The Boys' Names

My friend, Kim, was asking about the middle names we picked out for the baby, and the stories behind all of our boys’ names, so I thought I’d share.

We have given all of our boys family names for their middle names. So, Kolby is Kolby Michael – Michael is his dad’s name (obviously) and his grandpa’s middle name. [Michael’s dad’s name is Dick Michael Bradshaw (Dick, not Richard), and I wasn’t going to use Dick, so Michael worked for him). And the name Kolby is just a name I have liked for a long time – a guy from our church stake was named Kolby (although it was probably spelled with a “C”), and although I didn’t really know him at all, I liked his name when I heard it. And I just thought it was nice to spell it with a “K,” although I have since learned that there are lots more Kolbys and Colbys out there, and that the majority of them spell the name with a “C,” so Kolby will have to deal with having his name spelled wrong all his life – but he’s already used to that – he tells people when they spell his name wrong and asks them to fix it.

Eli’s full name is Elijah Carl. We picked Elijah because in the scriptures Elijah was the prophet who would turn the hearts of the children to their fathers, and often it is said that if you are interested in learning about your ancestors you have the spirit of Elijah. And since I have always been very into genealogy, Elijah seemed like a great name. Eli is our only one so far who goes by a nickname, although we do call him both Eli and Elijah, but we probably use Eli more often now. We had decided to call him Eli when we picked the name, and when he was a baby we didn’t call him Elijah very often at all, so it was quite surprising when Kolby started calling him “Jijah” for Elijah, instead of Eli. We thought that was cute and we called him Jijah too for a while, until he got older and Kolby kept telling me that his name was Eli, not Jijah. So, now we call him Eli most of the time, but we also use Elijah. His middle name is Carl, after my mother’s father, Carl John Spohr Jr., who passed away before he ever got to meet Eli, but Kolby and Eli were both able to go with us to Grandpa Carl’s funeral.

Camden’s name is Camden James. As many of you know, we like to have names picked out really early – we usually have had a boy and a girl name picked out for each baby before we had the ultrasound to find out if it was a boy or a girl. Camden has been our only one that we “changed” the name for – although it was only a couple weeks after we had his ultrasound that we decided to change our minds on the name we had picked out. We had chosen Ezekiel, and were planning on calling him Zeke, which I think is really cute. But everyone we told that name to automatically said, “Zeke the geek!” Now, I know kids can think up a way to tease just about anyone about their name, but when I realized that it was the first thing that most people thought when they heard the name, I started to have doubts about using it. It was just too easy for everyone to think that up – I didn’t want him to be teased forever about his name. So I decided to change the name, but Michael thought that it was a fine name, so he wasn’t too motivated to look for an alternative. I spent days searching through lists of baby names on the internet, printing out lists of possibilities, and then Michael would come home and cross most of the names off the list. (The only ones he would leave on the list were names that I thought were nice, but just too common). So, then I came across Camden on one internet list, and I loved it. It’s similar enough to Cameron that it doesn’t sound strange, but different enough that it’s not boring. Michael said that he liked that name, but that he thought it was the “weirdest” name he had ever considered using (I think that by “weird” he meant “uncommon”). So I went onto the US Census website and looked up the data about US children’s names for the most recent year that they had posted. I was pretty surprised too that Camden was more common than Kolby, Eli, and Elijah (although not as common as Colby). That was all it took for Michael – it wasn’t too “weird” of a name, so Camden it was. And his middle name is after Michael’s brother (his brother, Alan, goes by his middle name, and his first name is really James), and for Michael’s mother’s father, James Albert McIntosh.

When we were looking for a name for Isaac, I really wanted a name that fit well with the other boys’ names. I felt like Kolby and Camden were both more modern sounding names, and Elijah was a name from the scriptures. And Kolby and Camden both started with consonants (and the same sound), and Eli was a vowel name. So, I wanted a name that went along with Eli’s name so that he wasn’t the odd one out. We liked Isaac, and that fit the bill: a scriptural name that started with a vowel. Also, I like the story of Abraham and Isaac in the scriptures and what great faith Isaac showed in both God and his father at such a young age. And I was excited to use the middle name, Steven, after my dad. So he is Isaac Steven Bradshaw.

