A Rose by any Other Name

Today for Unique Names Day we're supposed to be renaming ourselves. The topic that we advertised is to think of ten names we might like to try. However, I'm just not going to follow the rules! I like my name. I get that some people named Jennifer, Mark, or Emily might get tired of always having to add an initial when referring to themselves. On the other hand, I've never had that issue. Of course, I've never found my name on a pencil, t-shirt, or key chain in the souvenir shop, but we all have our crosses to bear.

Instead of ten names that I'd like to try out, I thought I'd tell you ten names I have gone by in my life.

1. Rabia--Well of course I've gone by my own name. That's how my parents intended it! If you want to see the story behind my name you can click here.
2. Rabie-june--I think I've explained this one before too. In Farsi the suffix 'june' is an endearment. Since my parents lived in the Middle East and spoke the language for so long, the term stuck around and frequently gets appended to my name.
3. Poopsie--My dad's kinda silly. That's where I get it from, I guess. He's always called me his Poopsie. Sometimes, if I'm really lucky, I get to be Poopsie-june.
4. Sissy--I don't honestly recall if my brother called me this growing up, but I do know Alan uses it now. And we call Frances Sissy quite often as well.
5. Miss Brainard--That was my maiden name. When I started working in schools during my college classes that's what all the kids called me. It was always strange to hear. Mrs. Brainard is my mother!
6. Mrs. Lieber--Way back in June of 2001 I changed my name when I got married. I taught 2nd grade for three years as Mrs. Lieber. The first year it took a lot of getting used to!
7. Mommy--The name I am most frequently known by these days. The kids have tried out 'Mama' and 'Mom," but I'm not fond of either of those. Mommy it is!
8. When I left teaching in the public schools, I took a position in a private preschool. The kids there always referred to me as Ms. Rabia. The kids I teach at church frequently still call me that. Some of the kids' friends call me Ms. Rabia too, but most of them call me "Frances' mom," "Henry's mom," or "Benjamin's mom."
9. MamaRab or MamaRabia--That's a name that came about at my current job. I work with college students now. I've gotten to know some of them quite well and become close with a number of them. Megan is the one who started this nickname back when she was asking life advice or bumming Advil and bandaids off of me during her shifts. I liked the name so much, I borrowed it as my Twitter and Instagram handles.
10. Raybeeya, Robbie-bibbia, Robie, Rabby, etc.--Obviously with a strange and unique name you get lost of mispronunciations. These are some of my favorites. The second one is only used by my friend Stacey as a reference to how badly one of my preschool parents used to butcher my name! I will say it comes in quite handy for weeding out the telemarketers, though!

Do you like your name? Have you ever thought about changing it? What would you prefer to go by if you had the choice?

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<a href="http://www.thelieberfamily.com” title="The Liebers" target="_blank"><img src="http://i1291.photobucket.com/albums/b552/lspoon1/19cef8c1-afb5-4c38-b3bd-5f09bd4d4937_zps0e6fb14d.png" alt="The Liebers" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

If Parents Named Their Children Like Children Name Their Stuffed Animals

Baby naming is a big deal these days!!  There are entire websites dedicated to picking out names that go with a certain trend or match each other in special ways.  Lots of people get flak for making up crazy names or spelling them in a unique way.  Celebrities can be a special kind of crazy about names.  I'll even admit to being a bit particular about my own children's names.  Because I was teaching when all three of my children were born, I made a special effort to stay away from popular names.  My reasoning was that I couldn't bear to call out a name all day long and then go home and continue saying it.  I got a real winner with Frances.  She is named after both of my grandmothers and 10 years later her name is still not showing up on lists.  Henry, on the other hand, is a name I am hearing more and more often.  I blame Julia Roberts, who named her son Henry 10 days after I did!  COPYCAT!!  Benjamin is on all the lists.  In my defense, I thought he was going to be a she.  And the name I had ready is not trending, so I would have been okay with that one.

I got to thinking recently, though, about what would happen if parents named their kids like kids name their dolls.  First let me introduce you to a few friends at our house:

This is Baby Tiger

This is Baby Tiger

This is...Baby Tiger

The top two Baby Tigers belong to Henry.  The bottom one is Benjamin's.  In this case, I would have a little girl named "Little Girl" and two little boys named "Little Boy."  That might get a bit confusing, but honestly, I call both of the boys Bubby at times and they seem to figure it out.  I mean George Foreman named 5 of his 12 children George (and one Georgette)!!

