And the winner IS...

Posted by Jordan

Some of you may remember that last December we decided to run a little contest on our blog to NAME OUR BABY.

We had a lot of great entries, and this was, perhaps, the most productive thing we could have done to stimulate thought and explore more name possibilities.  In fact, we actually chose DAPHNE CLAIRE, both first and middle, from suggestions on our blog which we had not previously considered, but that we immediately fell in love with!

Thanks, everybody, who participated, except for my brother McLain, who should never be allowed to name a human being.  Sheri, bless you for choosing normal names for your children.

THE WINNERS:

The name Claire was submitted by Kristen Weller and Sarah Cantrell, with variations Clair by Emily Berkley and, to a lesser extent, Clarah, by Mindy Percival.  With this many winners, you're all going to have to split the prize, which will be 1/4 of a gift certificate arriving by mail soon.  (Just kidding.)  We'll figure something out here soon.

For a long time we were going to use Claire for the first name, but then we read Daphne, and it became a big back-and-forth dilemma.  We liked both names almost equally, but after trying to come up with blasted MIDDLE NAMES (the hardest part, really) to go with each, we decided that the best combination would be to sacrifice Claire as a first name and make it the world's cutest middle name.

Now,  the winning  submission for the first name Daphne came from Jaicee's little sister Naomie!  Congrats,  Naomie!  You win the prize!  Soon a van with a TV crew will pull up to your front door and present you with a giant check for ONE MILLION DOLLARS!!

Just kidding, of course.  What you actually win is babysitting privileges for life!! Hoorah!!

Just kidding again.  We'll take you out for a night on the town when we get up there.  Thanks for the suggestion!  We love you kiddo!

A little about the name Daphne:

Not only was this the name of the hottest character from Scooby Doo...

...(what a namesake, eh?), Daphne is from ancient Greek mythology.

Daphne means "Laurel Tree."  Daphne was a nymph who was so extremely beautiful that she was lusted after by both men and gods.  When Apollo, the sun god, tried to pursue her with intent to force himself upon her, she prayed to be turned into a laurel tree rather than to have her virtue and chastity taken from her.

And so it was, she was transformed into a tree, which kept her forever virtuous.  The tree became sacred to Apollo and its leaves were used to crown the victors of the ancient Olympic Games.

Now THAT is a namesake:  beauty and chastity.  A rare combination!  We will remind her of this when she becomes a Laurel in Young Women.  (Does anyone know if there is a link between the ancient myth and why the Church chose this name for its sixteen-year-old Young Women???)

So there you have it!  Daphne Claire Knutson.  We know some of you are not a fan of the name, but hey, we pretend to like YOUR kids' weird names...   ;P