name of daughter 2.0
So, the onomastics of baby #2.
I've talked a little before about how Pippa, when asked what the name of the baby in mama was, answered (seemingly out of nowhere) "Alice", and how that made me think about the name Alice, and also my grandmother's name, Mary Alice (which is what she went by).
When I went into labor, even though things were moving fast, it didn't seem like I would give birth before midnight (for an 8/8 birthday) and that was a bit disappointing because c'mon, 8/8 is a pretty awesome birthday. So I asked The Husband to look up what the saint was for 8/9 and he found out it was St. Teresia Benedicta of the Cross, aka St. Edith Stein. Now she is one of my favorites AND I love the name Edith, especially the nickname Edie. So I put that away in my mind.
She arrived at 2am and then there was the hemorrhage scariness, so we didn't even try talking names until the morning. After breakfast of course.
We looked at my list, and actually initially I was drawn to Josephine. Having gotten to know her now, I think she could have easily been a Josephine, Beatrice, Mary Beatrice, Edith, or Honora. But Gordon really didn't think any of them fit except Mary-Alice.
I thought about doing Edith as a first but I somewhat chickened out. I was thinking that Edith might be a tough name to carry as a first name because it's a name that causes strong love/hate reactions. I also wasn't totally thrilled at how it sounded with our last name (which begins with D--"th" to "d" is a kind of awkward transition). I think it does well in the middle slot. (My second choice for a middle name was Ursula. Gordon vetoed. He can't get over the Little Mermaid connection.)
So once we had settled on "Mary-Alice" as a first and "Edith" as a middle, there was the last problem: to hyphenate or not. I really prefer the look of Mary Alice without the hyphen, but the upside of the hyphen is that it makes it immediately clear that Mary-Alice is spoken as a unit. I think hyphenating is the right decision.
We sometimes call her just Alice, but most of the time we say Mary-Alice.
I've talked a little before about how Pippa, when asked what the name of the baby in mama was, answered (seemingly out of nowhere) "Alice", and how that made me think about the name Alice, and also my grandmother's name, Mary Alice (which is what she went by).
When I went into labor, even though things were moving fast, it didn't seem like I would give birth before midnight (for an 8/8 birthday) and that was a bit disappointing because c'mon, 8/8 is a pretty awesome birthday. So I asked The Husband to look up what the saint was for 8/9 and he found out it was St. Teresia Benedicta of the Cross, aka St. Edith Stein. Now she is one of my favorites AND I love the name Edith, especially the nickname Edie. So I put that away in my mind.
She arrived at 2am and then there was the hemorrhage scariness, so we didn't even try talking names until the morning. After breakfast of course.
We looked at my list, and actually initially I was drawn to Josephine. Having gotten to know her now, I think she could have easily been a Josephine, Beatrice, Mary Beatrice, Edith, or Honora. But Gordon really didn't think any of them fit except Mary-Alice.
I thought about doing Edith as a first but I somewhat chickened out. I was thinking that Edith might be a tough name to carry as a first name because it's a name that causes strong love/hate reactions. I also wasn't totally thrilled at how it sounded with our last name (which begins with D--"th" to "d" is a kind of awkward transition). I think it does well in the middle slot. (My second choice for a middle name was Ursula. Gordon vetoed. He can't get over the Little Mermaid connection.)
So once we had settled on "Mary-Alice" as a first and "Edith" as a middle, there was the last problem: to hyphenate or not. I really prefer the look of Mary Alice without the hyphen, but the upside of the hyphen is that it makes it immediately clear that Mary-Alice is spoken as a unit. I think hyphenating is the right decision.
We sometimes call her just Alice, but most of the time we say Mary-Alice.