Although I’ve previously written about the challenge of naming Madelyn and how we wish we could go back and give her a different name, there was something about Mama Kat’s 2nd prompt in this week’s Writer’s Workshop that inspired me.
Prompt 2.) I almost named my child _______, but chose _______ instead because…
(No offenses to the Mary Beths of the world; I’m just definitely a “Liz”.)
Longtime readers know that Craig we had specific naming rules, one of which was to “name a baby what you intend to call her”. We also tend to prefer shorter names: Craig, Liz, Jack, Kate.
So all this is to say that I don’t understand how we as a family have so many nicknames.
Though I do hold the dog responsible for starting it.
Jack‘s list of nicknames includes but is not limited to: Jackson Brown, Brown Dog, Brown, Buddy Buddy, Jax.
When Tessa Belle came along a few months ago, she quickly attained several monikers herself like: Tessa B, B-ster, B, TB, Hips Don’t Lie, Foxy Lady, Wolfie.
Among the 2 girls, Madelyn Rose has the most nicknames. And for obvious reasons. Her’s include: Maddie, Moo, MaddaRoo, Rose, Roo, Rooster, Mooster the Rooster, Booty Baby.
Kate, much to her displeasure, doesn’t have many nicknames. Because I’m lazy, I do sometimes call her “Kay”. And my term of endearment for her has always been “Sweets”. But Kate has reached an age where she wants a nickname and feels left out for not having one.
I blame Kindergarten for this.
Because all of her friends have nicknames, she needs to have one, too! It’s all about the group mentality at age 6, apparently. I tried telling her that her name is perfect as it is because she doesn’t need a nickname to go with it. Kate thought about it for a second, but then gave me the, “I don’t think so, Mom!” response.
One thing I know for sure is the best nicknames emerge organically over time. As badly as Kate wants it to happen, she’s not going to be able to convince a group of her friends to address her by some 7 syllable alter ego (which are what her attempts at creating possible nicknames for herself were).
I hate to break it to ya, kid, but these are the ropes. If I were you, I’d be pretty happy with the name of “Kate”. I’m sure there will come a time that you make some sort of public misstep, and earn some type of nickname as a result. Maybe then you’ll realize that nicknames aren’t all that they are cracked up to be.
What nicknames do you have? What nicknames are you happy to have outgrown?
My family is famous for the nicknames we give each other. We each have about a thousand.
Growing up, I was Boo, Monkey, Monkey Doodle (actually, that one is sung), Bee, Sarabee, the Big B, and, of course, Betsy, as my name is actually Sarabeth. =)
I love that you had a nickname that went to a tune.
We love short names around here too! Simply because both my husband and I don’t have short names.
We love nicknames around here. Both boys have several!
Short names just roll off the tongue and out of the mouth so quickly!
My grandfather called me “Peanuts” when I was little. I loved having a special nickname.
When just one person gives you a name, I think it’s extra special. Kate’s Kindy teacher called her “Katie Kate”, and Kate LOVED it!
Love this! I’m not a nickname girl, either, but somehow my kids all have one? How did that happen?
(Also? You are *so* a Liz! Love!)
Ha! I L-O-V-E-D that you said I am *so* a Liz! I’ve always felt that way. For better or worse.
My favorite girl name is Kate. Our friends have a 5 year old named Kate (that’s it…just Kate), and we always call her Katie Loo Loo.
My boys are Jack and Nick. They’re nicknames truly are Buddy and Buster. However, Nick has a few more other than just Buster. I call him Nicky, Nicky Noo, Nicky Noo Noo, Noo Noo, and Noodle Nose. Poor kid.
It’s so funny how we take one-syllable names and come up with all these nicknames that are WAY longer, isn’t it?
I always love to hear about people with baby naming issues. My husband had some crazy rules when we were naming our girls too. They had to be three syllable names that could be broken into two syllable nicknames (Samantha/Sammie, Elyssa/Ellie) and absolutely NO nicknames as names, which is why Elyssa is named Elyssa instead of Ellie. Madness I tell you!
My girls have a lot of nicknames too. Samantha Rose is Sam, Sammie, Sammie Jammy, Rosey, Rosebud, Sweet Petunia. Elyssa is Ellie, Ellie Bean, Bean, Elle Belle, Stinkerella, Monster Baby. The names are endless and I love them!
I think you are the first person to have a husband with MORE naming rules than my own!
