Drew Barrymore has revealed the inspiration behind naming her daughter Olive, who is now 10 weeks old. And, nope, it wasn't after my grandmother! Harrumph! Nor was it after her grandmother. Nor was it after a favorite book or movie character. Nor did she conceive under an olive tree. Nor did she have strange cravings for the fruit (yep, it's a fruit) during her pregnancy. Nope, it was something a bit more unexpected that inspired the old-timey name.
Drew told Ellen DeGeneres that she was reading a baby book with her husband when she was three months pregnant, and it said, "Your baby is the size of an olive." Drew was immediately struck by the name. "That was it!" she said. "We never looked back." Cracked Ellen: "It could have been the size of a peanut or a grapefruit. It could have been named kidney bean."
"Kidney's not such a fun name," Drew admitted.
We tend to think of baby names having some sort of greater meaning and being selected after months, if not years, of agonizing consideration, but sometimes it really is just a case of hearing a word or name and liking it, with no "reason" behind it.
My mom heard another mother calling her daughter at the beach and decided she liked the name. So that became me. (She then gave me my nickname, Kiri, which is what most people call me, so perhaps she didn't like my full name as much as she originally thought!) She got my sister's name out of a novel -- and it wasn't a character's name. Just a descriptive term. My friend and her husband were determined to name their daughter after a state. Why? No real reason. So they went through all 50 states until they found one they felt went with their last name. (Indiana.)
I know other people who didn't even bother to pick out names. They felt their baby would "tell" them what his or her name was when they were born. Amazingly, though these children couldn't speak, all of them ended up with names!
Still, I'm really glad that baby book didn't say that Drew's fetus was the size of a "kidney bean."
What inspired your baby's name or your name?
Image via Ellen
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Comments 8
I know a girl named Montana.
@annie - i thought the same thing!
and my kid's names were ones we just heard and loved... and of course they both ended up on the top ten list the years after my kids were born, go figure. :/ the only name i really put that much thought into was my 2nd daughter's middle name. my husband and i were both very close to our respective grandmothers, but both passed away before we had any children. his grandma's name was maria, and my grandma's name was doris. we put the two together, and got Maris. (we'd have done that with our first daughter, but we fell in love with her first name and it didn't "flow" right.)
My daughters name (Brendalynn) came as a flash of insight while watching an episode of CSI with a young Dakota fanning playing a character called Brenda. I was 19 ( I wouldnt have Brendalynn til a few years later) and suddenly decided, if I ever have a daughter Im going to name her Brendalynn. 3 years later I did. My son is Nikolas, and I just liked the name..their middle names are my mom and dads first names.