I forget how far back it goes, but apparently one of my dad’s ancestors was actually adopted into the Boucher family. And that is why we bear that last name. Had that not happened, our actual last name would be Trembley.

My brother was talking about calling his stained glass company “Trembley Glass” as a play on that whole thing, plus its sort of a play on words.

So anyway, I was looking up the Trembley name, and came across this origin/meaning page. Very broad info that says the name derives from a region of Normandy called “Tremblay” going back before the Norman conquest (of England, I assume they mean).

This page’s info is a lot more detailed. Taking the name back to noted ancestors in the 1100’s in France. It’s actually pretty interesting, cause they say that there is one single man who is responsible for bringing that name to the New World, Pierre Tremblay who came to New France in 1646. Supposedly, it is the largest family in North America which can trace its ancestry to one man.

That site lead me to another site which is some kind of association of people who bear that name or ancestry. Other spellings of the name are Tremblai, Trombley, Trumble. There’s a family motto, “Tremble et va sans biais” which I have been unable to translate idiomatically. Plus a family crest (that other site had one too - a different one). If you join, you can get flags and stickers and like go to family breakfasts and stuff. It sounds like fun.

Apparently in French, a “tremblaie” is an Aspen grove. Here’s a picture of some Aspen.

This things pretty interesting, it says of Pierre Trembley and his wife:

Six daughters became the maternal ancestors of famous french canadian families: Roussin, Gagné, Savard, Perron, Peymard dit Laforest and Pelletier.

That makes us sound like a cool dynasty. I love it.

This other site has pictures of five generations of Trembly men.