I refer to The Small One as Mr. Super-dee-duper. You can imagine how well that goes over now that he is an emerging 3rd grader. And especially when I shorten it do “Doop.”
ps – This very topic is in my queue of future posts. Great minds…
Ha! Does he give you the “Moooooom!” every time you call him Doop?
We definitely do nicknames here. My husband and I call each other hun, the wife, and the husband. Our son, Michael, is Mike, but mostly we call him Dude. Our daughter, Paige, used to be called GG because that’s how her brother said her name when he first started talking. She doesn’t like it anymore and gets upset that she doesn’t really have a new nickname. Although some of her classmates call her Book. She hates that!
I joke that we should have named our girl Gabrielle so we cold call her Gabby. She never stops talking!!
I love hearing that she’s also mad she doesn’t have a proper nickname! Who knew that would be a sensitive issue.
Like Kate, I always wanted a nickname. So I was thrilled when (finally) in college Jilly became common.
As for my kids… Lucas is sometimes Luke. His friends sometimes call him Lukey (weird, I think). Blake is often Blakers, and he calls me Mommers. Morgan is always Morgan. I don’t care for Morgie at all.
If you’re going to say “Morgie”, you might as well say “Morgan”. Still 2 syllables!
I love that there’s Blakers and Mommers.
Ohhhh…growing up with the name Mhairi, how could I not have a ton of nicknames! While I thought I had the coolest name ever because I only knew one other Mhairi, I got called anything but that: Mars Bars (gymnastics), M squared (math teacher- maiden name started w a M), Ma-harry, Maharishie, Sweet Pea, Muffin (a Hoblit nickname that sticks today – think of mini muffins at baby shower…), Mar and then the college nickname of Maha (I think of you Liz every time someone calls me that). My dog Ebineezer is Ebin, Beebs, Beebees and my son Eian is duder or superman. My other son Noel (who is still a baby) has been called Noely, Rolly Noely and Noely Monster. Husband Ryan is just Ryan and I think he is okay with that.
Maha, you are forever a Maha and MY Maha!
Still love it and love that you commented here!!
I have many nicknames, my favorite of which is pumpkin lee.
Pumpkin Lee??
Dude….
Also, you are the only person to ever call me Lizzy Bear.
That’s just strange to me. Lizzy bear is such a natural nickname for you.
My kids have several nick names which as you mentioned, all arose organically and reflect something about them. Ironically,my youngest girl shares one of the nicknames you have given to Tessa Belle – Hips Don’t Lie! LOL!
Ha! That’s so funny! She insists on sticking her butt towards you to pet it, so I started calling her “Hips Don’t Lie” as a result.
I? Have never really had a nickname. Unless you count my college friends calling me Megon. But that’s not even a nickname, that’s just pronouncing my name funny!
(As you can see, I’m still bitter.)
(Or unless you count my elementary school lunch lady calling me Brittney. But that’s just ’cause she thought my name was Brittney and it never quite seemed worth it to correct her.)
Dude, you SO are not a Brittney. Nor Brittany. Nor Britney.
I know, right?
She was so silly.
My mom used to call me Tigger because I bounced around everywhere. I guess it’s better than Eeyore, which is what some would probably prefer to call me now.
I’ve had a lot of nicknames, but the only one I can really remember is LeeWee. A lot of people call me LA online, and a very small handful of people, mainly family, can actually get away with calling me Leigh.
Isn’t it funny how certain people ‘get away’ with a certain name? Only part of my mom ‘s family calls me “Lizzy” and gets away with it!
Isn’t it funny how your kids end up with so many nicknames?
Most people just call me Stef, though a few family members call me Steffie and I hate it!
It’s really hard if you somehow end up with a nickname that you really hate!
I used to be Mandy (my family still calls me this), but I changed it to Amanda when we moved right at the start of middle school. Mandy was for babies. Amanda was nasty. Like Ms. Janet. All of the Dudes have nicknames, because that’s just how I roll.
That’s what you should have on your tombstone.
“Here lies Amanda, not Mandy. Mandy is for babies and Amanda is nasty.”
We had the same “name your child what you intend to call them” rule. Although we do change the accents depending on the language which completely changes the names. Maybe we should go with nicknames.
I have a few sets of friends who had to figure in the accents and language/country differences.
In fact, my friend Alexa grew up in France and her dad/brother/other family still live there. She chose Jack and Luke for her boys because there was a close pronunciation of each.