 Moving on...

This is Lemurty

 I guess I would have had to go with "Girly" and "Boy-y."  That one would be hard on a spelling test, right?

This is Fancy Mickey.

 Naming a child based on looks is hard.  Their adult self looks very different from their newborn self.  I would have had three kids named "Baldy!"  That wouldn't go over well in the corporate world!  Or maybe I could have named them all "Brown Eyes."  If I waited till they had gotten some personality, Frances could have been named "Stripes with Plaid!"

This is Beary Bear.

And this is Bunny Bun.

 Going off of this theme, I guess the kids would have been named "Girly-Girl" and "Boy-y Boy."  Maybe I could even go with "Kiddy-Kid" for a little variety. 

This is Unicornia.

I have no idea where to go with that one...

But it's better than trying to work off this:

That's Benjamin and his teddy, "Nothin' the Bear"

How about you?  What would your kids be named if you based it off of their stuffed animal collection?

Benjamin, On Turning Three

I interviewed Benjamin the other night while we were waiting for his brother and sister to get their pajamas on.  I like doing this interview with my kiddos near their birthdays so I can have a record of how their answers change as they grow.

1. What is your favorite color? Blue
2. What is your favorite toy? motorcycle (I hear stories every afternoon about whose turn it was to play with the motorcycle at day care)
3. What is your favorite fruit? oranges and strawberries
4. What is your favorite tv show?  Team Umizoomi
5. What is your favorite thing to eat for lunch? strawberries & "the other chicken" (He was referring to my audacity to serve some chicken and black bean concoction instead of plain chicken tenders for dinner the other evening.)
6. What is your favorite outfit? a shark shirt
7. What is your favorite game? trains
8. What is your favorite snack? strawberries
9. What is your favorite animal? a giraffe
10. What is your favorite song? "A B C D E" (and then he sang it for me)
11. What is your favorite book? His Mickey Muse search and find book
12. Who is your best friend? Daniel & Simon
13. What is your favorite cereal? both (he likes to mix regular Cheerios and Honey Nut Cheerios)
14. What is your favorite thing to do outside? bikes
15. What is your favorite drink? lemonade
16. What is your favorite holiday? winter
17. What do you like to take to bed with you at night? giraffes
18. What is your favorite thing to eat for breakfast? chicken (haha!)
19. What do you want for dinner on your birthday? cake (hahaha!)
20. What do you want to be when you grow up? a monster "Grrrrrr  ARRRRRGGGGHHHH!!"

And after the interview, just for fun, I asked him his whole name.  He replied, "Benjamin Uncle Alan Lieber."   I LOVE IT!!  Have I ever told this back story?

The book is called "I Was So Mad" hence the facial expression.

One night the kids were talking about their names.  You may recall from this post that Frances is named after both of my grandmothers.  When it was time for Henry to come along I felt like we should pick names from Ken's side of the family.  Ken's maternal grandfather was named Henry and that name "fit" with Frances' name so we picked it.  Ken didn't really want his first name used, so we went with Charles for a middle name.  It's Ken's middle name and his father's first name, so it counts double.

Did I mention that we never found out ahead of time what our kids' genders would be.  I knew Frances was going to be a girl and I knew Henry was going to be a boy.  So far we were two for two.  I knew that Benjamin was going to be a girl, so we had a great girl name picked out and ready to go.  When Benjamin was born, Ken said, "I have good news and bad news.  The good news is we have a beautiful new child. The bad news is we don't have a name!"

We spent a lot of time in the hospital going back and forth on names.  We really couldn't decide on anything. Somehow we came to Benjamin and agreed on that, but couldn't figure out a middle name.  Someone (not Alan) suggested the name Alan and I liked the sound of it.  Alan is also my dad's middle name, so it counts double too.

Back to the night my kids were talking about their names...The older two know who they were named after, and they are quite proud of the stories. Then they told Benjamin that he was named after Uncle Alan.  From that point on, Benjamin has told us that his name is "Benjamin Uncle Alan Lieber."  Makes sense, right??

Check back on Monday for a report on birthday festivities!  Have a great weekend, friends!