What Will We Name the Baby?

So I honestly haven't given much thought as to what to name the baby what I'm carrying. Like some people I know, I don't really like to talk to people about what I'm going to name the baby because

1. I change my mind about it at least once a month and

2. I get sick of seeing people's disappointment in my choices.

With every kid I have heard the reasons why I SHOULDN'T name the baby whatever I've chosen.

Lincoln - "They'll call him Stinkin' Lincoln." - They/we do...honestly, sometimes he DOES stink, so...

Asher - "It sounds too much like Ashley." - But, I like the name Ashley.

"Kids might call him Asser." - They do/have. Our cousin, Taylor, who really is the sweetest, nicest kid, has had a bit of a speech problem in the past, i.e. car door was pronounced by him coy doy, etc. A year ago when he was visiting during Christmastime Joel came home from playing games with his family with the most incredulous look on his face. "Asher told me that Taylor called him Asso!" I just looked at Joel and said, "Joel, Taylor can't say Asher's name! He was just saying Asher's name." Joel: "Oh." The next day Taylor was sitting on a stool at his grandma's house and in the sweetest way patted the stool next to him and said, "Hey, Assy, come sit by me."

Clara - "Isn't that the name of a cow? Clarabelle?" - Yeah, a cow from a Disney cartoon that no one has seen since 1986.

For this baby several name incarnations have already been shot down. Ginger sounded too much like a stripper (okay, I'm the one that decided that). Lola was the same. And "Fiona will remind everyone of Shrek."

I mean, I get it, okay? When my friend Marilyn named her baby Sebastian I was like, "But, that's the name of the crab from the Little Mermaid!" Yeah, EVERY name is going to conjure SOME bad connotation for SOMEBODY! As a Special Ed teacher I have my own list of names that remind me of the "special" kids I used to teach and the "special" reasons why I could never name MY kids the like.

There's Rayden who would shout out to me in the hallways, in class, wherever I saw him, "5 star boxes, teacher!? 5 star boxes!?" Yes, Rayden, you can color in 5 star boxes.

There's Kayden who, although he couldn't read more than three words anticipated the Wheel of Fortune Extravaganza in my class and said, "What's that say, teacher? The Wheel of Fortune Estrasasanda?" (That's where the name of this blog comes from)

There's Michael, an autistic boy who perseverated on clocks, who surprised me one day by opening the elastic waistband on his pants, reached down into his big boys, pulled out his wristwatch, slid it onto his wrist, and licked the face of the watch.

And there's Paige, who incessantly pooed her pants in first grade and would CONSTANTLY yell "Boo!" to me while making starburst motions with her hands as I was trying to teach.

Okay, actually I am forever endeared to my special ed kids and I miss teaching SO MUCH! So, I guess those names aren't out of the running, per se.

I am just as opinionated as the next person about baby names. I don't want any name that's too popular. Joel keeps saying he wants to name it Emily, but I refuse simply based on the fact that it's at the top of the baby name lists these days.

Also, I don't like odd ways of spelling names. Why do we have to spell Makayla 12 different ways? My friend Elicia has a devil of a time with her name. She told me someone once called her El-lick-ia. Her maiden name is Timpson, and she also said someone once called her Elicit Tampon. That one's my favorite. I keep thinking about someone really saying it assuming it really was her name and it makes me laugh every time. If you see me chuckling to myself like Toodles from Peter Pan, I'm probably just thinking about my good friend, Elicit Tampon.

My point about baby names is no matter how crappy the name you chose for your baby is; no matter how stupid and odd it sounds; no matter how many druggie-celebrities are named the same; everyone will come to like it or not based on your baby's personality. So, in the end, as long as your baby is incredibly cute and sweet and amazing, people's opinion of that name will change to reflect that. Hooray!

As stated before, my list of name possibilities has changed over and over again. Previously on the list:

Girl Names:

Willow

Jude

Emma Grace

Lauren

Kaiya

Lindy

Boy Names:

Forrest - I don't care that there's a movie called Forrest Gump!!!!!!

A favorite game we've played with the last two pregnancies is coming up with the most "interesting" names we can think of. When Clara was still cooking we came up with a couple of winners:

Fritzi Special - after the great Spanish Fork clothing outlet

Ricey, Beefy - names Asher and Lincoln came up with

Posey - after the lady we bought the house from

This pregnancy has garnered a few additions to the list, but I would appreciate your help in coming up with better, more interesting options.

