose, Lucy, and Adeline, he said Rose was his favourite.

The idea of a sweet little girl named Rose running around was so exciting to me. Matt said he really liked the name Rose as well, and sometime in the third trimester we were pretty set on Rose. In my mind that was her name, even though I knew we could potentially meet her and think she suited a different one. I started praying to Saint Rose of Lima to intercede for her a bit when I was pregnant and also through the labour (especially with the tiny scare in the beginning).

If you want to read about Rose's birth story, click here.

For the middle name, I wanted it to match her first name and had always loved the idea of naming middle names after special people or just having meaning behind them. My mom's name is Teresa and that's who we named her middle name after, and Matt's mom's middle name is also Theresa. I love that she will have that connection through her middle name.

2016 was also the year Mother Teresa was canonized and I think Saint Mother Teresa is such a beautiful example and an amazing person to be connected to as well. There is also the connection to St. Therese of Liseux since Therese is Teresa in French, so I love praying for St. Rose, St. Mother Teresa and St. Therese to intercede for our little Rosa.

I also love the cute nicknames that come with the name Rose. Rosie, Rosa, Rosalita... it also rhymes with so much which everyone has made very apparent :).

I love how the name Rose is simple, elegant, sweet and feminine, and all the little associations connected with the name (even just how beautiful roses are) caused me to feel more and more right about that being her name. I'm so glad that Matt loved the name too. It was such an awesome experience getting to chose the name that Rose will have the rest of her life.

These photos are from around this time last year. Time flies! 

Photos by Monica Anne Photography