Royal Baby | Classic & Popular English Names!

Howdy!

I have been wanting to publish this post for MONTHS! Back in November, I decided to talk to you about all of my thoughts about The Duke and Duchess of Sussex expecting their first child! However, I wanted to have time to really think about the names that this child would be called, and I am finally ready to tell you, plus give you a few other cute English names that could help give you a royal edge as well!

Since it was confirmed that Meghan would either give birth sometime in April or early May, I knew the middle of March would be the perfect time to release this post to the world as part of the last minute pickings before the newest Windsor baby would arrive and we figure out how wrong (or right) we were with our choices! I still believe what I said in my previous post about their child being referred to as “Lord” or “Lady” instead of having a princely title. However, I realized I forgot something important to keep in mind if they do indeed have a boy, and that is the first son is usually given the title “Viscount” and the second son is the one to be called “Lord” or “Honourable”instead! That’s all I wanted to say before we go any further into the post.

One of the differences between The Duke and Duchess of Sussex and The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge is that since Prince William is the first son to the throne after his father Charles, Prince Of Wales, is that he and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge needed to use respectful and royalty-type names for their children. Prince George, Princess Charlotte, and Prince Louis are all very well-loved among the public and the royal family. However, I never got that feeling with Prince Harry and Meghan, Duchess Of Sussex. They are really a royal couple of the modern age. So, I added a section in the picture above of both sexes of names that are usually popular with regular couples in both America and Great Britain. I also needed to keep in mind that instead of using his real name: Henry, he goes by his nickname “Harry” and the same goes with The Duchess as her first name is Rachel when she uses her middle name “Meghan” so when I began to look for possible names for their little one, I had pick out names that could work out for these situations too!

I’m going to begin with talking about the possible girl names. I have four that jumped out at me the most and could be good first names and they were…

HENRIETTA LOUISE: The origins for this name is of course, the female variation of Henry. Although it is an older name, I still think it would be cute to see again. It already has royal quality as it was used with King Charles I’s wife Henrietta Maria. Nicknames include: Hattie, Etta, and Ree.

MATILDA JANE: This name comes from Germany, and means “mighty”. It has shown up throughout the English and Scottish royals. There’s another version that has been pretty popular throughout the many generations of the royal family, and that is “Maud” but I feel this has some promise because it’s sweet and sort of a formal name to use the name “Tillie” as this has grown in popularity recently. Nicknames include: Mattie, and Tilda.

NORA ELIZABETH: I picked this because it could play out as both a first name or a nickname for the name “Eleanor” instead. Nora is adorable and little that I feel like it has a big following, especially over the last couple of years. The name Eleanor, has been used a lot throughout British history, the first one to come to mind is Eleanor of Aquitaine, the Queen Consort of Henry II of England.

SOPHIA DIANA: This has been my #1 pick for the past four months! It was really popular here in the US for a few years, and I feel it is still is well-used but I think it could gain the top spot back on the various yearly name lists if they use it too. Unfortunately, the name “Sophia” hasn’t been used among the royals as much. The last one was King George III’s wife and Queen Consort, Sophia Charlotte, and their daughter Princess Sophia, she never married and has no descendants. Nicknames include: Sophie and Fia.

Now it is time for the boy names and I don’t know why, but I always have difficulty coming up with clever boy names. Trust me, I didn’t feel like I was much help to my sister when she found out that she was having a boy instead of a girl. However, there are a few names on this list that are a better chance of appearing with The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, so I hope you like this mini stack of names too!

CHARLES HENRY: I think after Prince Louis’s birth and name reveal, everybody started to realize that the royal family really like to repeat names, especially if they have a strong meaning for the couple! That’s why I picked Charles, because let’s face it, there is a greater chance of this name showing up than Meghan’s own father! The name Charles though has had a bad rap throughout British royal history, such as the beheading of King Charles I, but since times have changed and evolved, I think the name can take a whole new life in the modern world! Nicknames include: Charlie and Hank.

NICHOLAS GEORGE: The name Nicholas isn’t common among the British royal family, as much as other monarchies around the world. The reason why I put it on the traditional side is because, Tsar Nicholas II of Russia was first cousins to George V. I think the name is very strong and kind of spunky, I’ve always loved it and it would be nice to see it here! Nicknames include: Nick, Nicky, and Nico.

OLIVER WILLIAM: Now when I was thinking of the lesser classical names, I was pretty stumped for a good few months. So, I had to look online at various baby name websites to see what was popular in the last year and Oliver jumped out at me and I thought, this is really cute! It has the sophistication to be a possible royal name, but it has also has its modern flare as well. And I can definitely see the nickname “Ollie” being used for him too!

