The Baby Name Game

Patrick and I have had names picked out since before we announced we were expecting. From what I hear I don't think it usually happens like that.

I've seen people go in circles forever about names...this, that, the other. It's overwhelming. What's in a name anyway? In my opinion, EVERYTHING. And I am super picky. I'll walk you through my criteria. You can judge me and my OCD later.

Rule 1: No Top 20 Names.
Ok, I'll say it. There are some super-cute names on the top 20 list. But, i grew up as "Katie S." Ok, now how annoying does that get, always having to go by your last initial. And now, even in adult life I'm Katie K. or Katie Kennedy because there is another Katie at work. Another Katie at book club. In fact I think I have like six Katie's in my cell phone contacts. Patrick's best friend's wife's name is also Katie. So now I am also called "My Katie" in that situation.

My mom said she had no idea Katie was so popular when she named me that. And to be fair, I am named after my two grandmothers (Katherine and Lorraine.) Maybe in Germantown, TN. , where I was born, it wasn't as popular... but in good ole Catholic town Louisville it's pretty common.

So here are the names that were automatically eliminated for us because of this rule(This is the 2011 list):

1	Jacob	Sophia
2	Mason	Isabella
3	William	Emma
4	Jayden	Olivia
5	Noah	Ava
6	Michael	Emily
7	Ethan	Abigail
8	Alexander	Madison
9	Aiden	Mia
10	Daniel	Chloe
11	Anthony	Elizabeth
12	Matthew	Ella
13	Elijah	Addison
14	Joshua	Natalie
15	Liam	Lily
16	Andrew	Grace
17	James	Samantha
18	David	Avery
19	Benjamin	Sofia
20	Logan	Aubrey

Rule #2: I love old fashioned/traditional names. Not so much like Gertrude and Cornelius... but classic names. I like names that aren't too trendy or fleeting, or where you will be able to say, "Oh, I bet you were born in 2012!" Lately, these old fashioned names are becoming en vogue again and I love it.

Rule #3: No famous names. With the last name of Kennedy there are lots that are off limits. Jacqueline, Caroline, Jack, John, Teddy, Rose, Robert... The list goes on, right. Sorry, but I don't want to explain to my kid why their name's in the history text book, on the news, or whatever.

Some other considerations.... I like family names and biblical names. I think it's sweet to honor those who mean a lot to you through nomenclature.

I have to say, our boy's name came to us easier. "William Luke." If the baby had been a boy he would've gone by Luke. I know what your thinking -- you broke rule #1. Ok, your right. BUT that is my husband's first name and his grandfather's first name and the baby wouldn't have used that name any more than Patrick uses William. so I justify it in that way.

But our baby is a she-baby. And her name came to me one day while walking. I didn't think of the spelling or diminutives, anything like that, but I thought Hmmm... Lucy would be a sweet name. It met rules 1,2, and 3 and Patrick liked it. Ironically, it meant the same thing as Luke which is "light." I thought that was sweet too. This baby will certainly be a light in our lives!

Since We were sure our baby was a boy anyways I didn't consider it much again until we knew the baby was a girl. Before we knew, we were secretly calling the baby "Baby Lukey" as a compromise between the two names and with the discussion that we would finalize a name after we actually new the sex. But from 8 weeks on it was "Luke or Lucy."

Low and behold Lucy stuck. I can't for the life of me fathom changing her name. It's like this has always been her name how could we possibly change it? Plus we really like it. And, we've found out in a couple ways that it meets the family name criteria....

Lucy's kicking me as I'm writing this.

Anyways, we still have a couple secrets up our sleeves. I haven't told you the middle name. Because I don't know. We've got it narrowed down to a few names and depending on what we feel like when she's born we will pick one of them. We also haven't told you whether or not Lucy will be spelled L-U-C-Y or a different way. Because we haven't really decided. We might also have another secret up our sleeves... ;)

So anyways, for all practical purposes we will call her Lucy. Love it or hate it that's her name. All we have to say is one thing. "I LOVE LUCY!!"

Oh, and for the record, here are the Socialsecurity.gov official stats on the name from 2011:
In the year 2011 Lucy was ranked #72. Sounds perfect for us. A name that is known but not too popular.

For all those preggos out there who want to scrutinize names go to www.socialsecurity.gov and search baby names to find out just where your little one's name ranks!