Before we knew that we were having a daughter, I wanted to name a potential son "Coltrane." Not that I am a huge jazz fan, but I really thought that if I named my son after legend John Coltrane, it would be impossible for him not to be cool. Even if he tried to be dorky like his dad, he'd be propelled into coolness by the momentum of his name. My wife, said no.
A lot of my friends faced a similar temptation when the Lord of the Rings movies were out. They wouldn't admit it in the theater but you could see it in their eyes. "What if we named our son Aragorn or our daughter Arwen? How awesome would that be? Very awesome, that's how. What is it going to take to convince my wife?"
And there's the rub. Usually, both parties are not invested in naming a kid after a movie or a book. It takes some convincing. So here, as a public service, are a few ways to convince your wife or husband to go with the name you like:
1. Offer them the next name.
Do the whole Popeye, "can I get a hamburger today and pay you for it on Tuesday" thing and say that they can name the next kid. It's like when they trade professional athletes and mention that some "athletes to be named" were involved in the deal. Tell your spouse that when it comes time to name the next kid, you'll give them complete freedom in picking.
2. Trade them the middle name.
If I were smart, I would have told my wife that if she let me name our son "Coltrane" she could have given him the middle name, "John Cusack." She loves John Cusack and would have thought it was great to have a living reminder of the movie "Say Anything." Tell your wife that your son's middle name can be "Christian Bale" or tell your husband that your son's middle name can be "William Wallace." Eventually they might cave in and give you first name rights.
3. Mention that fictional names are scandal proof.
It sucks when you name your kid "Orange Julius" and then out of nowhere someone named Orange Julius gets famous. They then proceed to get arrested for biting a cop outside a strip club and then throw a ham sandwich at the judge during the trial. Suddenly your kid is going to be called "ham sandwich" out on the playground. That's part of the beauty of a fictional name. Unless we unearth some unpublished manuscript in which Aragorn unexpectedly becomes a heroin addict, you don't run the risk of getting a scandal associated with your kid's name.
4. Search your family tree.
I'm not saying it's going to be easy to find the name "Lord of the Morning Mist" in your family tree, but it's not impossible. Dig deep and hard, going back generations until you find some way to position your proposed name as a family name. "Well honey, you see Herma named her son Herman in the late 18th century. And as you'll notice, "man" is the second half of that name, which is why I want to pay tribute to their heritage and memory and name our son 'Batman.'"
At some point, I need to do a post on crazy Bible names, but for now, hopefully you've got some new ideas on how to convince your spouse that Treebeard is a perfectly suitable name for a new born.
Monday, May 26, 2008
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102 comments:
Love it, wanted to name my son Cade after Cade's Cove in Gatlingburg, TN. Didn't work, his name is Colton instead. Oh well, they both start with a C :)
For the longest time, I have been convinced that my firstborn son will be named Caspian. I just think the name reeks of awesomeness.
Oh, I forgot to add this great point that can be used, " Now dear, remember little Arwen will have to write her name over and over in school and we just can't give her a looooong name, think about how tired her little fingers will be, Arwen has just 5 letters."
A friend of mine was once having difficulty convincing her husband of her name choice for their soon to arrive son, so I suggested she tell him she had decided to call the boy Gorgonzola, so that husband would choose the original option. Kind of backfired when he decided he liked Gorgonzola...
Haha. My niece is named Arwen--She's four and even wears around an authentic arwen necklace from the film!
You could also just do what I did. I wanted to name our daughter Scout after Scout Finch in "To Kill a Mockingbird," but my husband wasn't having any. He liked the name Schuyler, and I really didn't, but I went with it because I could still feasibly call her Scout. After all, Schuyler and Scout both start with "sk" sounds. Now she's seven months old, and the majority of people we know refer to her only as Scout. I win. :)
We're also in the process of negotiating for future children. My husband likes "Justus" for a boy, but we are very, very white, and I just don't feel right namign a white kid Justus. I love the name Connor, but my husband thinks it's too yuppie. Compromise: Connor Justus. Now everyone's happy. :)
PS: I'd never thought of naming a kid Aragorn until I read this post.... Now I'm considering the awesomeness of Aragorn Justus ...