Tiara Beige - doesn't it sound awesome?

Hail Mary - I swam with a girl in high school who's name was Damaris and I could never figure out if her name was Dam-aris or Da-mare-is. The only way I finally learned was when a friend said, "It's so when her mom's mad she can just say, Damn Aris!" If we name this one Hail Mary we could just say all the time, "Aw, Hell, Mary!" and it kind of wouldn't be swearing.

Cysty - I have an ovarian cyst that's currently taking up considerable room in the womb (although, it's perfectly harmless, they tell me). We talk about it like it's the baby's twin.

Rainbow, Sunshine - Actually, if I thought I could get away with it I would name a baby Sunny or Sunshine because I knew someone really awesome and inspiring named that.

So, does anybody have any good submissions to add?

This list seems so incomplete. Please! Help!

P.S. Here's video of Clara, it's indulgent, but she's really cute.

Scrappin' it Up!

Look at me scrappin' it up! I am so sick of doing crappy scrapbook pages by hand. It takes me forever - about an hour each page - and they still look like a 13 year-old did it.
I bought a CD of scrapbook files from the craft store but then discovered CUTER, free stuff on the Internet (http://www.shabbyprincess.com/) It took me a while to figure out how to do it - what program to use, how to download (and unzip) the files, what format to save it in, etc. But now one page takes me about 15 minutes and they are slightly cuter than my handmade versions.
Hooray! I'm so glad to be saved from the tortures of real scrapbooking (I was never a REAL scrapbooker, so real scrapbookers: please do not be offended. I honor your creative expression just as I honor mimes or jazz dancers/flag twirlers (in parades) for their creative expression)
Does anyone need a tutorial? I would love to show you how it's done. And I'll take anyone's advice, tips, tricks, etc. on how to do it better. (Except from Tia, because her version of scrapbooking always includes sandpaper, which seems very wrong, and because it's has to be 2nd-gen stamping, when I never even mastered 1st-gen stamping! "Close to ma Heart!")

So, here's the first page what I done. We went on a trip to Vernal this fall because Joel had to oversee a dam. We stayed in the NASTIEST motel (the Sage Inn) on the only street in Vernal that anyone could classify as the bad part of town, but our kids kept saying, "Wow! This is the nicest hotel ever!" ...we don't get out much. We took the town by storm! - Visited the dam site for a few hours, went to Pizza Hut for dinner (DINE-IN!!!! _and_ we ordered sodas)

we went to D.I. (my favorite part of the trip, and I kept thinking the whole time how proud Dan would be to know that we went there) visited the dinosaur museum (pictured below), a city park and we spent considerable time at a wildlife refuge. It was such a fun trip, although I had to have lots of rests on account a my compromised condition (prego).


Here's our Halloween page (cute paper, for sure!) Lincoln was a pirate, Asher was a vampire, and Clara was Dorothy from the wizard of Oz. Joel and I were what we are every year, it seems, disco people/skaters/dates, or something. At our ward Halloween party we scored the prize for the cutest date (or something like that). I'm pretty sure that while they gave awards to anyone who dressed up, we came home with top honors. Also of note, I wore my rollerskates because they are lime green and white and so are my white polyester pants with green stars down the leg. I was skatin' it up like ya'll know I know how to do and someone asked me if I had ever been in a skate club, like at a roller rink. I took the question as a observant compliment to my abilities.

And here's Christmas. Lincoln and Asher both got what they asked Santa for. Lincoln got pirate dress-ups and Asher got a flashlight. But the Geo Trax which also came Christmas morning took up the bulk of our attention through the holidays.

After we opened presents Joel got out his motorcycle and pulled the kids on tubes on the fresh snow. He said it made his Christmas. It was fun family activity. Whenever I was on the tube with Clara she'd be totally silent the whole time unless I said 'woo hoo' and then she'd echo the sentiment. I kept asking her if she was having fun, and in her lowest, most bored voice she'd say, "uh-huh."

P.S. We had our ultrasound and found out we're having a girl. We're excited and happy that the baby is looking much cuter than most fetuses.