We didn’t find out the gender of either of our babies either and when I was pregnant with my second, we REALLY struggled to come up with a girl name because we felt the option from when we’d had Jack was “for that baby” and not “for this one.”
Weird. I know. But we’re weird. So.
Our two girl choices were Carly and Casey and we simply could NOT decide between them. But since the middle name was going to be Christian (from my maiden name) I suggested that we name our daughter Karly with a K so that her initials would be K.C. just in case we decided that name suited her more…
Now, no one spells Karly’s name correctly and we call her KK. (Duh.)
Or Kakers. Or Kaker Baker Candlestick Maker.
Which takes a long time to say. But as I’ve already admitted…
We’re weird.
As soon as you said “KC”, I totally thought you were going to tell me her nickname was “Sunshine”.
Oh gosh, my Dad used to call me “Boy” and “Big E”. But I promise he loves me. HA! It’s just that I have 3 older brothers and he used to tease that he was just so used to saying “boy”.
Not sure where “big E” came from but sure glad I outgrew that one!
And My Katelyn has SO many nicknames it’s unreal!!
My dad called me Goose. So no worries on my end!
My kids also have nicknames….all but the last! Personally, I’m happy to have outgrown Scooter!
I was so annoyed at my lack of nick name growing up. And I love nicknames.. I almost always shorten people’s names!
I’m super guilty of shortening names! And for people who I don’t really know well enough TO shorten on my own!
As for nicknames for our kids, we have just added ‘ie’ to the end of their names.
I don’t know why b/c I annoy myself with this tendency. I can’t imagine what other’s think.
I think it’s awesome that you do what drives you crazy.
You are a damn funny woman, Jen!
Probably the weirdest nickname I had was Jamel. The “J” pronounced like an “H.” In college I was chosen Lil sis of a frat. We had to decorate these paddles and have all the guys sign them. All the lil sis’ put there names on their’s. At the store, the were all out of “I”s so I used a “L”. And my roommate thought it so funny that she called me Jamel. Forever. Too funny. I hadn’t thought about that in decades.
I love Kate.
You can always do what my family did and take the first two letters of her name to create the Kaka.
Would she like all of her relatives to call her kaka?
As long as it’s a LONG A sound for KaKa that might be OK.
Kate’s godmother is Kat. And I chose “Kat” as her nickname when I met her in college because she went by Katie and I already knew too many Katies.
She was cool with my request/insistence, and to this day, I’m the only one who calls her Kat.
Oh wow did I identify with a lot in your post! We’re a huge nick-naming family. We have multiple nick names for each other, our son and especially our cats. I’m amazed Daniel knows the cats’ real names LOL.
My name was supposed to be Carrie Elizabeth and shortened to Carrie Beth, but my parents came up with KeAnne at the last minute with Elizabeth being used as my first name (KeAnne’s my middle). My family and friends have always called me Kiki. I had some less pleasant names in school that I’m thrilled to have outgrown (“Kickstand” for instance).
I love your nicknames! I bet you’re a fun family.
We have a ton of nicknames for everybody, too. Or at least, the kids and animals.
Isn’t it funny how the animals end up with them, too?
I wanted the Name Them What You Call Them, but Abbey is Abigail anyway, and I call her that sometimes.
My kids both have sooooo many nicknames, some of which make sense and some don’t at all.
OMG, you have the cutest kids. AWWWW! Love this photo
I have always loved the name Madelyn. And Kate is very cool. I have known quite a few over the years and they were always cool girls. Kate usually became Katester though, which I always liked to say 
Oh don’t get me started. With a name like Charlotte, the nicknames never end! I once had a kid named Columbus Tyson III make fun of my name. Like, seriously? LOL!!
Now that you say that, my mom calls her “Katester”!
all of blog land knows the Katie/Kate debate. I introduce myself as Katie, but I have only heard my husband call me that once in his whole life. I am Kate to all friends and family.
Sometimes my mom calls me Katesy.
Your children are ridiculously gorgeous.
Seriously. How do you stand it?
They’d get away with murder at my house, and I’d be a puddle of mush every day.
You’re a tougher cookie than I thought, BooBoo.
xo
Love this post. Babynames are my favorite topic. For real.
Such a good point: “the best nicknames emerge organically over time.” SO true. And as you point out we can try to control what our kids are called but sometimes the kids’ friends or the kids themselves take over.
I’ve FINALLY accepted that my little Elissa is Lissy. Pains me, but I’m mostly over it.