What's in a name??

Back in the Stone Ages when I went to school, in sophomore English we had to read Romeo and Juliet. Part of our grade was to memorize and recite from memory 20 lines from the play. To this day I remember most of those 20 lines! I can't remember my last phone number in Little Rock that I had for 3 years but I can remember 20 lines of obscure English literature. Go figure.

What's in a name?

Would a rose by any other name smell as sweet?

Ole' Will even knew the importance of names. It was names that kept those two impulsive, suicidal star crossed lovers apart. So I do not take the naming of a child lightly. Not only is your child stuck with the name that you give him/her but you are too. You have to make sure that you don't get sick of yelling Jimmy John! every time he does something wrong.

I've done pretty well with the names I've given my children, at least on my side of things. I guess you would have to ask them if they liked their names although I have received no complaints so far. I think I like their names even better than when I named them. Maybe its because I have grown to love the kids with the names more than I even imagined possible, but that's a post for another day.

Suffice to say, I take the naming of my children very seriously which makes what I have done very out of character. I have given my children equal say in the naming of their new brother. *

*Fine print: Said mother has the legal right and responsibility to revoke all said privileges if she feels the future welfare and safety of her future son is at stake.

We were keeping a list of names but lists and I soon part ways. (Yet another topic for a future post.) So yesterday I pulled out our white board and we made a list of all the names we had and then a chart next to the names. We had 8 names and each person is to rank the names with 1 being their most favorite and 8 their least favorite. When voting is done we will then take the top 4 names and re vote. Confusing enough?

Julia was the first to enter in her rankings.

And here is our board. See the list of names on the left? The numbers on the far right are the totals of the rankings so far. (You will notice Evan is #1 and Reginald is #8) I should have made this secret ballot though because my children have realized the power of their rankings. They are mathematically figuring out how to hurt names they don't like, thus the decision to take the top 4 names and re vote. I think that the second vote will perhaps be secret ballot. Trace is the only one who hasn't voted yet. He really wants to make his vote count. Fortunately, no matter what he does his top pick, Reginald, will never make the top 4.

You'll notice that there was an add on name late in the game that wasn't even ranked. In case you missed it:

Yes, you are reading this correctly. It says Voltron. It reminds me of when I was pregnant with Ross and I let Trace help give suggestions for names. If Trace had had his way Ross would have had the name of a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, preferably Michelangelo.

Now you see the reason for the fine print!