It's easy to name your kid. Just find out the most popular, most used name currently in play, then give them that name.
When my older daughter was in kindergarten (in the 80's) something like 15 out of the 17 kindergarteners in her class had names that started with "J" (Jessica, Jon, Jason, Justin, Jennifer...).
Today, when a teacher looks at the class and says "Ashley", half of the class looks up thinking the teacher is talking to them. The other half doesn't look up. They are boys.
wow...my wife & I just read this. Do you secretly surveil our potential-child conversations? Just the title is a bit scary in that we've BOTH discussed this. Come to Milwaukee & we'll go out for a beer & discuss GI Joe...
Ahhh, the name game. My wife and I had an agreement early, if we had a boy, I got first name, she got middle name. If we had a girl, we would reverse it. So, we got three boys out of the deal. The first boy, I wanted to name Merlin. At the time, I was reading a lot of mythology, and thought that would be the coolest name. The second son, I wanted to name Beowulf (wayyyy before the movie). I figured kids could call him Wolf, and any kid named Wolf is cool.
Well, my family was outraged, and payed us to not give our kids those names. $500 later, I my first two sons are named Roger and Donald.
Fortunately for my third son, we were saved, and went the good old Christian stand-by of Matthew. Of course, the thought crossed my mind to name him Theophilus, just so my family would pay me again....
I'd never name a kid Arwen or Aragorn... but Elessar or Aowyn (the cooler form of Eowyn)? Definitely possible.
Charlie, I'm glad you have a very involved family... and that you are susceptible to money. Because your kids would never forgive you. Think of the song "The Boy named Sue".
My wife and I have an agreement; each child has to have at least one normal name. So our kids names are:
Galadriel Anne - we call her Adrie (Ay-dree)
Samuel Peregrin
Owen Elias Meriadoc
If we have another girl she will be Eowyn Elizabeth (although I am still holding out to name her Eowyn Elbereth even though this violates the one normal name rule. Elbereth and Elizabeth are so close who would notice.)
"It sucks when you name your kid Orange Julius...Suddenly your kid is going to be called 'ham sandwich' out on the playground."
It is this kind of deep, philisophical commentary that brings me back to this blog time after time. Your skills are truly awesome.
My friend's daughter is named Arwen. She's around 2 and very free-spirited.
Kat-
At the end of the day, it really is about the wisdom, the deep wisdom. Are lives being changed? Well, I need to be humble, but if I can help someone not name their kid Orange Julius, then yes, yes they are.
Jon
We named our daughter after the baby in the movie Willow, Elora. Not Dannon though...it wouldn't flow well with our last name. :)
Our son is named after a famous minister....or gunslinger...you choose. ;)
I had a friend in college named Tirzah Joy. If you don't get it, say it out loud. My parents always said that if I had been a boy they would have gone with something Biblical like Mephibosheth or Nimrod. I hope they were joking.
ROFL! OK, OK, calm down . . . OK.
My name is Christopher Noah. My parents named me Noah as I am the first born and wished that I would be able to take a stand alone against the world if needed. Also it's short. And if needed I can always revert back Christopher, Chris, Cris, etc. (I hate my common first name, and the fact that my middle name is becoming so common.)
My brother, Matthew Caleb, also follows, "It's short and the first name is always a back up if he doesn't like have a unusual name. (i. e. Matt) He was named Caleb because Caleb had Joshua to stand by in times when standing against the crowd to do what's right, and he had a big bro (me).
My youngest bother, Andrew Seth, also had the "short and common name with nickname (Drew)" idea. He was named Seth because my parents figured after his two older brothers killed each other off . . .
Just a tip from someone who's still in high school, I love my biblical unusual name (not that everyone would, but I do).
Job, now that would be nice. Short and everyone would pronounce it wrong!
(On a side note, Caspian, Rilian, Tirian, Shasta, Beowolf, Samwise, etc, would be pretty sweet too.)
I don't think you should write a post about people's names, because that might hurt somebody's feelings.
Sincerely,
Misty Morning Mountain
It would be disingenuous to claim I am not being pedantic, but...
