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Photo by Julie Ryan Evans; Lila Claire and her brother, NolanI always thought naming a girl would be fun, but when it came time to name my daughter, it was painful.
My husband hated my favorite names ("Eleanor" and "Beatrice") and refused to let me use any combination of names that could result in an embarrassing monogram or future email address -- which actually ruled out quite a few. Too trendy, too tacky, too many dogs with the same name ...
In the end, we came up with one we both liked pretty well: "Lila Claire."
I liked the traditional feel of a two-name name and the way it sounded together. Unfortunately, it's rarely used together.
Now I understand why friends and family who we see regularly don't call her "Lila Claire," because my husband and son often call her only "Lila," and occasionally I do too. But what absolutely floors me is strangers who refuse to call her by the name I give them.
It never fails. I'll be in a store, and someone will stop to talk to us.
"What's her name?" they'll ask.
"Lila Claire," I'll reply.
"Oh, Lila, that's pretty."
"Yes, we really liked Lila CLAIRE," I'll respond.
"Well, it was nice to meet you, Lila," they'll say as they wave good-bye and I'm left a little annoyed, but mostly amazed at just how often this happens.
In fact, I'm not sure any stranger has ever repeated back to me her full name.
For years, two-name names were common (Mary Beth, Peggy Sue, Cindy Lou Who ... ). It's not like I'm asking them to include her Social Security number, just the name I gave her. Apparently that's asking too much.
Do you people call your child by the wrong name?
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Comments (14)
I think perhaps people are assuming that Claire is her middle name, which is why they leave it off. Perhaps if you gave them her name plus her middle name, they would get the idea that Claire is part of her first name.
My oldest son is Nicholas, and we call him Nico for short. I don't mind if some people call him Nick instead, but I hate when people try and call him Nicky.
My second son is Lucas, and I refuse to allow to call him anything but that. His name is not Luke, Lue and especially not Luey.
Hello,
I get your frustrations but the only problem I see is you not correcting them properly. instead of saying we prefer Lila Claire, say no her name is Lila Claire. Although it might have been common then it might not be seen that way now. Some might even take Claire as a middle name. You should either explain or just not let it be such a big deal. I am sorry if this sound harsh but say what you mean, mean what you say. Or just say she don't like her name shortened.
I don't have that problem as our daughter only has the one first name... Hannah. We selected that name because we thought "well you can't go wrong with Hannah- the worst that will happen is people this day in age will call her Hannah Montana" (gag me), right?Thank GOD that doesn't happen as often as I worried it would....
What does get to me though is when people leave off the last "h"- Hanna. It looks so incomplete! And the classic way to spell it is HannaH! I'm not sure why this bothers me so much, but it really does. I can even spell it out for them and they STILL leave out the last "h"!
I guess no matter what you name your child, someone somewhere is eventually going to give the child a nickname, spell it wrong, pronounce it wrong, etc... there are no "safe" names these days.
I think you're being a bit petty. Most people probably think of Claire as her MIDDLE name, not a part of her first name.
My daughter Is Victoria Mae, but on her birth certificate, Mae is listed as her middle name. Even still, I like to call her Victoria Mae. I don't expect other people to follow suit. I don't introduce her as Victoria Mae.
Now, my aunt was always called Janie Mae. That was her full name.
I think the issue is that a lot of people introduce their babies by their full names. As new parents, we are so proud of the perfect names we have chosen that we often want to share the whole name with everyone! Also, with babies, most people are asking to hear the first and middle names. Once your daughter gets older, and you introduce her as Lila Claire, people will catch on more quickly that it's a double first name!
Our son is named Timothy. My entire family calls him Timothy. My husband's family, however, all but two of them call him Timmy. Telling them "His name is Timothy" doesn't work. I honestly think they do it just to annoy us.
We're naming our second child Ayla. When we told my mother-in-law, she told us she didn't like it. My guess is that she can't come up with a nickname for it. I think she even tried suggesting other names for us. My husband's aunt, upon hearing her full name (Ayla Claire), paused and said "I'll call her Claire." Fine, and she'll call you George.
We have the oppisite issue with my daughter, when people ask they seem to expect to hear her middle name too. I've quit telling people my daughter's middle name because then they screw her name up, her name is Leah (lee-uh) and her middle name is Ann. If someone hears her middle name they automatically think her name is Leanne or Leanna and it drives me nuts. She's 3 years old and my aunt's husband's family STILL thinks her name is Leanne and no matter how many times I've corrected them they still call her that.
People probably assume it's not a 2 name first name, but rather her first and middle. I don't think it is a personal snub...
My in-laws refer to my 3.5 year old daughter as "it!!!" I put up with this when she was still in-utero (although I did NOT like it!) but it makes me cringe every time they say "It likes green beans" etc. Come on!!! She is named after THEIR son so it's not like it's a weird name to them. :( I respond back with yes SHE does or yes Christina does. They haven't picked up on my hints yet. Grrr!