Baby Names

I must have studied the baby name book a hundred times. I looked online: one site claimed to have 27,000 baby girl names! I went through it and through it. There just weren't any names I really loved. So I decided to try to get past my first reaction to the names and look deeper at the meanings of the names. Who comes up with the meanings, anyway? I mean, some names of course are biblical and we can pretty much figure out the meanings with accuracy. But other names I'm pretty sure are made up by some pretty imaginative people. One name in particular would have been better if we were bringing home a puppy instead of a child. Shmoopy. Can someone tell me the meaning of Shmoopy?

Out of frustration I decided to start at the back of the book. New perspective, right? I really tried to say each name outloud and picture my sweet baby girl living her life with that name. Do you know what kind of names are at the back of the baby name book? Zita, too close to Zit...Yvette, reminds me of an old person....Xena, Princess Warrior....and Wilma....Yabba, dabba, doo! Still nothing.

And then I was reminded of a name I have always loved. It's not a common name, I didn't find it in my baby name book, I couldn't find it listed in the 27,000 baby girl names online. But it was a name I had heard one day and have always wanted to use it. Hopefully Greg would like it.

Our tradition (you know how important traditions are to me if you have read my post on Monday) has always been that Greg and I will each write our our list of favorite names. It's top secret and we're not to discuss the names until we go out to dinner, Ponderosa. We each pull out our names and if one name happens to be on each list, that is the one we go with. Of course, each name choosing dinner has it's own special story, I'll save that for another blog. :) But, since we just moved and we don't have Grandma's house close by for baby-sitting, we decided to just sit and go over the names. Greg didn't really have a lot of names on his list, but he did like the name I have chosen! Yay!

And the other part of our baby name choosing tradition is to keep it a secret. Only a handfull of people know our baby's name, and really it's because I have a terrible time keeping a secret. This is a name that makes me smile, a name I can see my baby girl growing up with, and I am ready to retire my baby name book to it's spot: the bottom drawer of my dresser.

I don't know why I struggled so much in finding a name this time, but we finally have it! Yay! And, it has a great meaning, too.