Wimpy (from the Popeye cartoons) uses the line "I'll gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today."
Bob -
I completely agree and I recently saw a clip on a cartoon network show that reminded me it was wimpy. I just felt like if I said, "wimpy" instead of "popeye" folks would not have known what I was talking about. I calculated the percent of people that would post comments saying, "who is wimpy" vs. the percent of peopel that would say "it's wimpy not popeye" and statistically speaking there were a lot lower odds of receiving "it's wimpy not popeye" comments. The other option was to say, "Do the whole wimpy from the show popeye thing" but that got kind of long and clunky.
Did I know it was wimpy that says that? Yes. Should a grown man spend this amount of time analyzing a wimpy reference? Probably not, but what can I say, that's what I did.
Jon
Wow Jon. Thanks. That was indeed awesome.
Don't do it. Just. Don't.
When my daughters were born both my wife and I really loved the names of certain characters in a couple of sci-fi books. So we named both of them [NAMES DELETED TO SPARE INNOCENT CHILDREN].
As you can see, this was pretty geeky. The kids grew up, but more importantly, the parents grew up.
We have never explained to our kids the origins of thier names. In fact, we have made up completely different origins hat have to do with blending names of people `way back in the family tree.
But we live in dread that one day one of them will pick up a tattered paperback in a used bookstore, open it and see their names as warrior princeses.
I'm Elora's dad. It was easy to go along with that one because it's a real Scottish name. Not that I would ever hesitate for a minute to admit where it came from.
I did compromise on John Wesley. I wanted to name him Patrick Henry after the patriot and my childhood best friend.
Great blog, btw. You're my new Joe Carter. (Which means I'll be stealing ideas from you instead of him from now on).
We named our sons after dwarves from Middle Earth. Durin is our oldest, and Dain is our youngest. We tried to avoid the obvious main heroes.
My husband wanted to name one of our sons Thorin. Thorin. Yes, it's another dwarf. Still. Thorin??? Come on!
I wanted to name our son King. My wife told me that was a dog's name. She also told me that he would be even more arrogant - something he'd have to battle with already simply because he was my son. I was like, It's not like he was the King of KINGS. He'd just be my King. She still said no.
Be careful with the Christian names. I went to church with a bunch of pentecostals and apostolics who found the most hidden Bible names and named their kids after them. When my little brother - who used to best friends with those kids - told me he found his daughter's name in some verse in Corinthians, I held my breathe.
He named her Chloe.
I exhaled a sigh of relief. Who knew Chloe was Biblical?
I know of a musician named Philemon. Everyone in high school called him Pokemon. He replied, No, It's pronounced, I feel on yo' moms!
He won ... kinda.
Why are there women named Delilah? Did their parents even READ the story?!
Wow - I'm actually shocked at the number of people who have actually named their kids LOTR names!! I would love to, but it's just not going to happen.
(Although if we ever have twins, their names will be Jacen and Jaina ... that's right, Han and Leia's names ... oh and I *desparately* want to name a girl Leia)
Umm ... although I can't really say anything, since our new baby (due June 14) will likely be named "Eleanor Rose" which, although Eleanor is after my husband's grandma, is also Sam's firstborn daughter, and Rose is, of course, Rosie Cotton-ish. So really, the entired name is LOTR although not intentionally!!
Coltrane is a great name. We are the type to name our kids after great musicians from yesteryear. I've considered the name Ellington, but not too seriously. Duke and I are both from D.C., musicians and in the same fraternity. Anyway, your Coltrane could educate his classmates on jazz early with a name like that. Wouldn't that be great story to share?!
Or if you want to name him after you and a great rapper from ATL, you could always go with Lil Jon! YEEEAHHHHH!!!
So today at our church picnic we met some guests who came whose son is "Atreyu", named after a character in "The Neverending Story"!
Ever see "The Matrix" with Keanu Reeves? "The Matix" is my son-in-law's favorite movie. The Keanu Reeves character was named "Neo".
"Neo" is also the name of my grandson.
Charlie - I actually know someone who recently named his son Justinian Theophilus. Thank goodness he can go by "Justin" in school, otherwise I suspect he would be spending the rest of his life hating his father.
