When he was born, our midwife said “take your baby”, so I leaned down and pulled him up to my chest… someone shortly after asked if it was a boy or a girl. I peaked up the blanket and announced boy. Very shortly after I looked up at my husband and said I think he is a _<childs name>____. My husband looked and me and nodded, as if to say ‘okay whatever you want’, in his emotionally exhausted state of having gone through a long hard labour with me. It’s not like I picked the name out of the blue, we had talked and agreed it was our top choice previously.

This time my hubby has made me promise that I don’t “declare” the name until we’ve had a chance to discuss it in private. Hehe, oops! I have promised.

We had a couple ‘back up’ boy names from when my son was born. We still really like them, so it will depend on what baby is like, if it’s a boy what name we choose… and there’s always a possibility that neither would work and we’d have to come up with new ones, but at least we have a starting place.

Girls names are a different story. We have not been able to completely agree on girl names. I have a favourite, which I am still hoping I will “win” on, but my hubby isn’t sold on. I certainly wouldn’t want to name our baby girl a name her Daddy didn’t love too. We aren’t at odds in our disagreements or anything… for example when one of us says I really like the name “Sara” (for arguments sake only) it’s not greeted with “oh I love that too”… it’s “yeah that one is okay but I don’t like ___ about it”. I feel we won’t be able to decide on the name until the a baby is born anyway and we see what he or she looks like. I would like to have some names we both really like so we at least have a starting place.

We both agree we want a strong female name, though funnily enough we disagree on what strong is . I agree with this site…http://pregnancychildbirth.suite101.com/article.cfm/strong_baby_names_for_girls However my husband does think a strong girls name can end with an “e” sound, where I’m not so sure it sounds strong, but more cutesy. Cutesy is good when they are little, but I’d like something she can grow up with and be whatever she wants to be… I think that is every parents wish. Maybe also because in my life I’ve always been called “cute”, instead of pretty, strong etc. and would like my girl to have more than ‘cute’ in her repertory.

My husband has two thoughts… 1) as above, that it is a strong name. 2) More importantly to my husband our sons name starts with a W, he feels we should try to name our second child at the end of the alphabet as well. There is a theory that says people with names close in letters on the alphabet, tend to be drawn to each other or get along better (years ago, we watched a 60 minutes program on names … I wish I could find it to watch it again!). We have yet to find a girls name near the bottom of the alphabet (s, t, u, v, w, x, y, z) we both like.

Then there are always those names you love but someone that the other person once knew brings up bad memories for them, or an association that won’t go away… and those are just out.

I am particularly drawn to girl names that start with the letters: a, c, and e…. and d, and l…. of course there are other letters I like too.

So suggestions??? girls, boys or both.

BTW…. there are some names that I really like, but would not consider naming my son or daughter it for one reason or another, so please don’t be offended.

I recently started a new job, which is going pretty good thus far by the way, the people are great, and I think I can really develop in it. I filled out my forms for my new position with both of our last names hyphenated. Yes I know that makes it for a really LONG last name. But I did not want to use only my maiden name, and I did not only want to use my married name, so I stuck them together! BUT, (yes there is a but), I had given them my resume with my married name, and was coming to them with my forms with both names. I arrived on my first day and most things were set up with my double barreled name. One of my superiors came to me and asked, so do you want this double barreled name or just your married name? I was feeling uneasy about my decision anyway, thinking it made for a really long last name, and perhaps would complicate things. The thing is I am was not really ready to give up my past experience in the work world, which felt like I was doing by just using my married name. It is something that I have worked for, and by giving it up, feels like I am erasing it. So I hum and hawed, and made an ill attempt to explain my identity issues. Finally said “okay, yeah just my married name is fine”. I was thinking she would not be asking me unless it would make things easier. Once I said yes she said, oh yea that IS easier. But I ONLY made this decision based on their explanation that it only took the systems a couple days to catch up. Because my email etc, was already set up with my double-barrelled last name. So I thought well the shorter last name is easier, and people will not have a chance to get used to my double barreled last name, so it will not cause any issues.

End of my week at work yesterday. The email that was sent on Monday to change my name we have not heard back from. My boss boss has mentioned a couple times, asking which name are you sticking with. I have explained that we are still waiting. Yesterday he mentioned it to me again that my name needs to be changed so we can get people consistently contacting me, and not being confused. Which I totally agree. So this identity crisis of mine, which I was hoping to avoid has become a little bit of a problem.

I wrote the above post a little while ago, and took it down for Lloyd and I to discuss.

I am now my married name at work. There are some things that have not been changed but for the most part they have changed to my married name.

My grandmother and my names were identical before I got married. We also look a little alike in her younger photos, down to how she poses. This is a grandmother I have never met, she died before my Dad met my Mom. Perhaps one day I will take my maiden name as my middle one. Or perhaps I will make it a middle name for my children. Who knows until then.