A rose by any other name would smell as sweet

What's in a name?

For those of you who haven't done it, naming a kid is a little stressful.

I've always loved my first name. When I was a kid and couldn't find personalized pencils and useless tiny license plate replicas, it was a bit frustrating. But still, I loved it. My initials on the other hand (SLZ), not as much. Though I've come to love them. Blob guessed my middle initial soon after we met and christened me "sleeze" or "sleezy." All of his (now our) friends refer to me as such, but in an endearing way (I tell myself). It's something you just have to own when you're ready.

Blob is OK with his name, but apparently rather would have been named after a horse. Instead, he was given a name both his parents liked. He also has cool initials (R.E.D.), which may or may not have been intentional. Not sure. I don't feel too badly for him.

For us, it didn't seem to matter much whether we had the "perfect" name. So why does it seem like this is such a big deal?

Well, here's part of the problem. I'm the girl who waited for almost two weeks to name the damn cats. I wanted an idea of what their personalities were like so I could pick something that fit.

We only get 24-48 hours to name the current project. Now, how to go about this?

The Criteria: cute name, not to weird, not too common, has to sound good with Blob's last name, can't spell anything weird with the initials, somewhat related to both of our heritages and most importantly, both of us need to not have a visceral reaction against it.

This last criterion ends up being the name-killer. Blob meets a lot of people on the job and they determine how he feels about a particular name. Unfortunately, as he works in a customer service industry, these people often need things from him. Needy people do not make good impressions. That doesn't leave us with much.

Also, everyone has opinions, which is both good and bad. I love getting suggestions for what people think we should name the project, but I don't really feel like sharing the names we're seriously considering. It's been hard enough finding a few that both Rob and I like, never mind trying to please everyone else who may have an opinion.

A good friend of mine is pregnant now too. Her in-laws don't like some of the options they've been considering. Instead, the in-laws would like them to name a boy Michael, which would then make their kid Michael Moore. Or Alexis or Alexandra for a girl so they can call her Lexi (since Lexington, MA has a special meaning to them). The problem is that my friend is a teacher and she's had too many Lexi's who have given her trouble in class. The in-laws decided that if they don't love the chosen name, they'll just call it Lexi anyway. No pressure.

Who knew naming a kid could be so political!

NPR is doing a series called "The Baby Project." Here is the post that got me thinking:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/babyproject/2011/07/04/137482827/naming-trends-and-how-parents-to-be-face-baby-name-hostility. Check it out!