Jamie was named after a favorite soap opera character, so he didn't mind much being called "Bub." It's all good when he's wearing overalls and boots, but when he dresses up for his day job, it doesn't quite work. So, I generally address him as dude. It works fine.
All growing up I was called Lis, or Lissy (hate that) and even worse Mel. I watched way too many episodes of Alice during my formative years, so the image of the big fat guy in a Hanes undershirt, the defining image of passive aggressive dominance was firmly rooted in my brain and I despised being called Mel. One time, during my middle school years I allowed my middle name to serve as my name and I spent the whole year completely confused. There were several Melissas in my class and I felt I was doing everyone a favor by dismissing my given name and jumping right to the middle. In hindsight it was a bad idea, mostly because I dislike my middle name more than my first. Lesson learned. Jamie has dubbed me Melissa Coffeycake. This I like.
When it came to naming our children, it was a long process of deciding which among many names we liked would be THE name endowed upon that child. Each name has a story behind it and Emmy's is no different.
I always wanted a little girl I could call Emmy-Lou, but the only name that would fit that particular was Emma and that name was way overdone in the world. See, I like names that are different enough to be, well, different, but not different enough to invite antagonizing attention. I'd never opt for a fruit or a species of tree as a sutiable name (but did go to school with this dude named Sequoia once. The kid was like 8 foot tall and a really good basketball player, so the name sort of worked. For him. Probaby the only human on the planet.) As we drove to see if our new addition was on Team Pink or Team Blue, I kept seeing all these signs for Emory this or Emory that, which was odd because it was the name I had sort of honed in on for a girl name. This was after my mother had me look up a (male) school friend from her early academic years and I thought 'Hmm....that BOY name is really pretty. I like that a lot." And so when the ultrasound rendered the information we were seeking, we knew this little girl would get the saved up name Emmy-Lou, without the Emma I distained. Emory. Perfect. Her middle name is Louise, which I took from my great-grandma Crowder, whose name was actually Louie. Emory Louise. Emmy-Lou.
But then things changed. Instead of calling her Emory, we started right off with Emmy. Cute. Every now and then, she'd be called Emmy-Lou. Or Emmy Lou Bear. Until the day Jamie changed it to Emmy-Roo. Emmy-Roo-Bear......Hmmm....
Now we've shortened all that and her new name is simply Roo. Seriously we call her Roo more than Emmy. More than Emmy-Lou or even Emmy-Roo.
The kid is going to be so confused. How we went from Emory to Roo....I don't know, but there it is.
She joins the ranks of Kee-Lay (Kyle. Jamie started calling him this after constantly being called Da-Tee by Kyle).
And Ca-Cah (Calla. Noah can say anything correctly, but still calls his sister this. We call her that now too)
Cassidia-dia (No idea. But we call her that everyday. Better than her former name Occidy...self-explantory)
And Liger (Elijah. Still yet, no idea. Where do we come up with this stuff??)
Mally (Mallory. It's how Noah says her name. We thought that was cute and adopted it for ourselves. Noah is renaming the whole family apparently)
Noey Bear (With lots of hair. I can't believe I'm admitting this out loud....Clearly we need a better hobby than coming up with stupid names for our children...)
And Roo.
Me? I adopted a new name about 14 years ago. I go by the ever popular "Mom" or for the little ones "Momma...." I am quite fond of my new moniker. And Jamie...
He's got the best one. He's got "DADDDDDDDDY!!!! DADDDDYYYYY'S HOOOOOMMMMEEE!!!"
Kind of jealous of that one, actually.
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