And for our last little boy, we felt like we were running out of boy names that we both agreed on. (We had a whole list of possible girl names that never got used). So, we waited until a couple weeks after we had the ultrasound to decide on the final name. I liked Riley (I thought it was a nice name that ended in the same sound as Kolby’s name, and it is also a family name – but Michael doesn’t care for names that can be used for a boy or a girl, and Riley has become more and more popular as a girl’s name lately). We also liked the name Tyce, except I just didn’t feel like it fit well with the other boys’ names – it was only one syllable, and all of our other boys go by two-syllable names (I know, I get way too technical about this whole name-choosing thing, but I’ve got to use the names for the rest of my life, so I might as well pick something I really like). (And no, we didn’t like the idea of naming him Tyson and calling him Tyce). So, then I thought of my great, great grandfather’s name, Courtland. I like that name a lot, and Michael decided that he liked it too – he is planning on calling the baby ‘Court,’ but I think I’ll call him Courtland. (We talked about calling Camden ‘Cam’ too, but that hasn’t happened so far). The thing that I really had to convince Michael about was my idea for the middle names. Yes, I said names, not name. I really wanted to use both my brother’s names, and we are not planning on having another baby. So, I wanted to name the baby Courtland Matthew Aaron Bradshaw. Most people think that is weird, but I don’t really care what people think – we’ve had more than one person say they wouldn’t choose some of the names we picked for our boys, but they don’t have to go through pregnancy, labor, or raising any of our children, so I figure they don’t really get a say in the matter. :) Anyways, I was thinking about how it would be for him to have two middle names, and I was thinking that most of the time it wouldn’t really be a big deal. Lots of documents just ask for your middle initial, so that will be easy: Courtland M. Bradshaw. And for other things, like diplomas, they usually let you choose how your name appears, so that won’t be a problem. But this way he will get to be named after two wonderful uncles. So, even if people think it’s silly of me to want to give him an extra name, I think it will be a very nice name. Courtland Matthew Aaron Bradshaw.

(Oh, and I mentioned that Kolby called Eli ‘Jijah’ before he could pronounce the name correctly. It’s kind of funny to hear all the ways that the boys have pronounced each others’ names when they were little: Kolby called Eli ‘Jijah,’ and Eli called Kolby ‘Bo-bee,’ Eli called Camden ‘Mamen,’ and now Camden pronounces Isaac ‘Igaak.’ So, if you think that we should have chosen some different names for our kids, I guess it could always be worse: we could have had Bo-bee, Jijah, Mamen, and Igaak instead. :) We’ll see how Isaac ends up pronouncing Courtland after he starts talking).

Grandma and Grandpa McIntosh

We got to go to Michael’s Grandma and Grandpa McIntosh’s home for dinner the other night. It was nice to see them again, and Michael’s uncle and cousins, Rich, Leilani, and Makaio. The boys had fun playing Grandma and Grandpa’s organ and piano, playing with the lego blocks, and Camden had a lot of fun following Grandpa around and playing with his cane. Thanks for having us over. It was good to see all of you!

An Orientation Week

This week Michael has had his orientation. He is excited to get started on Tuesday. He will start off with a surgery month. One thing that he mentioned from the orientation was that they were instructed on what to do when someone stops breathing or their heart stops, as the interns will often be the first responders when that happens. They got a refresher course in CPR, and learned how to use the defibrillator to shock someone if needed. That kind of responsibility sounds a little overwhelming, but I’m sure Michael will do great!

On Monday evening Grandma Faun watched the boys for us while Michael and I went up Millcreek Canyon to a place called Log Haven. They had nice food, and it was a beautiful setting, with flowers and little waterfalls surrounding the area where we ate. The new interns were invited to the awards dinner that night for the outgoing interns, and it turned out that that was their graduation ceremony too – but it was a nice, personal graduation with recognitions for each of the interns and not a lot of long speeches or anything like so many other graduations we’ve attended in the past. The dinner was nice, and we were able to meet a few of the new interns in Michael’s class and their spouses, and a couple of the outgoing interns. One of the couples we met that is leaving is actually good friends with Jandee and Dustin Anderson, our friends from Milwaukee, and they are moving out to our old ward in Milwaukee. They even bought the Lundgren’s house. Fun.

On Tuesday morning I went down to Pilgrim Point and met Mel and her boys for their playgroup. There is a fun little area with a big statue of Noah’s Ark and all the animals and it has water for the children to wade in and little fountains that splash up. There was also a cave with a bear statue and some fun gardens – we’ll have to go back some time, since it sounded like there was a lot more there that we didn’t get to see yet. And Michael got off in the afternoon on Tuesday, so that evening I went with Grandma and my cousin, Dorthy, to a meeting for their walking group. I guess some of the people in the group are pretty serious walkers – they do “race walking” and sign up for marathons and half-marathons all the time. I would just be up for normal walking, plus pushing the kids in the strollers, but I think I’ll try it out. Dorthy, Grandma, and I are getting up early tomorrow morning to go walking, so I’ll see how that goes.

