Why I'm taking her last name...

 Friends and family ask us often what names we'll take after the wedding. For a while after we were engaged, I was unsure. Heather and I talked (a lot) about having kids and we know that whether we conceive or adopt, we intend to expand our family. We also talked about our last names: mine having 7 letters (Barbour) and hers with 9 (Rodenborg); and that both of our last names get mispronounced on the daily (the last syllable of each of our last names is pronounced with a soft 'e sound - more like Barber and Rodenberg). So, hyphenating or using both our last names was easily ruled out as we don't wish that on our children. One of these last names is difficult enough. And, we want all of our names to match so we're easily discernible as a family unit.

So, Barbour or Rodenborg?

Around this time last year, I was fretting over what to get Heather for Valentine's Day, and I came upon the idea to buy her a quality leather-bound bible with her name imprinted on the cover. I found a two-tone purple bible in her favorite translation (NRSV). It was perfect. When the order arrived, I looked at the bible and thought about her last name, pressed into the lavender leather. I traced it with my fingertips, Rodenborg. This name had belonged to her father, David, who left this earth tragically when Heather was young. This name was shared by her sister, until last year, when Haley married Dustin Skeide and took his last name. Any children Haley and Dustin have will carry on the Skeide name. So, if we don't carry on the Rodenborg name, it would pass away with her father's memory. In contrast, the Barbour family is robust with grandchildren. My three siblings have 13 (soon to be 14) children between them, including at least four boys who will carry on the Barbour lineage.

I realized that the best gift I could give Heather for Valentine's Day was not just a bible with her name imprinted, but to let her know that her name was imprinted on my heart as well, and that it would be her name we carried forth into our future together, and her father's name and his legacy that our children will carry.

And so we will be the Rodenborgs (pronounced -berg), and hopefully the state of Texas won't make it too difficult for me to make that legal after the wedding... but that's another story for another day.