Update on the "I want to name my kid Aragorn" situation: Sadly enough, when I mentioned it to my husband (a huge LOTR fan), he barely let me finish my sentence before he flat-out said, "NO." What are the odds of that?
One of his uncles recently named his son Thalen. I can't find it on baby name websites or in baby books, so I have no idea where they came up with it. His step-mom thought it sounded LOTR-esque, but I don't rememer any Thalens in there either - anyone got a clue?
Oprah Winfrey was originally named 'Orpah' after the Biblical character, but a nurse misspelled the name on the birth certificate, resulting in the creation of the now-famous name. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orpah
My dad had a small (meaning huge) obsession with LOTR. So he wanted a name from there and my mom gave in, thus giving me my name, Lorien. It's from the forest Lothlorien, but thankfully she made him cut off the "Loth" part.
I actually like my name (not so much in high school), but nowadays I don't want to be seen as the one with the obsession. Heck, I only read The Hobbit. Couldn't stand to read the rest, so I just watched the movies.
Great post! (waving hi to your wife, one of my former JMC classmates!)
This also makes me think of a possible post about ultra-unusual Biblical names for kids. I seem to be meeting lots of little Lazaruses, Tituses, Malachis, Judahs, etc. lately. Seems like the hunt for the most unusual Bible name is on!
I wanted our son Sawyer to have the middle name "Rees" (pronounced Reece) because it was my grandparent's last name. So, in labor, when my epidural wore off and I'm wirthing in pain, crying like a tortured animal and my dear husband is standing by, wanting to do whatever he could to help...well, you guessed it. My son is named Sawyer David-REES and I have to give myself kudos. Well played.
I have already decided that my second born son will be named Samwise. I know that Aragorn is more popular, but Samwise has always been my fav Fellowship memeber. Plus we can call him Sam for short, and it will almost seem normal.
My sister is named Arwen.
She went by her middle name until the movies came out and then could finally go by her first name again. Reason? No one could pronounce Arwen correctly until then.
Always give your child a safe middle name if you're going to give them a crazy first name.
BWAHAHAHAHAHAH- Lil Jojm- YEAHHHHHHH! I am crying- really!
You could use this technique to sway the scales in your direction: the meaning has depth, purpose. While looking to name our son I found a good solid name meaning, "Great Warrior Hunter" (or something like that)...the name NIMROD. LOL How's that for the playground??
"Atreyu"
Love it!
Well not really...
The story rather..
What was the big flying dog's name? Any takers on that one?!
My son's name is Luke, as in Skywalker.
My friends named one of their sons Stryder and one set of parents would not talk to them for months. So cool!! My hubby and I named one of our girls Avery from the movie Jerry McGuire (sp?). Come to find out it is common. Bummer.
I have a cousin who named her kids:
Tinuviel(female) - after a minute reference in a poem in a LOTR book
Angelis Logan (male) - after Angelis, a character from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and Logan is Wolveriene from the X-Men's real name.
No clue on the other two kids names...i think they are gaelic or soemthing Dahthi (male) and Earendel (female)
.....
I am serious. Not a joke.
Yes, you really, REALLY need to do that post on crazy biblical names. Trust me on this. :-)
Nicholas Cage named his kid Kal-El. Cool. Dane Cook wants to name his kid Optimus Prime. Sweet. George Costanza already claimed Seven.
I'm afraid to mention what I'm lobbying for just in case it gets stolen. Okay, just promise you won't steal them...
Steve Rogers, Wolverine, Manatarms, or Steelheart (yeah, see if you know the reference for Steelheart)
I may be able to get Steve Rogers past the defense, but in all likelihood, his name will be Pete.
We're not planning on having any more kids, but if we do, I'm definately leaning toward Ham Sandwich.
My wife named our first son Benjamin, who we call Ben. She let me name our second son. I chose Luke. Those are two good Biblical names.
You should have seen the look of shock in my wifes eyes when someone said, "Oh, you have two little Jedi".
