What's in a name?

We've been asked a few times why we chose the names we did, so here goes:

Sophie or Sophia was high on both of our favourite names lists. We didn't decide until a few days before the birth, but when little Sophie appeared, we knew it was the right name.

Jasmine is my Mum’s name and both of us decided long ago that this would make a lovely middle name.


Matthew was also on both of our favourite names lists. In my case, my oldest friend is Matthew and the name is, to a degree, in his honour cos he’s a great man. Although we decided this long before the birth, it took a little while for the the name to fix to the baby. Strangely.

Charles came more from Chris than me, though I feel it goes really well as a middle name to Matthew. Chris’ Dad’s name was Carlos, the Portuguese for Charles, so there’s an element of family honour in there too, and a good balance to Sophie Jasmine.



What do they mean? Well, we didn’t pick any of the names for their meanings, but here they are:

Sophie: Means “Wisdom” in Greek.
Jasmine: Simply the name of the Jasmine plant with fragrant flowers, derived from the Persian Yasmin.
So, here we have a daughter who is wise and smells nice.

Matthew: English form of a Greek form of a Hebrew name, meaning “Gift of God”.
Charles: Either from the German Karl, derived from a word meaning “Man”. Or, derived from the Germanic element heri meaning “army, warrior”.
So, here we have a son who is either a man or a warrior, given by God.

I wonder if they’ll like each other.

Close, but no cigar
Names we considered that came close but didn’t make it included:
For Sophie: Catherine, Isabella
For Matthew: Max, Ethan

Nicknames
Well…they get called all sorts of things, especially in the middle of the night when they WON’T STOP CRYING!!!

But some of the more common nicknames include:
For Sophie: Little monkey, butterbean, Munchkin Minor, scrap
For Matthew: Grizzler, Chubster, Munchkin Major, Mr Potato Head