Here is the game we are playing:<\/p>\n
We are going to pretend that we are naming a baby and that the name MUST start with a certain letter, and so we will need one name starting with that letter for a boy and one name starting with that letter for a girl, or else one name that would work for either, EVEN IF we don’t like any of the names that start with that letter enough to Actually In Real Life choose them. It is just a game where we place artificial restrictions on reality in order to create the kind of tension that makes games fun—like when you have to choose what foods you’d eat if you could only eat three foods for the rest of your life: the fun is in thinking it over AS IF it were a real forced decision, while KNOWING it is not. There is a baby! It MUST be given a name with a particular letter! That is the game.<\/p>\n
After that basic concept, we can decide our own sub-rules, based on what makes the game fun and not stressful. Some examples:<\/p>\n
\u2022 I’m not planning to play that the name has to fit with the names of my other children or with the surname, though this would be an option for anyone who would LIKE to play it that way; I think I will have more fun if I pretend it is a stand-alone baby and that the surname is not an issue, though I may change my mind as we go. (And if I narrow it down to a few options and can’t decide, I might use siblings\/surname as a tie-breaker.)<\/p>\n
\u2022 It is also fine to narrow it down to a few finalists without getting to The One Name.<\/p>\n
\u2022 It is fine to wave aside issues such as a friend who already used that name, a famous person with the name, etc., if that makes it more fun and less stressful to choose. This is just pretend, so you can pretend that those things aren’t issues if you want to. (Or you can let the issues stand as they are in real life, if THAT is more fun.)<\/p>\n
\u2022 We can also all make our own decisions about whether the names have to be ones we think we’d ACTUALLY USE in that hypothetical scenario, or just our FAVORITE names starting with that letter, regardless of whether we think the names are practical; I am not sure which way I will play it, and I likely won’t be consistent.<\/p>\n
\u2022 If you already have a child with a name starting with the letter we’re working on, you get to pick again from all the names that remain; you don’t have to choose your child’s name as your favorite just because it WAS your favorite: this is a FRESH baby, and you wouldn’t give it the same name as your existing child. (If you would normally prefer not to repeat an initial within a sibling group, you can just pretend that’s NOT a preference for the sake of the game.)<\/p>\n
\u2022 You can do as much or as little explanation as you like in your comment: you can just list the names you chose, or you can explain your process\/preferences\/reasoning\/runners-up, or whatever is most fun.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Today’s letter is S. I have Sabrina, Sally, and Simone on my girl-name list already. I’d want to consider Seraphina, Sophronia\/Phronsie<\/a>, Susanna(h), and Sylvia, too. But I think I would end up choosing Sabrina.<\/p>\n I have an S name on my boy-name list already, too, and it’s Simon; however, we named a cat Simon. (My policy going forward: NO POTENTIAL GRANDCHILD NAMES FOR ANIMALS.) A recent surprising addition to my list is Stanley, which came from watching the show Detectorists<\/a>, which I recommend for nice calm viewing in These Stressful Times; I have a Cute Boy association with the name, because of Stan in the Beverly Cleary book Fifteen<\/a>. I have had Shepard\/Shep and Smith on my list, but I don’t think I’d use either one. I like Solomon, but people already think we’re a religious homeschooling family and I don’t want to feed into that. Oh, Sullivan! I’ve had Sullivan on my list. I like that. I think if I were naming an actual child of mine, though, I would end up using Simon, with the for-the-game assumption that everyone could get over the issue of the cat’s name.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Now you! If you want to! Only if it’s fun and not stressful! Feel free to adjust the game-play to be fun and not stressful!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Here is the game we are playing: We are going to pretend that we are naming a baby and that the name MUST start with a certain letter, and so we will need one name starting with that letter for a boy and one name starting with that letter for a girl, or else one […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[8,4,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14959","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-alphabet","category-favorites","category-reference"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3iyiG-3Th","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14959","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14959"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14959\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14960,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14959\/revisions\/14960"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14959"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14959"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14959"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}