What's in a name?

What is taken into consideration when choosing a name . . . for our kids, our pets, our blog . . . :)   I like classic names that are easy to spell and pronounce, without assumed nicknames, gender-specific, and not frequently used in the family.  No juniors.

 

When Sarah was born, Dave and I could not for the life of us agree on a name.  He liked Amanda.  I liked Jessica.  Most of you know that our little one arrived on her own schedule, by emergency c-section and several weeks early.  As we were waiting for surgery, we finally agreed that Sarah was a nice name.  Our choice was confirmed when Jefferson Starship and my doctor melodically belted out her name in the O.R.  Crazy, huh?  Nor could we agree on our son's name pre-birth.  He almost arrived unnamed, but just before the final push, his indecisive parents realized that Brian had just popped into both of their heads.  Call it fate.  I call it perfect.  

• Classic ~ check. 
• Easy to spell ~ Nope.  Who would have thought.  I always have to clarify that there is an 'h' at the end of Sarah's name, and that Brian is spelled with an 'i' and not a 'y.' 
• Easy to pronounce ~ check. 
• No nicknames ~ ummm . . . well . . . Sarah is usually called Fina - short for Sarafina, a movie I never saw but liked the name of; Brian is affectionately Twinkie by his mama (shhh . . . don't tell him I said that out loud), Bro by his dad, and B-dawg by his sister. 

 OK.  Two out of four isn't bad.  Where was I?  Oh yea - 

• Gender-specific ~ check. 
• Not frequently used in the family ~ ummm . . . well . . . turns out there are both Sarah's and Brian's in the family. 
• No juniors ~ ummm . . . well, Brian's middle name is David.  Does that count? 

Three out of seven - so sue me.  I still like their names.  And, what's more, they do too!

 

Pets.  Now that's another story.  When Dave and I married, he had two cats (Woody and Norman).  I had one (Tasha).  I can't remember where he got Woody's name from, but Norman was named after Norman Bates because he looked kind of psycho.  I also can't remember why I named my kitty Tasha.  I should have kept a blog then.  Two more cats were added to the mix - George (Dave picked that one), and Sam (short for Sampson because he was the tiniest stray kitten I ever did see walking on the dirt road to the duck pond and I thought he needed a HUGE name in order to survive against all odds).  We had lots of chickens and salt water fish, but they never got names.  Then came the goats - Over the years we must have had 40 or more.  Bob, Sue, Buck, Mama, Jackpot, Baby, more tiny newborns that left as soon as they arrived than I can count.  The black lab came with a name - Nicky.  She wasn't supposed to stay longer than it took her owner to drive her stuff to Texas and return to pick up the pup.  But, when she never came back, we had Nicky for a couple of years.  Molly, the horse, also came with a name.  When we moved from Utah to Colorado and lost our horse property, the pets were all gone one way or another.  The goats were sold off. Nicky went to live with Dave's brother. Molly went back to her original owner.  A couple of the cats had passed away, and the others were very old and stayed with the house when we sold it.

 

In Colorado, four-legged friend acquisitions began again.  We bought two kittens ~ Callie (a calico), and Libby (hmmm . . . how in the heck did I come up with that one?).  We bought a Papillion puppy.  No one could decide on a name.  I liked Cooper.  Dave liked T-Bone.  The kids liked a million different things.  When he had been with us about 3 days, I went away for a weekend retreat with some friends and told the family that, if he wasn't named when I got back, he was going to be named Cooper.  Little did I know that, while I was away, they made Post-it notes with all the options and put them on a movie box.  The decision was that, whichever name the puppy sniffed first would be his.  He sniffed Cooper.  Smart dog.  No one wants to be named after a delicious meal.  A year later, we bought Cooper's brother.  Again, the battle began.  Dave, sticking with his food-themed names, preferred Butter.  I liked anything but butter.  The kids liked a million different things.  We agreed on Mantequilla (Spanish for butter), and called him Mante for short (with a long 'a' like ahh, not like 'ant').  Two years later, while stopping in to a pet shop, I fell in love with a tiny, sad, and funny-looking wiener dog.  Every time I picked him up he fell asleep on me.  We went back several times and I finally convinced Dave that he needed to come and live with us (of course the kids were on-board from before we even stepped foot in the store for the first time).  Turns out, he looked different because he was a so-called designer dog - a Dachshund Corgi mix, dubbed a Dorgi.  Uh huh.  I think he's a mutt.  Dave and the kids:  "Let's call him  Weenie."  Mom:  "No."  Next choice, Mr. Weenie.  Nope.  How about Wiener?  Absolutely not.  Awww . . . come on . . . pleeeeeeeeeeze?  We settled on Oscar Mayer Wiener.  I called him Oscar from the get-go.  They called him Wiener.  Now we all call him Weenie, or Mr. Wiener, or Schnitz (short for Wienerschnitzel), but rarely Oscar. 

Now that we're back in Utah, Callie and Libby have gone to live in a much more sane, dog-free home with Auntie Vickie (well, Libby's worked herself into a svelte new body and sauntered off to some other porch - Callie's still hangin'). We still have the mutts. And, we've acquired yet another four-legged friend - Fransesca (soft 's' like snake, not like ch). She came with her name. We call her Franie.

The blog name was easy - I just used ours.  After all . . . what's in a name?!



Callie




Cooper



Oscar




Pre-svelte Libby




Mantequilla



Fransesca