On Thursday the boys and I helped Grandma plant flowers in the front yard. Actually, I weeded the planting areas while the boys helped Grandma plant. They are very good helpers. We got two different visitors while we were out doing that. The Kearls stopped by to drop off a sippy cup Camden had left at Tyce’s parent’s house. They saw our place and stayed to talk for a little while before heading off to the airport that afternoon. I’m glad we have plans to get together in the future, even if they’re not very soon. Also, after they left the relief society president from church came by and welcomed me into the ward. She asked if I wanted to be a visiting teacher and let me know that someone will come to visit with me too. That was nice of her to stop by. After cleaning the boys off and letting them get a little rest, we headed out to an activity at Snowbird resort for the new interns and their families. It was nice to have an activity just for our group, so I could get a better idea of who was in Michael’s class. We have met several nice couples, and I am hoping to be able to get together with them. There is no official spouse association, but a couple of the wives were talking about organizing something, so I’m looking forward to that. I was also thinking of e-mailing all the new interns and seeing if they would each send me some info about themselves and their families and I could try to put together some kind of directory. There are only 13 interns, I think, so that should be do-able. The activity at snowbird was nice. There was a nice dinner and some fun games, including some of those inflated bounce-house things, a zip line, some trampolines with harnesses so you could bounce really high and do flips, and gondola rides up the mountain. I’ll have to post videos later of the boys bouncing on the trampolines – they all loved it, especially Camden!

On Friday Michael didn’t have orientation, so we got some errands done and we went to the West Valley recreation center to check it out. We decided to sign up the boys for swim lessons, so Michael is going to go in tomorrow at 5am to sign them up, since they told us the classes fill up quickly. While the three younger boys went with us to check out the rec center, Kolby stayed with Grandma and helped plant flowers in the back yard. He is such a good little helper, and loves spending time with his grandma. That evening we went to Grandpa and Grandma McIntosh’s house for dinner, and then afterwards Michael’s uncle Rich and his kids stopped by. We had fun catching up with them and the boys had fun playing with the cousins.

Yesterday we went down to Spanish Fork to visit Alan and Jenn at their place. We played games for a little while, then played in the back yard before coming in for some cake and ice cream. It was nice to go down and visit them – even though it was quite the drive to get down there. After that we stopped at the grocery store and then headed straight back to West Valley for a ward BBQ. It was so hot out that I could barely stand to eat a hot hamburger, but after dinner there were some water games for the kids and the boys and Michael joined in a game of baseball while I talked to a couple of the other moms there. It ended up being a nice evening.

And this morning I ended up staying home with Isaac because he had a little cold. I helped Michael get the other boys ready for church, then I actually went back to sleep while Isaac slept, which was nice. Michael said that I missed a really good meeting, though, by a young man who was leaving on his mission. After church I ground wheat and made bread. I have been putting off making bread, just because it takes so long to grind the wheat (because I would rather grind the wheat enough for several week’s worth of bread batches all at once, rather than grind it each week, so that takes quite a while). But after doing it for a while, I ended up with 6 loaves of bread – perfect bread that rose just right (I knew it was my oven in Milwaukee, and not just that I couldn’t make bread that rises correctly), and I made 8 bags of wheat flour and the other dry ingredients to put in the freezer, so for the next two months I just have to pull out a bag, add the liquid ingredients, and cook the bread. Now that the grinding is done, it will be easy to make bread each week.

And after the boys took naps we went over to Sugarhouse Park for Grandma Bradshaw’s family birthday dinner. Her birthday is tomorrow, and lots of the Utah cousins got together tonight, which was fun to see lots of them again. We were right next to the lake, and as we expected, Camden fell in. He was chasing some birds right when we got there, and then he turned and stepped into the water before I could get to him. The bottom of the pond was so slippery that he slid right in up to his neck. I dried him off and let him run around in his diaper. Later Kolby was throwing pieces of bread in to feed the birds, and he accidentally fell in too. And then after that Michael was video taping Camden feeding the birds and Camden went in a second time and hit his head on the side, but luckily he wasn’t really hurt. I think Eli only stuck his foot in. And now all 4 boys are asleep and I have a chance to write this and try to get things updated a little more. It has been really nice that Isaac is sleeping in the playpen now. About a week ago I decided it was time for him to switch from being swaddled and sleeping in the swing to going down in the playpen, and so we prepared ourselves for a few rough nights of him being up and crying a lot, but he surprised us by going down just fine at night and for naps in the daytime, and not even crying for more than a few minutes each time before he falls asleep. I guess he was ready too.

Last Week

The past week was our first full week back in Milwaukee, and we had so much fun playing games and spending time with friends. It took a few days to get everything unpacked and back in the right places. We also got the Christmas decorations down and put away. After taking all the Christmas boxes and luggage to our storage unit, we had room to finally move the piano out of our bedroom and back into the front room, which has been so much nicer to play. The boys always want to play with it too.

