Most of us have known at least one pregnant woman who appeared to become slightly insane as the birth of her baby approached. Some pregnant women start cleaning out their refrigerators at midnight; others decide to rearrange the furniture. One of my pregnant friends was completely obsessed with finding the right valance for the nursery. No matter how many times I told her that the baby would not care if he had valances or not, she ran from store to store with an urgency that made me question her sanity.

... more

A child’s name is a loving gift that we bestow upon a child. Naming a child carries with it a big responsibility.

Most of us know people who dislike their names for various reasons. We want a child’s name to describe who he is, and we want the name to be representative of the love we feel for him. Few people purposely choose a name that they despise for their children.

A name can be a gift from either the adoptive parents or the birthparents. For some lucky children, the name is a gift... more

One controversial area of naming your child really surprised me – naming your older adopted child. I just assumed that when people adopted a child who was old enough to talk and identify himself by name, the child kept his name. Apparently that is not the case in many families. See the links under "Related Topics" at the bottom of this post for further discussion of this issue.

The reason I always assumed that a child would keep his name is because he already identifies himself by that name. I could... more

As you can see from the "Related Topics" at the bottom of this post, naming a child who joins your family through international adoption is a hot topic in the adoption community. Some people believe that the child should have an ethnic name that reflects his heritage; other people believe that a child should have an Americanized name so that he will blend into American society.

Which point of view is correct? I do not believe that there is a right or wrong answer here, so you need to do... more

When we were going through our home study, our social worker suggested that we read several books about adoption. I disagreed with many of the suggestions provided in one of the books, but the issue of names was the topic that really got my blood boiling. According to the author, an adopted child should never be given a family name, such as John Smith, Jr., or the name of a beloved relative. The author’s reasoning was that the couple could wind up conceiving in the future and would want to use the family name... more

As I mentioned in my last post, Naming Your Child: Semi-open Adoption, my husband and I never considered asking for input on our son’s name from his then-placing mother. Perhaps we should have done this, but the thought honestly never crossed our minds.

Since this was a semi-open adoption and the placing mother was not going... more

When my husband and I were considering baby names, we never once thought about inviting an expecting mother’s input into the process. If I had known that this was even an issue, I probably would have despaired of ever agreeing on a name since my husband and I could barely come up with a name between the two of us.

It was not until we met my son’s expecting mother face-to-face that I even thought about how she might feel about the baby’s name. Up until that time, the agency stressed that the expecting... more

My husband and I could not agree on a name for a baby boy. While his ideas for girls’ names (mostly names that sounded like porn stars) and my ideas for girls’ names (too “Southern belle,” according to him) were vastly different, we did find enough overlap to select a name – Caroline. Choosing a boy’s name was a completely different matter.

I had three rules for baby names, regardless of gender:

The name could not be gender-neutral (no “Pats” from Saturday Night Live). ... more

My last topic was kind of depressing, so let’s move on to a more fun topic — naming your child.

When my husband and I were waiting to be matched with an expecting mother, we were hesitant to make any plans. We did not want to buy little girl clothing in case we adopted a boy (and vice versa). We did not want to buy gender-neutral summer outfits in case the baby was born in the dead of winter.

The one thing that we knew our baby would need was a name, so we found hours of pleasure, and quite a... more

My son and I were cuddling before bedtime, and we were playing a little game of ours. I will ask, “Who is my favorite kid in the world?,” and he will say, “Me!” I ran through a bunch of questions, such as:

Who is my favorite kindergartener? Who is my favorite boy? Who is my favorite hugger?

His response to each question was, “Me! Me! Me!”

Then, I told him how much I love him and that I am so happy that I am his mommy. I said that I was so lucky that God gave him to me to be... more