God knew your name

I was putting Nate to bed last night and I glanced up at his wall and saw his baptism picture. The theme for his baptism was "Before the light of day shined on your little face, God knew your name." That got me thinking about the project Nate brought home from school about how he got his name. Parents need to write down how their child got their name. The funny thing is that Matt & I can make it a quick sentence that says it's the name he came with. Kinda like the pre-named dolls you buy in a store. But, that wouldn't be the whole story and it wouldn't be fair to Nate if we didn't write about how special his name really is. True, he did come with the name Nathan. It's not a name we we had on our baby name list when we were trying to conceive a child, but we actually liked it and it fit him. Plus, after calling him Nathan for 2 years we thought it would be confusing to suddenly change his name after his adoption. Of course, it was awesome that his last name was now the same as ours, but where does the special come in? You guessed it...his middle name. There was a lot of love that went into his middle name. While we were picking out names - before the light of day shined on his little face - we were at a loss how we could name a child after 2 special grandmas. Matt was very close to his Grandma Nonny, whose name was Valborg and my Grandma whose name was Edna. Surprise - not 2 names you would normally bestow on a child. My Grandma always said to please not name a child after her because she hated her own name. However, in my heart I knew it would mean the world to her and I had said I would even just consider using the middle initial of E only & she would know. Several months before she died, she said to me that she had been thinking about it and thought she had come up with a name that would work for either gender and would encompass both Grandma's names. She said Valdane. Val for Valborg and Dane for Edna - same letters, just scrambled. I liked it and so did Matt. A few months later she passed - 1/6/05. Little did I know at her viewing, 1/10/05 that the light of day had shined on my son's face. I didn't know him, but God did and he already knew his name. Yes this still makes me cry too - so if tears are rolling down your face while you read this, know you are not alone. So, 6 months later Nate was placed with us. After learning he was born that day and feeling like he was so connected with her, how could we not give him the name Valdane? It seemed so fitting. Grandma had been asking if I knew about the baby or if Matt knew about the baby days before she died and it will always make me wonder if she didn't know already. So, his name is Nathan Valdane. His initials are NVS - which makes me smile because is sounds like envious...and wouldn't any child be envious to have a name as special as his? God really knew his name before the light of day shined on his little face and he moved quite a few people to make sure that became his name on Earth.