Yes, I am that sneaky.
re: Thalen
http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Thalen
Google is wonderful
Hi! just found this blog-awesome!
love it! can I add your link to mine?
yes, Daithi is an Irish Gaelic name. I have a few friends named Daithi. (pr. DAH hee)
We named our 2nd daughter Niamh Eileen (Niamh is pr. NEEV) again, this is Irish Gaelic. In Ireland, this is not an uncommon name. I'm raising my daughters to be bilingual with Irish, so hopefully an Irish name doesn't look as posery.
When I was three, I heard the most awesome story in the Bible. It was about a girl named Esther. When my mom got pregnant, I obviously suggested the best name ever...
I told my mom that my baby sister should be called Xerxes.
When I got rejected on that one, I swore that it would be the name of my first child until I was eight.
Of course, I grew up, so up unitl today, I was planning on naming him Orange Julius.
Thanks a lot.
I know a girl named Arwen... yup... it isn't so strange I guess.
A friend of mine convinced his wife to name their first son "Jacen" which is pronounced just like "Jason." I'm not sure if she knew it at the time, but he was getting her to agree to naming their son after Han Solo and Princess Leia's son in the star wars books.
Jon,
When you get discouraged, please remember lindsey's comment. You have prevented someone from naming their kid Orange Julius. Changing lives through sarcasm: just another service offered by SCL. Little Gorgonzola would be proud.
High five, my friend. High five.
My wife and I named our firstborn Athanasius Christian. He goes by "Athan" (short vowel sound on the a) normally. We have another due in about a month and if it's a boy he will be Paladin Arlen.
If it's a girl, we had landed on Nathalie Belle. After this post, I'm officially lobbying for Nathalie Arwen or Arwen Nathalie. I have no shame about my LotR nerdiness.
The perfect name for a girl or boy. Jedi.
i know this has nothing to do with the lord of the rings, but i know of a girl in elementary school named stormie outlaw. sadly, i just know she'll grow up to be a porn star. i also know of a boy named seven fox. don't tell george costanza! these were kids in my boyfriend's mother's second grade class.
Oh, I'm in heaven. So many sci-fi/fantasy nerds (and I say that lovingly, proudly bearing the mantle myself) in one place!
I wonder how many people will start slipping "Cook" into their kids' names since Idol has wrapped up?
Falkor! The white flying dragon in the Neverending Story was Falkor.
I loved that book as a kid, and the movie too, but the evil wolf scared me half to death. Stupid repeatative nightmares.
'batman' - awesome.
Ok so I feel better about my kids names Niamh Raquel Eowyn and
Aine Maeve Xena Sophia.
Alana - I ALSO has a friend in college named Tirzah Joy...oh, I desperately HOPE that was the same person! I hope there aren't two sets of parents who think that was witty...
Lindsey - The idea of sweet baby Xerxes made me laugh out loud! Awesome!
My last name is pronounced "City" (spelled very differently). For years people joked that I should name my kids "Carson" and "Sue" (and more recently, "Detroit Rock")
I always just rolled my eyes and ignored such comments...until six months ago, when my wife and I decided that our daughter would be named Emerald.
We'll just call her Emmy.
I'm thinking Propecia if we have a girl, and Lipitor if we have a boy.
Oh my. I knew an Eowyn in college. One of my best friends in college named his daughter Eowyn. Of COURSE, I went to a Christian college. Does this happen at State U? Probably not.
Jon,
My wife and I were actually very fond of the idea with naming our daughter a LOTR name, like Arwen. But we thought it might be a little weird. So then we went to a book of Celtic last names, because #1 the elvish language was based on Celtic and #2 my last name is Irish.
We found Anwen, a name for both boys and girls, we loved the sound of it. But we went with the alternative spelling of Anwyn, much more girly. Incidentally, Anwyn also happens to be the name of the land where the Cinderella story takes place according to one of the retellings. Go figures, LOTR and princess stuff, my daughter's name rocks!
So that's why you name your pets after the cool characters. I have a labrador named Batman, a golden retriever named Arwen, a silver tabby named Robin and a grey cat named Lucille (after BB King's guitar)...oh and a fish named Rocky because his jaw sits to the side. I know, I'm cool.
My pastor has a daughter named Arwen. He's a HUGE LOTR fan (reads them once a year) and gave her the name 20+ years ago. I like the name.
