. . .and the little mouths that try to say them. I've been thinking a lot about baby names lately. My husband and I have a pact. If it's a girl, I choose. If it's a boy, he chooses. Simple. I've already got my girl name picked out. I'm about 95 percent sure. Every one I tell tries to sound nice about it, but I know they don't really like it. Even my mother, whose name is included in this choice of mine, doesn't like it. "It'll grow on me. Just like Bianca did." She tries to console me. Or is she consoling herself? Hmmmm.
And she didn't like the name Bianca when I first chose it over five years ago. Few people did. I was warned by everyone. "Are you sure?" But I was sure. It was the one time my husband and I completely agreed on something. Bianca Elizabeth. A whole mouthful of a name for such a small baby of six pounds. And she grew right into that name, as if any other name would have been as mismatched as the outfits Bianca puts together.
When she turned two, I got a real laugh, though, out of her little friends trying to say her name. Here is a list of things Bianca was called:
Binca; Bonca (both of which eventually inspired the little ditty we sing to her sometimes even now which goes "Binca, Bonca, makes Bianca"--yes, we're kind of a weird little family); BIanca (with long I sound, like Bionic); Ganca; BiGanca; Biaca; and last, but not least, Bilancala, which her two-year-old cousin repeatedly called her when we visited in California this summer.
Don't get me wrong. I actually think it's all pretty funny. Now, very few of her friends say her name wrong. And when I think of her, nothing but Bianca would have worked for my precocious five-year-old. It's the perfect name.
Of course we all probably think that. But the question is: does your child grow into the name or does the name evolve in your mind to be like your child? What do you think?
Oh, and by the way, if you'd like to know the 95-percent-sure name for a baby girl, just ask and I'll tell you, as long as you promise not to say "Are you sure?"
