What is in a name?

Not much happening lately other than work and normal daily routine. I finally got cleared by the doctor to go back to working out. I had a stress fracture in my foot and bad tendonitis. I was in a boot air cast for 2 months and then physical therapy for a month. I gained some weight and am glad to be back working out. It motivates me to eat better too. My neighbors are very good about walking and have recruited me to walk with them. The loop around the neighborhood is about 1.2 miles. After two weeks I can do 2-3 loops a walk. It feels really good and is especially nice to have people to walk with. I have really become good friends with my neighbors (Chris & Leila). They wrote a very nice letter of recommendation for my adoption and are very supportive and excited about the adoption. They don't have any kids and have already told me they will spoil her rotten.

So I checked out a bunch of baby name books from the library a week or so ago. There are too many. It seems that names are so important. I would hate to curse my daughter with a bad name. I always thought my own name was pretty plain "Susan Marie." Maybe that is why I have always felt like a plain person. Or maybe that is why I am so down to earth and practical. Anyway, I had a few ideas of names before I checked out the books.

Evelyn was my grandmother's name. One book says it means "hazelnut" another says it means "optimistic." I know it sounds old fashioned but it is also not a terribly common name anymore and I would probably call her Evvy. That has been the name that has stuck with me for quite a while.

Elizabeth is also a nice name that I like. One book says it means "consecrated of God." I had a sister named Stacy Elizabeth. She died on the same day she was born due to a birth defect. I thought it would be a nice tribute to her short life. One of my favorite movies is Pride & Prejudice (have the A&E version as well as the newest version). I love the character Elizabeth in that movie. She is strong willed, thinks for herself and doesn't care what anyone else thinks about her. If I name my daughter Elizabeth, I would probably call her Lizzy which the book says means "devout.". There are a ton of variations/nicknames that come from Elizabeth and it is a nice name when she gets older.

Middle names that I am thinking of are May, Mae and Marie. May is my mother's middle name and I would really like to honor her because she has always been so supportive of me. In one of the name books it says it means "bright flower." Another book says it means "great", "discerning" or "flower." Mae is a variation of May and is part of my dad's stepmom's name (Flora Mae). Another one is Marie. That is my middle name and was my grandmother's (mom's mom) middle name. I also thought it would have some latin connection to Maria.

I guess I am more a traditionalist as far as names are concerned. I may look at the books some more. One of the books is quite interesting. It doesn't so much give meanings of names but it rates them as far as popularity through history. It shows trends and also shows names that would be good sibling names for both brothers and sisters. Not that I am thinking that far ahead of having a brother or sister for my girl.

Well, if anyone has any advise on naming, I would welcome feedback. No guarantees on whether or not I will take the advise but I would be interested in how other poeple chose their children's names.

I am in a waiting mode right now as far as the adoption goes. I am still waiting for my USCIS (INS/Immigration) approval to come through. It has been almost two weeks which is the short end of the average wait time of 2-6 weeks. I did notice they cashed my check so maybe that is a good sign that the paperwork is being processed.

I did apply for a couple of grants this past week to see if I can get any help financing the adoption. I need to write another proposal to give to my employer who offers no paid time off or any other adoption benefits. I gave a proposal that I received from the Dave Thomas foundation to one of my HR reps who said he would forward it to the appropriate corporate HR person. I have my doubts that he got it to the right person. Anyway, I have decided that I would do the proprosal over again and send it electronically the the VP of Human Resources at our company and maybe she can channel it to the right person at the main corporate office who handles the benefits for all the subsidiaries. That is one of the things that I plan on working on this holiday weekend. I really would like them to pay me for part of the time off that I am taking when I bring my daughter home. They should at least give me 6 weeks paid time off like they do when mothers give birth at the company. Those mothers are covered under short term disability insurance so it isn't officially "maternity leave."

Well, I am going to sign off for now. I will hopefully write some more this weekend. I just got a laptop at work to bring home for when I am "on call." So now I have wireless networking at home and can sit on the couch with my laptop and type on this blog. Much better than sitting back in the office.

Hoping for a sunny weekend and some time at the waterpark.

Later,
Susan