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This week, four lucky Chicago Parent readers will win five tickets each to a special sneak preview of “Sing-a-long Little Mermaid” at the Music Box Theatre, 3733 N. Southport Ave., Chicago, at 5:30 p.m. Aug. 22. To win, tell us how you decided on your child’s name. Once you have posted, e-mail your answer, name and Chicago Parent ID to e-dition@chicagoparent.com. In submitting your comments, you are granting Chicago Parent permission to run them now or in the future. You must post and e-mail us for your answer to be counted. We will not release your e-mail information-it is purely for contact purposes. Winners will be chosen at random and may have no affiliation with Wednesday Journal Inc. or its employees.

This contest is now closed. Thanks to everyone who participated.

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Kate Pancero
Assistant Editor/Weekend E-dition Editor
FabMama columnist
Chicago Parent

Boy did I have a hard time trying to convince my husband not to name our son after him--Roosevelt Jason.  I borrowed one of my friend's baby names book and I found Jadon.  I told him that the name would be just like his middle name except we were changing the "s" to a "d".  He finally gave in.  I wouldn't have been able to stomach Roosevelt as my child's first name, no matter how distinguished it sounds!  The name Jadon means "ball of fire" and needless to say, he certainly lives up to his name!  Maybe I should rethink Roosevelt after all.

Hi!

We decided on Matthew because, as two people who work in high schools, we never met a Matthew that we didn't like.  When we found out that the twins were boys, we went with Adam and Zack to start and end the alphabet, with Matt in the middle.  Now, the twins are so different from one another, having initials at opposite ends is perfect!

 

Denise Dalton

Lockport, IL

My husband and I have an agreement that he could name the girl and I can name the boy, so I husband loved the name Vanessa and I said OK to it. But my grandmother recently had passed away so he suggested that her middle name be in honor of my grandmother, which is Victoria, so her name is Vanessa Victoria.

My daughter's dad's name means prince and mine means crown/garland so combining the two we came of with Tiara - of course which means a princess crown. Her dad's middle name is Gabriel so we took a shortened version and voila! "Tiara Briel"...she lives true to her royal name everyday.

Well naming a child can be a really hard process or thinking one at that. I have 4 kids, with 3 girls and 1 boy.  My oldest child is name Abeje, which came from an African book meaning "I asked for her".  When I was pregnant with twins (girls) I didn't know what to name them so I stayed with the "A" names.  Arileyah and Ariyana for the twins names.  When my son came, I just named him after his father, kept it simple.

momw4kids

Two of  ours are family names, two are Biblical names, two are just unique names we liked and the last one is a famous character from literature.

I wanted my children to have names that began with a  "J", as that is one of my favorite letters of the alphabet.  My son is Justin Michael and my daughter is Jessica Pauline.  And then there's my husband, John.  I can't say that I fit into the mix, as my name is Natalie.  Also, I didn't want names that were easy to rhyme with, so they wouldn't have a difficult time in school.  Children can be cruel sometimes.  Their middle names are in honor of a deceased relative to carry on their memory.  

I have 2 girls.  Our first was easy to name.  Simply for her, my husband just loved the name "Amber" and her middle name is "Elizabeth".  Elizabeth was chosen after my Mom who has passed and I wanted to carry on part of her name.  Amber means "precious stone".  She's not a stone, LOL, but she sure is precious and extra special to us after having 2 mis-carriages, she was our ultimate miracle and as precious as can be.  Our second daughter took alot of thinking and sometimes names are hard to decide on.  We came up with "Ashley Nicole".  "Ashley" means "from the ash tree field".  Interesting I guess.  In the end, we wanted both girls to have "A" names and it would be easy to roll off the tongue when you need to yell at them or for them.  Ha ha ha!!!!

Kari Domiter

Berwyn, IL.

Our first child's name was a "no brainer".  My husband wanted his son named after him and so that's what we did.  Simple!  Our second child's name came from the bible story of Hannah.  I always loved the story of how Hannah asked the Lord for a child and she promised she would raise him for God's service and she did.  Well, I did not necessarily ask to conceive my second child, but when my pregnancy was threatened with a possible birth defect I was praying like Hannah for my child.  So, although we had already chosen the name Samuel, his name actually fit because I asked the Lord for him and I told the Lord I would raise him for his glory and I am (with my husband - of course!).

Senia - Chicago

I named both of my children from characters from TV shows.  My daughter's name is Zaria, from the show The Parent Hood with Robert Townsend, it was his daughters name.  My son, I did not know what I was having so I wanted a unisex name, so he is named after Cameryn Manheim from The Practice, but since he is a boy I spelled it Cameron.  Both of them have "M" middle names because that was my middle initial, so there you have it, Zaria Marie and Cameron Michael.

My husband was not as eager to start the baby naming process as I was so it took quite awhile.  Around eight months, I wore him down so badly he began to go through the baby name book letter by letter putting little dots at names he liked.  I did the same, and we discovered we had over 100 names with two dots.  We didn't know [or want to know] the sex of the baby so we sort of gave up.  Then one day I went into labor at work and were total unprepared for "her" arrival.  Late in my pregnancy, I had a dream in which I called the baby Sarah.  So I told my husband her name was Sarah and that was that--she had to be named!  Little did I know he began telling relatives she looked like a little "Anna".  After three days, and pressure from the nursing staff, we decided on a very ethnic middle name from his side of the family to name her and he agreed to it.  Her first name is Sarah and has a very Irish middle name.  I've already named our second child and I'm not even pregnant. I don't want a repeat of the last time.   :-)  It will have a simple common first name and a very ethnic middle Polish name. 

We named our daughter Leila Ivette. Ever since I saw the movie Big Daddy I fell in love with the name Leila then I heard it again in the movie, "the recruiter".  My husband said it was crazy to name our daughter after names I heard in movies but then I heard it again in the soap opera, General Hospital and I knew it was meant to be, Leila.... Her middle name is the same as me, her mom. :)

My choice for my son's first name Trey is for sentimental reasons.  I didn't have a boy name in mind.  I decided to name him after a cousin of mine who's nickname was Tre.  My cousin had died, at age 40, the year before my son was born.  His middle name Lorenz is a representative of two actors I liked,Larenz Tate and Lorenzo Lamas.

tddalton:

Hi!

We decided on Matthew because, as two people who work in high schools, we never met a Matthew that we didn't like. 

I'll start with an awww on that, since my oldest is Matthew!  Named after my grandfather's birth name, before he was adopted and re-named Robert.  We had Roberts, we had everything, but no Matthew.  It was my grandma's suggestion.

And again, from a HUGE family on both sides, our daughter's name was tougher.  I wanted Katie, my husband didn't like it - to this day, he hasn't told me why - we all have our reasons, right?  I settled for Kelly, another fine, Irish name.  I do have an older cousin Kelly, but she lives in MO, and I always liked her!  Both names, a perfect fit!!

This was fun!