I started into my new rotation, which is surgical pathology. I am with one other student and we sit in a room and look at pathology slides with the residents and fellows. I am amazed at how fast they can look at a slide under the microscope and know within seconds what they are seeing. This is good for me to start getting used to looking under the microscope, since I will have to do this in my dermatology residency.

Last Wednesday we had a huge snowstorm that swept through the area, dumping about 12 inches of snow. There was also a really gusty wind, so being outside and on the roads was bad. The director of our rotation on Tuesday said to not come in Wednesday if the snow was bad enough, so I ended up having a snow day, which was so nice. Steph and I were able to get a lot of little things done at home that day and that night we had the Kearls over for games. We played out in the snow when they first got here and the boys had so much fun because there was so much.

Thursday night we went to dinner with Tyce and Faith to celebrate Faith’s birthday, which was Saturday. We went downtown to the Pizza Shuttle and they had really good gourmet pizzas – we got a bbq chicken, alfredo vegetable, and spinach with feta. We thought it would be more than enough food, but the boys ate so much, and there were no leftovers. They have definitely gotten their appetites back since coming home.

Friday was Eli’s first day of preschool. He is in the same classes with Kolby. We got some really cute pictures of him and Kolby dressed up for his first day. He had so much fun and loves school, especially since he is with Kolby – they are such good friends. Steph said that as soon as they got there the boys were off playing and didn’t need her to stick around.

That night the Kearls had asked us to babysit for them so they could go curling. We went to their house to help out, and when they got back some others showed up for cake and ice cream and games. By the time we were done playing Killer Bunnies, it was pretty late, and all the kids were already asleep, so we just decided to spend the night in their front room. It made me feel like I was back in college. Saturday morning Nathan came out around 6:30 with a little flashlight, and when he saw Steph sleeping in the recliner, I guess he thought she was his mom and got really excited that she was out in the front room. He came over and shined the light on her, but when he realized that she wasn’t his mom, he started screaming and ran back to his parents’ bedroom. It was really funny.

Saturday we got to listen to the worldwide leadership training conference over at the church. The topic was on raising a righteous posterity and the focus was on how to better help our kids to learn the gospel in the home and to make sure that we made our homes safe havens from the evils of the world. I thought it was neat how often they spoke about making the sacrifice of faith to have a family while still in school and not making a lot of money, and that if you would obey that commandment to multiply and replenish the earth, then you would be blessed immensely for it. As I look back on our marriage so far, I can definitely see how much we have been blessed and helped as we have tried to follow the counsel of the prophet and keep the commandments. In the conference they also gave advice on things to do to have more love and unity in the home. Steph and I are continually trying to improve on making sure that our children always feel loved and that we are spending good quality time with them. We decided to set up a weekly night out with one of the boys so that we could spend more individual time with them. We will start with Kolby this week. Saturday night we had Peter and Cynthia Hedgecock over for games and had fun catching up on each others lives for the past few months. They brought a new board game that is now our favorite game for the time. It is called Carcassonne and is similar in some respects to Settlers of Katan, but easier to explain and quite a bit faster to play. Basically, you take turn picking up pieces to add to the table as you build up cities with fields and roads and you get points based on what you build.

Sunday was probably the coldest day that we have had so far since being back – the high was only around 10 degrees, and there was a really cold wind blowing all day. Kolby gave a talk in primary on the topic of how the scriptures teach us about Heavenly Father and Jesus. He said that his favorite parts of the scriptures are those about the Lamanites, and his favorite stories are Nephi building the boat, Noah and the Ark, and Ammon and the sheep. He wanted to do the talk without our help and he did a good job with the primary president helping him. I am really looking forward to next month when Camden will be old enough to go to nursery, because one of us ends up spending the hour in the hall with him because he just doesn’t want to be quiet. :) I also got released from my calling as the ward physical facilities representative and my assignment as the stake building coordinator. For now I will just be doing home teaching, which is different, especially since I have had those callings for almost the whole time we’ve been in Milwaukee.

After church we had dinner over at the Hedgecocks. Peter is an excellent cook and we love eating his food. He made us salmon that was so delicious. I had to run for a few hours to do my home teaching with Jason. We had fun catching up on the lives of Steve and Kara and Kyle and Tracy and their kids. When I got back to the Hedgecocks we got the kids in bed and then played another round of Carcassonne. We are so grateful to have such wonderful friends here in Milwaukee and are not looking forward to possibly having to leave them when I graduate.

Grandpa McIntosh also had his back surgery on Wednesday. It sounds like everything went well, although things were a lot worse than the doctors had thought once they got in and started working. He is out of the ICU but had to have a blood transfusion Sunday night. It is good to hear that he is continually improving, if not as fast as he had hoped. You are in our prayers grandpa and we hope that this will help to alleviate some of the pain you have been dealing with for so long.

We hope everyone else is doing well and love hearing from you.