nicknames

In Monday's blog post, I discussed how my wife and I came up with our daughter's name. Today, I figured I would discuss the idea of nicknames.You may have noticed that I never shorten Genevieve's name with a nickname each time I mention her. This is not a coincidence. We have no desire to shorten her name. We think her name is beautiful the way that it is. That's why we picked it. If we wanted her name to be shorter, we would have given her a shorter name. People have asked me what I intend to call Genevieve. My reply: Genevieve. I'm not saying that people are wrong to give nicknames, but Polly and I aren't big fans of them.

I don't mean to come across sounding snobbish or anything like that, but we want our daughter to have an appreciation for her full name. If she chooses to shorten it when she grows up, that will be her decision (though Polly and I would still call her Genevieve). We like her name and intend to continue to call her by it.

It felt good to get that off my chest. Now, after all that, I would like to completely contradict myself and give you our preferred nicknames. As I said, Polly and my preference is for Genevieve's full name to be used. But we acknowledge the fact that others will want to shorten it. There are four nicknames we've been okay with so far. They are:

1. G (can never go wrong with the first letter of a long name)
2. Eve (or Evie)
3. Vieve (pronouncing the "i" as a "long e" sound and the "e" as a "soft e" sound like in the French pronunciation of the name)
4. Viv

We are adamant about avoiding "Gen" or "Genny." I know plenty of people with those nicknames, but that's actually the problem. I don't dislike those names, but we gave our daughter a unique name intentionally. We would prefer a nickname to be unique as well. I think a unique first name is important for someone with as common a last name as "Brown."