Tuesday, April 9, 2013

What's in a name?

It has been forever!!! Life just got busy and there hasn't been a lot of time to spend writing. Between school, work, and well, being pregnant life is just crazy!

As most of you know we are having a baby girl! We decided on the name Penelope. Truthfully, this is a decision we made way back when we were engaged. I don't even remember how it came about but we both heard the name and knew that if we ever had a daughter that would be her name. Lots of people ask us if we're going to call her Penny for short but I prefer other nicknames. The one I like is Nella. Jesse likes to call her Nella Penella. My step dad calls her Sweet Pea and I thought that was so cute! I also really like the name poppy but Jesse doesn't really care for that one. We're still trying to figure out what her middle name will be. Here is what we have so far:

Fay: I loooooooove this name. I also really like Fayette but Jesse likes Fay more. This is a great middle name because it's simple but so elegant sounding. Penelope is already a long name so a short middle name would work really well.

June: I don't love it, but I like it. Again we like the shortness of the name; we're leaning towards one syllables middle names. It also sounds great with our last name.

Jane: I love the way it sounds with Penelope and our last name BUT if you look up Penelope, Jane is the most common middle name that goes with it. Those who know me know I am obsessed with a popularity of a name (yes, I am aware Penelope is quite popular now, but it wasn't as much when we liked it.) I don't want our Penelope to be one of gazillions of Penelope Jane's. Jesse is trying to work me on it but I don't know if I'll budge.

Elena: This is another name we love! However, it is popular. I don't know of any Penelope Elena's and frankly, Elena has so many spelling variations that it still might be a unique name.

Cecilia: I don't know why we like this name but we both like it (surprisingly!) and it sounds great with Penelope.

Carmela: Okay, so I promised I would never name any of our children after family members. I feel like if you do it once there is pressure to do it for the other side of the family too. But this is an exception. My Italian heritage is a big part of my life and I have always felt very connected to it over all my other heritages. My Nona (Italian for grandma, however my Nona was my great grandmother) was a wonderful lady and I have very fond memories of her. I feel like it would be such a great honor to have it as Penelope's middle name.

Allison: This is my maiden name and it's a common first name. Why not make it a part of Penelope's name? We both really like the idea of Allison as our daughter's middle name but my sister Kasi beat us to it. My cute niece Tessa has it as her middle name. I suppose that doesn't stop us from  being able to use it too. We could almost make it a cute little tradition. But we probably won't. We're still considering it though!

I know lots of people like to keep the name of their baby secret until delivery day but I am a terrible secret keeper. Waiting till 10 weeks to tell everyone we are pregnant nearly killed me (I found out I was pregnant at 4 weeks!) And maybe this is totally stupid but, I was a little nervous someone would steal the name. I thought maybe if we announced it no one would take it. I know, I am so paranoid!!!

I've also had a lot of people ask us what we would have named our child if we were having a boy. Close family members are aware of the names we had in mind but again, I'm paranoid, and think I'd like to keep those names to ourselves. :)

Anyway! We found out the sex of our beautiful little baby on March 8th (already a month ago!) I was so crazy nervous! We had a standard doctors appointment first and were told the normal. Our baby is healthy and is a good size which I wasn't surprised about but it's always nice to hear. We heard her heart beat again which I always enjoy and I was weighed offered time to ask questions. According to my doctor at that point (18 weeks) I had only gained 2 pound. I am almost certain the nurse wrote down the wrong weight. I started at 111 pounds and she said I was only a 113. But I swore I saw 116 on the scale! And when I went home and weighed myself I was 116. Not a huge difference but still. I am pretty proud of myself. The doctor said I should have gain 10 pounds by this point but that she wasn't worried about it. I am really set on staying in the 25-30 pound weight gain that I'm suppose to gain. I try to eat healthy however I am human and give into cravings. Anyway, after the appointment we had an hour to kill before our ultra sound so we ate lunch in the cafeteria because I was starving. Our hour went by quickly and we went and waited in the waiting room for our name to be called. That felt like forever but I'm sure it really wasn't. When we got in the tech asked us what we were hoping for. We said overall we want a healthy baby and would be happy with either sex but that we were secretly hoping for a girl. Okay, not so secretly haha. She told us that means we'd probably get a boy. And I agreed. The two days before I decided I thought we were having a boy. Jesse agreed. But still, we hoped! She took all sorts of pictures of the baby and it was so much fun to watch the baby squirm as she applied pressure to my stomach. I waited in anticipation not knowing when she would reveal the gender. However, before she told us I thought I knew for certain it was a boy. Jesse and I both looked at each other and kept mouthing, "it looks like a boy, right?" The tech was trying to get the baby to roll so she could get a picture of her back but she was so stubborn! I would lay on my left side and the baby would almost roll when I did and then she would flop back down onto her back. We tried again on my right side but still, she wouldn't budge. We did this again and again until the tech managed to get a picture right as she was almost rolled. If you look my facebook you can see that picture where she is in a funky position. The tech was so funny. She said, "your child is so stubborn but at least the baby revealed itself to me. It's a girl!" It happened so fast I couldn't believe what I heard! I looked at Jesse and we both had total shock on our faces. I of course busted up crying because I'm a cry baby haha. When we left and were heading out to our car Jesse yelled at the top of his lungs "WE'RE HAVING A BABY GIRL!" Ever since then Jesse randomly breaks out into daddy-daughter songs. He is so cute and I love that this is something we get to share together. Every time Nella kicks Jesse comes running over to feel. He loves to kiss her and talk to her. I already know he is going to be the most fantastic dad. Penelope is so lucky to have him as her father!

Other than that, nothing is really new. I feel huge. And most days I love it. I love when people ask about her and complement me on how pregnancy suits me. Now that I'm not sick as often pregnancy is actually fun! I love feeling her kick and love it even more when I can feel her roll! I love learning about her and all her new developments (she can hear us and other noises around me and she can see!) Every Thursday Jesse and I find a moment to read together the week we're on in our baby book. It makes us feel close to her. We are SO excited to finally have her but at the same time we're nervous. It's funny how back and forth we go. "UGH I CAN'T WAIT FOR HER TO BE HERE ALREADY!" "Uhm, she can take all the time she wants, no rush. I can wait." I'm sure that's normal though.




17 more weeks to go!!!

Are there any middle names you guys like? What are some fun nicknames you can come up with for Penelope?

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