Eden's Name

I've had many people ask about Eden's name and how we decided on it.

After the initial shock of finding out we were pregnant, we both had a very strong feeling that she was going to be a girl. No particular reason. We never even contemplated a boys name.

Initially, Tina wanted to call her Wiley. I said, "Wiley? As in Wiley Coyote?" I didn't like it and wanted a Bible name. Tina said, "Fine. You find a name I like better than Wiley and I'll be happy to change it." After going through all the standard names like Sarah, Rachael, Rebekah, Ruth, etc, Tina was still not happy. So I tried some more obscure names (and there are some really bad names in the Bible) Tina finally asked me to stop when I suggested "Vashti."

At the 12 week ultrasound, we could see her hands, feet and bones, even though she was so tiny. Tina said, "How beautiful!!! How can we name something so beautiful? What could describe her? Then she said, I bet the Garden of Eden was this beautiful." Then it hit us... how about the name Eden? Isn't that a place name and not a person name? Does it matter? Her father (that would be me) quickly did some web searches and found out that the name Eden was not too uncommon. (See an earlier post showing graphs!) It means beautiful, paradise or place of pleasure. PERFECT.

The next day we did this crossword puzzle.


No, I don't believe God speaks through crossword puzzles, but it was fun for us to see.