Name Story

The last night I ever spoke with my Grandma was from the hospital the day Annette was born. I called to share our news with her and she said, “Annette, that is lovely, it reminds me of my mother’s name, Annabelle.” It was just the following week that my Grandma went to be with Jesus. Ever since that time I always thought it would be sweet to have an Annette and Annabelle. Jason also loved the name and found in his family tree that he had a great Aunt named Annabelle Paine. We liked that the name had a connection to both sides of our families. Anna means grace and Belle means beauty. We pray that her life would be full of both.

We were a little more stuck on the middle name. Both Josiah Michael and Annette Marie have middle names that start with “m” (quite by accident) so we decided to go with that. One day the name Mei came to me and I liked how it flowed with Annabelle. I’ve always loved May (my birth month) but decided to use the Chinese spelling because Annabelle is our third child born in China. Mei means beautiful and also “youngest of sisters” in Chinese. Often little sisters are called “Mei Mei”.