How to name your child...

Well here's a helpful hint for those non-parents, if there are any and read this...
Baby name books don't really help you CHOOSE a name, they help you eliminate names, and thereby I suppose eventually help you choose a name. I went to the library and picked up 2 books. The one that was helpful in a sort of way was "beyond Jennifer & Jason Madison & Montana" -- It's a few years old and the most helpful thing about it was somewhere near the end of the book one particular tip. It was:

Consider that you may have more than one child and whatever you name your first child, you will not be able to use on subsequent children. Same thing with naming your second or third, if you want them to all go together, try not to make them all matchy-matchy (like a family we knew was Jeanna, Nina, and Serena- oh and their middle names rhymed too) or all starting with the letter J (Jason, Jaime, Jenna, Jake) or that sort of thing.

That advice was actually helpful to me as we kept talking about it more and more, if we use one particular name, then we wouldnt be able to use another, as some of the names we have picked out may cross over with middle and first names, and that's just silly. The example they gave was having a girl named Roberta and calling her Bobbi and then having a boy and naming him Robert and calling HIM Bobby. See what I mean? That had really never crossed my mind before.

One thing we did (forgive if I've said this) is to take the names we are considering and print them out in a nice, bright color (like orange) --big enough to be seen across the room-- and tape them to the nursery wall. Then go in at the beginning or end of the day and just look at them. See how they 'look' to you.

One other piece of advice is to 'introduce yourself as your kid' when you go out somewhere. Which I think is stupid. Then people aren't going to know your real name. What WE found was more interesting and useful, was saying, to each other of course, Hi I'm "Tyler's" mom [not a name we are considering, that's my nephew's name]-- and seeing how it feels in your mouth. Or try, this is my daughter "Felice" [again total hogwash]...

Really, though, don't go out and buy a baby name book for $12 (the price of the only one we found in a store)-- go to your library and check one out and use it for ideas, or to dwindle your names down. That's what we have done and so far we're down to 10 combos of names. Not too bad, considering. Oh and be aware, there were at least 20 baby name books on the shelves. Good luck trying to pick one. :-)