Better than naming your kid Douglas Fir or Merry Xmas Trees. Yup, actual names from the Davenport IA phone book.
i teach swim lessons, and you would not believe some of the names i come across.
this year we had a lot of little girls named "trinity," which i think is pretty cool, but it still conjures up images of the white rabbit.
i think the best one (and by best i mean made me want to puke) i came across was Heaven Lee such-and-such. this little girl was basically named "heavenly."
it hurts, sometimes. it really hurts.
I just named my daughter Eowyn. Arwen's a nice name but the character is barely mentioned in the books. Not a lot of male Lord of the Rings names you can get away with besides Tom Bombadil and maybe Samwise.
I go to church with a girl named Eowyn, and she's in her mid-to-late-20s, which means her parents were WAY cooler than all of these people nowadays doing it after the movie.
On bible names - one of my friends is quite determined to name her first child 'Zebedee' and our pastor is desperate to dedicate a baby called 'Zerreubabel' (I may have spelled that incorrectly).
Not Treebeard. Fangorn, maybe. Although I like the Celtic-sounding elven names--Cirdan, for example. I really wanted Cirdan as a boys' name, but my last 2 have been girls so I didn't get to press the point...
Now I have to look all these names up on the Name Voyager:
http://www.babynamewizard.com/voyager
Betting on Arwen for the 2000-2010 update.
We named our son "Sam" which we decided on after coming home from watching The Return of the King. We tell people he is named for my great grandpa Samuel, but my wife and i know better. It's possible she's a bigger LOTR nerd than I am!
In our close circle of friends, one couple named their son Strider. Another couple named their daughter Eowyn. And a third couple named their son Treebeard.
You may now draw your own conclusions about our taste in friends.
Favorite names I've personally encountered were two guys in college: Drew A. Blank and John John John.
I knew a guy in college named Okay Dok. Introductions were killer. "This is my friend, Okay." "Sure, okay, he's your friend, but what is his name?" He figures that his dad named him Okay out of bitterness because dad had to go through life with the name Donald Dok.
My husband wanted to name our first child Cirque Isthmus (landforms). That didn't happen.
My mom's uncle had parents who were all about non-mainstream Bible names. That's how my mom ended up with an Uncle Zadok, who I can only assume was named after the first high priest of Jerusalem. Apparently Uncle Zadok would sit on the front porch and shoot pinecones out of the trees with his rifle. Ohhh, Uncle Zadok.
I'm not so mythological, more hippy, so my friends make fun of me for wanting to name my kids River and Willow and things of the sort.
There is absolutely nothing secret about my desire to name my kids after inhabitants of Middle-Earth, but I'd prefer to go with the more obscure names.
I was named after the HOUSE in "Gone with the Wind". My middle sister was named after the MALE character "Ashley". Our baby sister ended up with the only Biblical name.
My fiance and I have often had these types of discussions. If we have fraternal twins we will most definitely name them Luke and Leia. And if we had the guts we would name one of our kids Indiana, as my fiance's last name is (obviously) Jones.
Heh...at least Arwen and Aragorn are heroic book/movie characters to be named after. My parents apparently read Ayn Rand's book We the Living at some point before they had kids, so I ended up with the same name as an idiotic girl who made one bad choice after another and eventually died of a gunshot wound in Siberia. Talk about a depressing namesake.
Wow - love this post, and can't wait to read the one on crazy Biblical names. I'm a name nut, so love to hear people's ideas and opinions. Didn't like LOTR at all, so wouldn't be naming kids after characters for that reason, but definitely would consider using names from favourite pieces of literature for future offspring!
i desparately want to name a child after LOTR, but probably not Arwen or Aragorn...I really like Lorien (Lothlorien, like the girl that has already posted)
my brother always wanted to name a son Evenflow...and his last name is Falls (my maiden name, of course) pretty sure that is a Pearl Jam reference...
I have a French last name now, so I am looking at French names. unfortunately, not many cool French male names are out there...Jean Claude? I dont think so!
"crazy" bible names I know nothing of, but Jedidiah (my son's name) is just about as awesome as they get.