SPENCER JOSEPH: This is the name that everybody is hoping and praying for, since Prince Harry is seen to be more attached to Princess Diana’s family legacy and her siblings. Since my last post, I discussed that there could be a small possibility that if the first born son, could be awarded with the title of Earl of Spencer down the line, but after finding out that the current heir, Charles, has two sons, it kind of made me rethink my original notion. I think the name itself is very regal, and cute for a baby boy of the 21st Century! Nicknames include: Spence, Joe, and Joey.

Before I go, I wanted to let you all know that I will be starting a “little” tag on my blog’s Facebook page starting in April! It’s called the ABC Baby Names Tag and instead of doing it all at once, I’ve separated it out into six months. So, every Wednesday from April to the end of September, there will be TWO names for every letter of the alphabet. I would love for you to list your favorites in the comments each week too!

So, now I am officially finished with the post! I’m comfortable with my last minute choices and I believe any one of them have a strong case against them! My mom was very surprised with them as well! And now we wait…

Are you curious as to what the Duke and Duchess of Sussex will name their child? Do you have any guesses as to what he or she could be named too? Let me know!

Becoming An Auntie

Howdy!

What is it about babies that’s so intoxicating? I know they smell amazing and I’m still shocked that Glade or Yankee Candle hasn’t figured out a way to bottle that stuff up by now, but seriously, why do they have the power to take control of a person so fast?

Whenever my mom takes away Nolan from my bed, after having a time of snuggles, I am so sad, having a little human just laying out on a white fleece blanket is so cute and addicting! He looks so conformable and warm, but he has so much innocence upon his wrinkled face. His strawberry blond hair sticks up on the top of his head, and as he stretches out his arms and legs. At this point in his life, he doesn’t know about my disability. He just knows she likes to do goofy faces and sing to him. You feel mesmerized, and so out of touch with your surroundings because you don’t want to miss out on anything.

On June 12th, my sister went to her last check up to see if she was dilated any more than the day before. This pregnancy wasn’t a walk in the park for her. She was pretty miserable throughout the whole thing, and constantly asked my mom and some of her friends, who recently had babies, if they ever experienced this or that. Little man has been wanting to come out of the “bat cave” since April! So when she found that it was time to go to the hospital to get this show on the road, she was nervous but I’m sure kind of excited to finally met him after all this time.

My day started normally, well, actually I didn’t sleep very well the night before so I was actually looking forward to sleeping in that morning. That plan shattered when my Aunt Laurie texted me that Blondie was on her way to the hospital, within five seconds after reading that, my mom called my dad to get dressed. At 10am, we got there to their fairly large room and we sat in our uncomfortable chairs–including my push wheelchair! We sat in there and talked, but the majority of the time everybody was on their phones. I was happy that I decided to bring along a book, because I read the crap out of it in those fourteen hours!

My parents and I went outside a couple times, just to get out of that room for a bit. They went out a lot more than I did though. My dad and I ate down in the cafeteria for lunch, we had to eat a salad because that was the only thing that looked good. Surprisingly, we both enjoyed it, even though we both kept farting through the rest of the day! After we went down to the gift shop and looked around, we got around the little onesies with funny sayings but what got my attention were these booties, we could find IU and Purdue pretty easily, but in the corner of my eye I spotted a navy blue and hoped that they were Butler booties and they were! So, of course, we had to get them for him because he already has a Butler onesie, he needs something to keep his little toes warm too!

She had to have her doctor break her water, she was really afraid of it and at this time, dad had to leave the room (but he left like three separate times because he doesn’t like to his girls cry) and I sat in my chair facing the inside of the bathroom, with tears rolling down my face. I don’t like to hear/see her cry either! Blondie went through nine hours before caving in to get the epidural done and which case, we all had to leave the room. Afterwards, she started to become very relaxed, they gave her a “peanut” which is this inflatable, peanut shaped ball to put in between her legs to help him come down. The epidural worked so well, that her legs were so numb that she had a hard time moving them on her own, and for some odd reason I thought about the time when we went into a hot tub for the first time and how it took three people to get me out because my lower half was asleep!

When she finally reached ten centimeters, my dad and I were forced to leave the room and go wait in their waiting room. My parents are not patient by any means, but I am. I was very proud of myself and how I did sitting in the chair, keeping to my book. As we sat in the waiting room, watching Impractical Jokers on the television. My mom finally texted him that he was here after what felt like an hour. He got stuck coming out and they had some issues, but they were both fine. Once he got that message, we waited outside the door, which was a bad idea for dad because he was already having trouble with his knees.

Little Nolan Wayne was born on June 13th, and weighed 7 pounds, 8 ounces and was 21 inches long! I found out that they did name him after Christopher Nolan, who directed The Dark Knight series, but Brandon also said he was named for Nolan Range, I guess he voiced or came up with the character Deadpool. Wayne is actually Brandon’s middle name, but since he’s a big Batman/Bruce Wayne fan, it kind of fits there too!

