Jane. Jane is a name that was at the top of our baby names list when I was pregnant with each of our last 3 children. But even though we loved the name, it never made the final cut because we like to name our kids after family members or close friends and we didn’t know anyone named Jane personally.
In September 2016, 3 months after the birth of my last child, I finally understood why that name kept standing out to me. Jane wanted me to find her.
After feeling impressed to finally dig in and learn how to research my family tree and find names to take to the Temple, I sat down with one of the Family History consultants in my ward. I’m one of those people who has a lot of their family tree already filled out so we had to go back pretty far. The first person that we found was Jane Elizabeth Clayton.
She’s a distant cousin of mine… well, that’s what I thought at first. I have since calculated that she is my 2nd cousin, 3 times removed… which actually isn’t as distant as I first thought.
Over the next couple weeks, I was able to find Jane’s husband, Alfred, and 11 of their 12 children. The day that my husband and I were able to be sealed for Jane and Alfred was such a special and spiritual experience.
I have felt particularly connected to Jane over the past few years. I have felt her angelic assistance, both since discovering her, and also I’ve been able to recognize her help with certain trials that I was going through, particularly during my last pregnancy.
I would love to someday discover a photo of her and some stories about her life. I look forward to meeting her on the other side of the veil someday.
