Announcement Part Deux!!

Keep your pants on people, we'll get to the name in a minute! I told you we were going to be overdramatic about this (just a WEEEEE little bit), so surely you didn't think I was just going to post her name this morning and go on my merry way?!?!?!? Keep reading...we'll get there, but first, I'll tell you how we got her name.

About 3 weeks ago, I made a list of names that I liked. I did most of my research on the internet (shocker) by looking at popular (and unpopular) lists of names by year. I tended to lean toward the more traditional names. Ones that had made the top 100 semi-consistently over the last 100 years or so. You know - the tried and true names. Some of the names on the list were: Madeline, Jenna, Katherine, Becca, Emily, Bethany, Amanda, Melanie, Heather, Hannah, Nichole, Sarah, and Courtney.

There were plenty of things to consider - does it sound rhyme-y with our last name? Yes? Then no. Does it end in "F" since our last name starts with "F"? If yes, then no. And then of course, I presented the list to John and we ruled out several and added several (I've presented more of the "final" list). He did veto one of my favorites quickly, but I vetoed one of his suggestions pretty quickly too.

Halfway through a week of these conversations and I started to panic. Well, maybe panic is a bit strong, but for those of you that don't know, when our precious baby David came into the world, he did not yet have a name. We thought we had at least 3 more weeks to decide, and we just felt like it was too big of a thing to commit too soon. I was determined not to let that happen again. John thought I was being a bit overzealous - and he's right - we have time - she'll probably come sometime in February so we have at least 3 months, but I had my mind set on a goal. I wouldn't be stopped.

Everyone knows that I'm impatient. At the first opportunity, I cornered John where he had to talk to me. Yep - for you boys out there, I forced John to TALK to me about NAMES!! And for quite a while too! It was a long dinner - at that fondue place - you know - the one that takes TWO HOURS to have dinner. We went through the list, I made him tell me what he thought, and he actually confessed that he'd been tossing a few of them around in his head for a week or so. We even asked the waitress about how the potential names sounded.

Regarding her middle name - many of you know (and you should if you've read the blog) that her middle name would be either Carol or Elizabeth. My mom's name was Carol Elizabeth and she'd wanted a granddaughter so badly. My sister has two (amazing) boys, and of course, I have David. She loved her grandsons with all her being - she really did - but she only had daughters, so she was a bit partial. So - our daughter's middle name is going to be Elizabeth.

I tell that story (again) for one reason - to explain why we changed from Carol to Elizabeth. Originally, I thought her middle name would be Carol, but it just didn't have the same "ring" to it with the names we were most partial to.

Not many of you are still reading...right? You're onto other things. As John says, "There are just too many words there." Cut to the chase!! I did promise to reveal her name today...and believe me, I'm DYING to tell you all. It's been VERY hard to keep this secret!! I'm not good at keeping my own secrets (but tell me ALL of yours - with my memory, I'll forget half of what you tell me anyway). I'm digressing...it's all for the sake of some good drama. For those of you that scrolled down to the bottom of the post hoping to see "HER NAME WILL BE" in bold, capital letters...no dice. Sorry about that.

Eventually we'll tell you...but not right now. You'll need a decoder. It's not a difficult decoder to get, but you do need it. Look at the first letter of each paragraph in this post. That's her name!