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About JacJac
Back
 Jacquelyn Abigail XiaoLi is a big name for such a little
girl! To us, she is known as JacJac. Here’s the story behind
her name:
JacJac (Jacquelyn) -
When we first began seriously thinking about adoption we
wanted to ask the children their opinions. Two-year-old
Logan’s was a typical response: a blank stare and goofy grin.
But four-year-old Bekah was tremendously excited at the
thought of having a baby sister! One evening we went to see
our first family movie, Disney’s The Incredibles.
Coming home from the movie, Kevin mentioned that, although the
Incredibles had superpowers, they were really incredible
because they worked together as a family. We went on to
discuss how OUR family could be like the Incredibles when we
work together. This caught Bekah’s attention and
imagination. She stated, “They have a mommy and a daddy like
us. They have a big sister, like me, and a younger brother
like Logan!” Then she stopped to ponder for a moment. “But
they have a baby Jack-Jack and we don’t…” We could see this
was just about to upset her when she announced with a huge
smile, “But you’re going to go to China and get our baby
Jack-Jack, aren’t you?”
From this point on whenever we referred to the adoption, we
called the baby JacJac. It became such an ingrained part of
our family’s conversation that when it came time to name her,
we decided Jacquelyn was a natural choice. Jacquelyn is a
Hebrew name meaning “supplanter” (to replace, to come after).
Abigail
– We are delighted to name our daughter after Janie’s mother:
Brenda Gail Davis King. But, we didn’t want to have a “little
Brenda” running around, and Brenda had never really liked her
middle name (something about being called a “Gail force” when
she was younger). So we compromised and came up with Abigail. This beautiful
name is Hebrew meaning “a father’s joy”. We have no doubt
that our Abigail will be!
XiaoLi – JacJac’s
full name at the orphanage was Shan Wei Xiao Li, most probably
given to her by the orphanage director. In China, people put
their sir-names first and given-names last. For example, my
name would be Crouch Janie. Shan Wei was JacJac’s sir-name.
It is from the name of the city she lived in: Shanwei.
Probably all children from her orphanage were specified the
sir-name Shan Wei. Her given-name Xiao (pronounced “She-ow”)
means “morning” and Li (pronounced “Lee”) means “beautiful”.
We wanted to keep XiaoLi as part of JacJac’s legal name. If
she decides to identify with that part of her heritage when
she becomes older, it will not require all the paperwork of a
legal name change. Her Chinese name was also one of the first
things ever given to her in her homeland and we wish to honor
that.
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