Once we were finally allowed into the room, it was so surreal.

As we left the room to get ready for the birth, I thought to myself “this is when everything changes. She won’t be just your sister, she’ll be a mommy too.” So to hear this little baby crying outside the room for the first time was weird but amazing. We stayed for a little bit, but we eventually went home and ate our McDonald’s and went to bed. Later that morning, we came back and they were in their new room, and this time Blondie was doing skin to skin with him and I finally got to see his face. Before we went back home, I actually got to hold the little tyke and it was so strange to feel his weight on my belly and the movements of his fingers underneath my lifeless hands.

He just turned a month old last week, so he’s growing stronger and has the face of my dad! He smiles and tends to smirk to anybody that is speaking to him.  He’s chilled out on my bed many times and threw a punch, kicked my stomach and thighs a few times. I like to kiss the top of his head. I just enjoy watching the different facial reactions appear, like his content sigh he makes when he’s comfortable and of course the poop-y expressions. He is just a sweet thing, and I can’t believe I am this little rugrat’s auntie now!

Nolan’s Nursery Tour!

Howdy!

Well… he’s here!

We all thought he’d either arrive the day before but instead she went into labor at like 10am Tuesday and had him at almost one o’clock Wednesday morning! I’m hoping to actually write another blog post in a couple of days and that’ll have more of the stuff that happened during both labor and delivery, so you’l just have to be a little patient for me, because I’m both visiting and trying to find my sleep on that of it.

Today though, I am taking you through Nolan’s room! My mom and I went over to their apartment the first weekend of the month to help her organize it, because between the first baby shower, Brandon’s family also came down a few days later, the room itself looked like it exploded! Luckily, by the time we came over Blondie and Brandon had tried to clean up most of it, so not only could you see the floor but it had the makings of a really cute room.

This is how it looked before any of us went through it…

It had been a long time since we went over to their apartment, well, I can’t say that, because before heading to the villas to start her baby shower, my mom did go inside to see if there was anything they needed help with so she got to see Chipper and the cats. She swore up and down she didn’t hold Otis, but I didn’t believe her! So when we both came through the door, Chipper was SO excited! He was jumping up and down and whining, he’s never done before, and the cats were even happy to see us. I had both Samuel and Otis sniffing and checking me out.

We “helped” clean the rest of Nolan’s clothes, I attempted to fold onesies on the foot stool of the rocking chair, and that was a disaster of itself! I can fold rags and large towels, but me and baby clothes are apparently another story! The only thing I was able to do was after they were washed, I turned them out again because I guess they have to be inside out to get them clean, which as I thought about it, I didn’t think that was so smart because how are you going to know the stain is actually gone without flipping them around again? I thought that was a stupid idea, but that’s me for you.

Both Chipper and Gru were the ones who were basically attached to Blondie’s hip as we were messing around in his room. Chipper just wanted attention and kept going in and out of the room, and since my wheelchair isn’t big enough to block the door frame, he was able to go in and out freely. Gru, however, sat on the rocking chair with Blondie for the longest time! He’s the one that likes to lick and shove people over, and there was literally no room for the two of them on that chair, so she gave up and since he wanted to lay out and sleep, she put him in the pack n play. Don’t worry, Brandon’s Saints’s blanket was underneath him the whole time!

We didn’t move a lot of stuff, they had the dressers and crib where they won’t be in the way or anything. It was mostly putting up his clothes in the already crowded closet and putting up the pack n play as he really won’t need it this early, he’ll mostly be in the swing (he doesn’t like it!), which goes faster than we all were really comfortable with! And they also have the bassinet in their bedroom, that Toni enjoys sleeping underneath I guess. The only things that mom did scoot over was the rocking chair and trash can to the other side of the changing table!

The bed situation was pretty hilarious though. As you will see in a bit, Nolan won’t need anymore stuffed animals as the whole thing was covered with different ones when we got there! You had Blondie’s love of both rottweilers and sloths on full display along with Brandon’s childhood Pokemon characters too! The crib, stroller, bassinet, and car seat were the first things they were given back in December through February I think! Everything else has been from either Aunt Cindy or Brandon’s family.

So I think that’s it, that’s all we really did there. Who know little over a week later, he’d actually be here already. Thank god, everything’s clean and ready for him!

It’s A… Round 2!

Howdy!

Back in February, when I came out with Blondie’s gender reveal, we found out that my cousin Kristi was pregnant with baby #2, so I decided to put both of their surprises into one post, and this is why it was given the title “are there two babies” because it kind of worked out perfectly!

I think Kristi would have liked to find out the sex earlier but she and little Joseph moved down to Louisiana back in early April. Her husband Joe is in the military and that’s where he is stationed, but it’s actually the same place where my uncle (her dad) was first stationed too, so there’s a special significance to this exact place. They have a nice house, lots of room for not only them, but Joseph, and their animals, they have a dog Sage and a cat, you remember Ozzy from our pack, his name is now Bruce Wayne!

