When we were picking out names for our kids, one thing I was certain about was that I wanted their name to be their name. No nickname, just a name.
Here's the deal:
I love my name. It is beautiful and classy and I love the story behind it, but it can be confusing.
I love my name. It is beautiful and classy and I love the story behind it, but it can be confusing.
My real name is Katherine but I grew up Katie.
My family and close friends always called me Kate as a nickname to Katie.
Kev met me through my family, so to him, my name is Kate.
Ever since we started dating, he introduces me as Kate, so his friends, people in North Carolina and Monterey call me Kate.
People in DC who knew me before call me Katie.
New DC friends call me Kate.
My facebook says Katie, my email is Kate.
Obviously my blog is Kate. But my voicemail Katie.
Obviously my blog is Kate. But my voicemail Katie.
I now introduce myself as Kate, but don't correct someone if they call me Katie.
So if we ever become facebook friends and then you worry that you have been calling me the wrong name all this time, don't- it's not you, it's me. And I have some identity confusion.
Completely unrelated picture of the boys at this time last year.
Remember how amazing Bennett's mullet was?
Completely unrelated picture of the boys at this time last year.
Remember how amazing Bennett's mullet was?
Hope you have a great weekend!
19 comments:
I'm with you on nicknames, I want our kids names to be their names not nicknames. Everyone on Joe's side of the family has translated their names into ending with (y)... Joe growing up was Joey and his 2 sisters ended with that (y) sound as well. Me no nickname, wasn't allowed. No Mandy here. But I find that I have nicknamed my cats ending with a (y) sound... Normie and Boozie (really Contessa).
Strange how nicknames work out. (:
I went through a phase in college where I introduced myself as Meg instead of Meghan so I have a group of friends that call me Meg while everyone else calls me Meghan. And I totally understand what your saying... My husband is Chris to me but Christopher or CJ to his family. We didn't do it on purpose but I'm glad there's no nickname for Noah. There are a lot of names I like but don't like the nickname for it and therefore has been eliminated.
OMG!!! Bennett is such a BABY in that picture! Crazy how quickly they change from baby to little kid, huh?!
I guess we aren't much on nicknames either. Adelle was Addie June as a baby, but as she has grown we mainly call her Adelle.
I love Kate as a nickname. My niece is Katherine too and I think it is a beautiful name :)
I never thought of you as a Katie! My college girlfriends call me Lizzy, HS friends call me Liz and now everyone else knows me as Elizabeth.
Oooh love that baby mullet. We get those at our house too!
I feel the same way! I always said whatever I name my kids will be their full name, which is why I chose names you couldn't shorten! LOL My parents named me Elizabeth but then they called me Lizzie ever since I can remember, now when I get called Elizabeth I want to cringe
Haha I'm in the same boat. My real name is Jennifer but everyone mostly call me Jen. My Dad is the only one allowed to call me Jenny. :)
My sister-in-law, Margaret, is like you in being called different things by different people, including her full name for work purposes, but Meg and Megan by different sets of relatives and friends. I hope you have a great weekend, too!
Bennett has grown so much!!! It's funny I have the opposite take on nicknames. My parents tried picking names that you couldn't shorten, because my mom is like you and goes by several different names. My brother is Justin, which works. (With me, they forgot about Hil.) Anyways, I always wanted a nickname for my brother so badly that it is a priority to me that my kids have nicknames. In fact we almost exclusively call our Bennett Benny.
My daughters first and middle name is Dannika Jane. It drives me crazy when people call her Danni or DJ. My sons name is Mattis. People already have started calling him "Matti". Ugh
Funny that you wrote about identity confusion due to lots of nicknames - my sister is an Elizabeth and definitely feels that - even more so since she goes by Liz so even her initials aren't the same - and she's in healthcare so she does have to initial things a lot - and when she writes EM she says she gets some confusion because everyone knows her as Liz :) I seriously remember her going through at least 10 nicknames as a kid - Liz, Lizzy, Lizzie, Lizi (with hearts over the i's), Betsy, Eliza Jane, Beth..... ridiculous. My name is truly un-nicknameable so I was always a little jealous.
I feel like no matter how hard you try, nicknames just emerge. I got called Harold by my dad (which makes literally no sense), and then many derivatives of my last name by people for a long time. My kids are Anne and Lucas so there are very obvious nicknames for those (Annie and Luke) but we end up calling them the strangest things - bunk for Annie, and muffin for Luke. ?! Wonder how long that'll stick!
I've been in that boat! I've always been known as Susan. When I was little, my dad used to call me my full name Susan Therese all the time, like it was one name. Around age 18, my sister at the time started calling me Sue. It stuck with my sisters, but no one else is really allowed to call me Sue. It just sounds weird when other people say it! But I like it when people call me Suz, that's ok :) My cousin just named her baby Katherine and calls her Kate. I love that name!
haha...I am torn on the nickname thing. My oldest we named, knowing we would use the shortened version. However my husband really loved the long version so we compromised and named her Rayana, but I always call her Raya. At school she goes by Rayana right now, because I want her to learn to write her whole name....but I'm sure that when she's older kids will shorten it.
For my youngest I decided I was tired of the nickname thing so we named her Brielle and never call her anything else. Much less confusing!
Growing up though I was always super jealous of kids who had multiple names/nicknames lol.
ha! I love this! My name is not really nick-nameable which I've been very thankful for at times!
I have some one-syllable names picked out for future babies...to some people, "Kristin" was just too difficult and they'd try to shorten it to "Kris" or "Kristi" (BLECH!). Therefore, I have plans for classic names.
I think I prefer Kate to Katie. :)
I was given the name TT and ToeToe growing up because my initials were T.T. (before getting married) by my dad and cousins it just kinda stuck from there and my bother was JT or bubby depending on who it was talking / calling him. Again initials as well. My husband's name is Jared but he doesn't go by that, in fact a few months back my director at work asked who Jared G****** was and it took me off guard. He goes by Gabe, all of our friends call him Gabe and we with introduce him / or he introduces himself as Gabe. The name Jared is just so foreign to me.
I absolutely LOVE double names, I have a double middle name and I plan to give my kiddos double names as well.
Haha I know what you mean. I personally am just "Megan" to pretty much everyone, but after helping with so many sorority recruitments this year and trying to keep all the women with their nicknames or alternate spellings or being called by their middle names straight, I decided I want to name my kids something that has one spelling and no nickname. It's harder than I thought to come up with name ideas, though! And now I'm interested to read the story behind your name....
Well this explains so much! Haha! You KNOW I love Kate, but you will always be Katie to me! This is why I am 99% sure we will actually name our little girl KATE - not Katie, not Katherine, just KATE (so maybe there won't be the confusion of shortening a long name).
But then again, people always find a way to do nicknames. There is absolutely no way to shorten "Ericka" and yet I have a couple of people who have always called me "EB", one who called me "Little E" and a whole handful who call me just "E" to this day! I don't know how an initial can become a nickname but it has for me. (Luckily I don't mind. :)
I've always wondered about this a little bit. I played around with going to Kate when I went to college but couldn't do it! I love how you can go either way:)
EVERYONE mispronounces my name. It's J-ANNA, but everyone wants to say J-enna, J-oanna, J-ina, etc. I don't correct anyone and answer to whatever, because my friends and fam always correct people and get mad, haha. My sister's name is Kathleen and everyone calls her Katie too!
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