Speaking of obscure biblical names... I'm planning on naming a daughter Tzipporah someday. Then I can nickname her Zappy. heh heh heh...
I really pushed for Gideon for our youngest, but I also liked Jerubbaal which is what they called Gideon after he had torn down the altar of Baal. Alas, our son is called Henry George, two family names on both sides . . . Perhaps next time.
This is why we have social services.
Personally, I'm partial to the virtues: Mercy, Grace, Hope, Faith...my kids someday will walk around sounding like they walked out of a 17th century sampler (appropriate for a historian mother!)
i definitely agree with the second comment; i am going to name my firstborn son Caspian (Augustus will be his middle name).
I have shaken hands with and congratulated 9 years worth of graduating classes. The cruelest joke a parent pulled was naming their daughter April Lyn Paris. I felt so bad for her. I just smile and said: "congratulations dear." BTW, my last name is Thalen, and apparently their are tons of us in Germany, Holland and Canada as well as the US. It's a fairly common last name.
Just wondered why someone said she was way too white to name a son Justus. I'm white and we just had our third baby and his name is Justus Abraham and we love it!
We named our first daughter Alathia (the Greek word for truth)
and our second son Jeremiah
I totally wanted a Liberty and Justice and Evangeline and Charity, etc. but my husband said absolutely not! Twin girls would have been Alathia and Karis (Truth and Grace).
I have never heard of the singer Coltrane but I saw that name in a baby name book and would have loved to have a son named Coltrane James.
Naming kids together is tough!
P.S. I think one idea for Stuff Christians Like that you haven't yet covered is:
Being "In the Greek"
Having taken Greek in Bible college and having heard tons of pastors drop that phrase, I think it's quite humorous!
I love this post!
I've decided that if I ever have triplet girls (not very likely), I'll name them after the three Elven rings from LOTR. So they would be Narya, Vilya, and Nenya.
I'm a big Trekkie as well, so the names there that I love are: Dax, Riker, Chakotay, Jadzia, Kes, Bareil, Emony, Tobin, Iliana, Ziyal, Geordi, and Tasha.
And of course, there are dozens of LotR names to choose from.
I thought i was the only person who seriously wants to name their daughter Tzipporah. I think it's an amazing name, along with Zion. No one else seems to think it's a good idea. Oh well. :-)
When we were pregnant with our first we jokingly came up with the name Axel if the child turned out to be a boy. (As in Axel Rose). But the name grew on us over time, and the baby was luckily a girl, because we probably would have gone with it. Instead, she is Adora. (Which turned out to be the first name of She-Ra Princess of Power, but we didn't know that at the time)
We named our second Grace. Which is kind of a biblical name I guess.
We wanted names that were easy to spell and easy to pronounce.
I went to elementary school with a boy named Job. He was always having to explain it to us unchurched types.
My best friend's older sister had a strange Native American name-- something like "Diyani"-- although she was not Native American. She pulled it off okay because she was charming and un-selfconscious.
Some people I know named their baby "Griffin." With the middle name "Ryder." I just hope he has a sense of humor.
Crazy names I've come across:
Lacy Braugh (pronounced with the last three letter silent...)
Happy Thanksgiving (I am not kidding).
Sunshine Hooker (went to high school with her - she was called down to the office a lot...)
Whenever I have kids, they'll probably have some unusual names. My name's Dianna Elizabeth, and a lot of people ignore spelling and think I was named after Princess Diana and Queen Elizabeth. No dice. I also hate being called "Princess" by complete strangers.
I wish more parents would think out their names before they actually name their kids. One of my theology profs named her kid Lazarus (she has this obsession with the resurrection). Another prof has a kid named Tavnia (Tah-vee-nah), which I end up shortening to "T" because I can never remember the correct pronunciation.
It seems a lot of geeky/academic types end up with weird names.
That said, whenever I have kids, and if it's a girl, she'll probably end up with something crazy like Lurianna Lurilee. Yep.
Cade's Cove is a nice spot.
Had to chime in here...my first name is Aragorn (and I'm female). The only problem is that I get called Erin, Acorn, Airborn, Armageddon (I kid you not), and anything else that vaguely starts with an "a".
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