B is for. . .

B is for baby, of course...

(a wooden B that is resting on the crib rail

for now until I can find where I want to hang it)
and blanket...

(This is the very neatly- made, reversible blanket that Nana Patti crocheted for her soon-to-be grandson.)

and blocks...

but it's also for our baby-to-be's name.

B is for :

Choosing a name was hard in some ways and simple in some others. I've had a baby name book for a long time for writing purposes...to come up with names for creative writing pieces. I am not one of those girls who has had a baby name picked out since 7th grade. I think I've always wanted to wait until I was pregnant to decide upon a name with my hubby instead of having a preconceived idea of what I wanted in a name. We also bought another baby name book in Barnes & Noble before Christmas. What an undertaking to choose a name that will stick with a person for life!

There are tons and tons of names out there. To keep in manageable, we picked a few letters a night and started going through some names. Nothing was really jumping out at us, but we kept coming back to one name even before we got to the B section of the book (we were skipping around, looking at different letters). The name was Brett. Since Don is a Packers' fan and I have become one, too, we began joking around about calling him Brett Favre Johnson when people asked what we were going to name him. The Brett part we kept coming back to. We really liked it! So, after reading through lists of names, and eliminating names (We are both teachers, so there were some names that we've had in the past that we would or would not ever name our kids.), we ended up deciding upon Brett! We have chosen Michael as the middle name...Grandpa-to-be Ross' first name and a solid Catholic name that Don also liked.

• It doesn't have any nicknames.
• The syllables sound good with our last name.
• It doesn't have any weird rhymes.
• It sounds like a good, solid masculine name.
• Neither of us have had a Brett in our classes during our years of teaching...no negative or positive associations with it via past classroom experiences.
• In the baby book, we also found it under a list of "blonde" male names. Ironically, Shannon is listed under "blonde" female names. Who ever knew I'd fit the blonde list...or that there was even a blonde list of names! Maybe Brett will be a little blondie, too.
• Most people we've tried it out on have liked it, too! (unless they are not Green Bay Packers...or Jets Fans..hee hee)