I loved hearing all of your baby names and suggestions recently over on Instagram! So many of my favorites were mentioned, and I love all of the classic and older names that have come back around. While we’re not sharing the name we’ve chosen yet I wanted to chat more on the topic of choosing a name as it can be so hard–but has also brought me such comfort with both of my pregnancies to call them by their names beforehand.
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This pregnancy has been different from my pregnancy with Rex in so many ways. But one aspect that has made me a little sad is that I haven’t felt as connected with our girl–until more recently that is. Mostly, I’m sure it’s just being busy with work and Rex… and not taking as much time for myself these days to really focus on what’s happening inside my body. (Sounds like this is all totally normal the second time around when chatting with my girlfriends but realizing this has made me more intentional lately to take some extra time in the evenings to count those kicks and get excited for her arrival.) I mentioned in this post, that I rarely even know what week I’m in (which has actually also been nice as it’s flying by!). But another aspect is that we didn’t have a name for her until just a couple weeks ago. I know so many parents go into birth without deciding on the name (or even knowing the gender), but for me, it was such a sweet way to really connect with Rex throughout my pregnancy–getting to call him by name.
With Rex, I instinctively knew he was a boy from the very beginning, and as soon as we had our gender reveal I gasped, “it’s Rex!” Almost as if I already knew him. Sure, it was a family name I had always loved and Tanner and I had been chatting about boy names so that made things easy, but even so we had quite a few boy names we loved and I still instinctually felt like this was Rex. Which was pretty cool! This time around we weren’t as set on our girl names. We had our favorites from when I was pregnant with Rex and a couple other contenders, but we were still very much open. We weren’t actively searching on baby sites but just thought the name would come to us. And sure enough in a crazy way, it sort of did! Tanner mentioned the name a couple of months ago, but then I started getting all of these little signs and seeing her name pop up in the most unlikely places. Signs as I was driving that I had never noticed before… in books and conversations, etc. I had a really strong feeling when I was in New York as the name kept appearing to me, and I came home telling Tanner that it was bringing me such peace. Even if we change our minds again before she’s born I’ve found such joy in the past couple of weeks having a name to call her by.
What are your thoughts on choosing a baby’s name? Did you turn to any sites? A girlfriend also recently tipped me off to NameBerry.com which I hadn’t come across before and it has what seems like every single name out there!! Definitely a good one if you’re on the hunt for names too.
Or are you a fan of family / more traditional names?
And what are your thoughts on sharing the name beforehand? I have such mixed feelings here as it can be so fun to share (especially with close friends and family) but… everyone has an opinion.
Photography | Stephanie Russo (originally shot for Jenni Kayne)
