Baby names...

I don't know whether other people have this problem, but naming a baby is hard work!!! I remember when I was young I had a set of names, and those were the names I was going to use when I had kids (shockingly enough, when I did have my daughter, she didn't get my #1 girls name "Fiona Keely"!) I guess this is exacerbated by the fact that I am one of those weirdos who don't want to know the gender of the baby until birth. (Well, most days I don't want to know...I do have my moments of weakness!) As we are fairly traditional, and don't like trendy names (like, for instance "Addison" which was the name of two different babies announced in the same week in hubby's hometown paper...) we tend towards family, and of course, Saint's names. Naming our daughter caused a sort of conundrum. Very early on in the pregnancy, we decided that if we had a girl (and I was fairly convinced we were having a boy!) we would name her after hubby's grandma who passed away around the time we found out we were expecting (in fact, hubby announced the good news to the family the evening of the funeral...) So, our girl's name was Eva. Now, middle name is slightly more complicated. At first, we thought something boring and traditional like "Marie" would be a good option.

Around the same time, I decided that if it were a boy, we would name him after St. Gerard Majella. We played around with that name, and decided on Gerard Michael (Michael being a family name on both sides...) We had done a novena asking for St. Gerard's intercession to have a child, so it seemed fitting. Naturally, as my desire to name the baby after St. Gerard increased, Eva's middle name became Majella.

Now, you can't just name your first child Eva Majella, and then name the next one Peggy Sue (or any number of non-discript names!) So, we've been banging our heads against the wall trying to figure out names that are traditional enough, and Catholic enough to fit into our naming scheme. A couple of weeks ago, my grandmother passed away. So, I thought that it might be fitting if we have another girl to name her Charlotte, after my grandma. Hubby thought on this, and was having trouble envisioning himself calling a little baby girl Charlotte. You see, our families have different trains of thoughts on names. His family believes the more nicknames the better. My family named us short names so that we wouldn't need nicknames (so I've spent a great deal of my life explaining that my name is NOT short for anything!) So, anyway, hubby decided that Charlotte was fine if I was okay with him calling her Charlie. I decided I could handle that. Further, I thought that maybe we should name the baby Charles if it turns out to be a boy. Thus, we are waiting for Charlie either way. (Hubby has cousins who did something very similar, last time they were expecting, the baby was going to be Frances or Francis...she is Frances)

Now, on to the middle name saga...and here is where the slightly creepy stuff starts! First, we chose a middle name to go with Charles, and took the easy way out. So, if we have a boy he will be Charles Borromeo (after St. Charles Borromeo...yes, we are that creative!!!) Of course, I am having to go through training to be able to pronounce Borromeo (I have some sort of mental block...) so that I'll be able to yell it if need be...

So, picking a middle name that honored a Saint and didn't sound dumb with the name Charlotte was a little more difficult. We tried many different Saint's names, and none of them seemed to work! Finally, I was surfing some Saint's sites, and ran across St. Angela Merici (whom I have read about before, but isn't one of the first Saints to pop into my mind...) So, I refreshed my memory about her, and like the way that Charlotte Merici sounded, so I brought the name idea to hubby. So, we grabbed our trusty and not-so-trusty Saints books (the one that is not-so-trusty is called All Saints and has a bunch of people who are not cannonized Saints in it...) to look and see if they had St. Angela Merici and/or St. Charles Borromeo. Sadly, neither are listed in the "Loyola Kids Book of Saints", but St. Angela was in All Saints, and both were in our "One Year Book of Saints." So we read about St. Angela in All Saints...foundress of the Ursalines, which were not a religious community in the sense of nuns until after her death. Then we read about her in the One Year book, and same basic information until the end when it said that after her death, St. Charles Borromeo organized the Ursalines into a religious order and got permission from the pope.

Basically, my thought is this...if your boy's Saint's name shows up in the blurb about a proposed girl's Saint's name, you have found your Saint's name! Just too much of a coincidence for me!

So, Charlie will now be either Charles Borromeo, or Charlotte Merici!