Much ado about a name

And rightly so. The name that we'd give our son will stay with him for the rest of his life. It's just right that we spend most of our time thinking about it. With Xofia, I already knew the moment I learned that we're having a girl. Xofia Enia are modern and shortened versions of my grandmothers' names. With this second baby, it wasn't as easy. Even if I passed the naming responsibility/burden on to my husband, I couldn't help but stick my nose into the process.

The second name, we already knew. We wanted to give him a name that's taken from "Alice" -- my mother-in-law's name. So it was decided long time ago that his second name is going to be Ellis, a variation of "Elijah". Now comes the crucial part. The first name. We wanted it to start with X, the same as Xofia's.

Because it was my husband's turn to name him this time, he was deep in research after much prodding on my part. Triumphantly, he announced "Xian"! I liked it! Much like Christian with a twist, and we'd pronounce it "See-yan". Also, we liked that Xi'an is one of the oldest cities in China with rich history (read: terracotta warriors).

Little did we know that there's an actor named Xian Lim. We didn't know at that time of excitement because, really, we don't watch TV anymore. As anybody in this generation is wont to do, I googled the name "Xian" and google came back with pages and pages of "Xian Lim Scandal". That sent out warning signals. Really? Somebody has a name like that, and he has a scandal?!

Call me cheap and fickle, but that really put me off. I started looking for alternative names we may like. And trust me when I say, there's not much options out there when it comes to names starting with an "X". And Ate Xofi would not let us change the name anymore. She won't stop insisting on calling the baby Baby Xian. I took it in light strides.

Until last week, I wasn't able to slightly convince Xofi to change the name. I think I have found a name I like that the older sister agrees to. I may just have to keep on broaching the idea so she'd get used to it until the baby's out. For now, I plan to just keep the first name a secret. Not for long though, this baby's out in about a month. Excited much! :D