And now they’re going to add on to another one!

I should probably shut up and tell you what they’re having, right?

However, I do think it’s fun to keep the suspense though!

Keeps everything interesting….

Okay, okay! You want to know so bad. Well, here you go!

 

IT’S A GIRL!

Yup, they’re having a girl! I was totally backwards in a way! Once my mom told me (yeah, she told me before I could watch the videos of Joseph with his pink fingers!) I was literally having flashback after flashback of how both Kristi and her older brother Chris used to “get along” back in the day!

Anyways, I asked Kristi what made her think that this child would be different, because after her first few doctor appointments, she was telling all of us that the heart rate was higher than Joseph! She also said that she had an awful first trimester, and suffered from morning sickness, and I don’t think she was sick throughout her pregnancy with little Joseph, but in his defense, he kind of surprised everyone because they found out she was pregnant with him after she had surgery on her appendix! They did the Chinese calendar and other gender predictions on Google, which we did all of those on Nolan too (they all said he’d be a girl!), and majority of them said “girl” so apparently they are somewhat reliable!

This might seem pretty interesting, between my sister and I, plus all of our cousins on my mom’s side, there are more girls, but as far the great-grandkids (as my nana and papaw put it!) there are more boys! Kristi’s niece Lynn has been the only girl in that section of the family for a decade now! So there’s a big possibility that she’s excited to another girl in the family too! I was told that they have picked out a name, but will not release it until she is born this fall. I still think the letter will be used in the first name, but that’s just me!

I would like to mention that you may not get another baby post in a few weeks. Since this went up today, Blondie is considered “full term” and if Nolan wanted to come out now, they wouldn’t try to stop him, so with that being said, if there are any other blog posts that talk about my sister being pregnant and she has had him and I’m not changing the layout of those paragraphs. So if you only follow me on here, you may want to follow me on my Twitter or Facebook pages, that will you’re not left in the dark, that and you wouldn’t have to wait that long to hear the news of his birth either!

Hope you all have enjoyed this blog post 🙂

Baby Shower

Howdy!

As most of the world was obsessing over The Royal Wedding, we were celebrating the soon arrival of my little nephew with a shower! Both sides of the world was greeted with a beautiful day; even though that morning we had a small rain shower in which case made it very humid outside, but the sun shined brightly and it was just perfect.

The drive to Blondie and Brandon’s apartment gave me flashbacks to when we were driving to the church on their wedding day over a year ago! Some of the things that were different that we didn’t have to change out clothes at a certain time and my mom and I didn’t see those little boys fighting in the backyard as we drove by. We literally saw one threw a nice punch at the other kid! It was probably one of the funniest things and the highlights of the day!

The place that had the shower was at a clubhouse, which was a little villa, where residents of a nursing home eat and have fun together! They also rent it out for public gatherings, and since we were suppose to get less than twenty people there, it was actually the perfect setting for this sort of thing! My mom, Aunt Cindy, my dad’s cousin Mindy, and Blondie’s friend Raven brought food and helped decorate the fairly large space. We had balloons, confetti, and an “Oh Baby” streamer, it was all so cute! Mindy made a very beautiful cake, that was covered in various shades of blue, it had silver sprinkles in different sizes, as she says they were made of chocolate! One side of the cake was chocolate while the other was vanilla. And in the middle was a picture of the sonogram of little Nolan with his name at the top!

Once the guests started arriving, one of the things that they were supposed to do was mark their guess of when little man would show up. Blondie made up with a calendar of the days of June and the first two weeks of July, because “mom refuses to go on any longer” and I’m not quoting that for the hell of it, this was actually written on the bottom of the poster board!

The due date is July 2nd, but nobody believes she’s have him on that day. He’ll either come early, or be stubborn as hell and surpass the due date entirely! If the second option does happen, some of us will be laughing our butts off! I still think Nolan would could arrive on the 30th of June, I might be a little biased with that guess because it is Arthrogryposis Awareness Day! Our mom and dad think he’ll be born on July 1st, which is a special birthday on my dad’s side.

My sister wore a very pretty flow-y blue dress she found on Amazon, it was very long and I would be lying if I didn’t say I was very nervous everytime she went walked around the chairs! I thought she looked very beautiful as it suited her and growing belly! I think she only liked it because it had pockets, because whenever I saw her, that’s where her hands would be to try to keep them away from the food!

We played some games, but in the span of two hours, we didn’t get to play all of them! Poor mom spent a good hour trying to put together a homemade Baby Bingo. She and I kept getting into arguments because she could NOT understand that there isn’t 20 words of baby items for all five letters! The other game that my mom wanted to do was have everybody guess how much ribbon could cover her belly! I wasn’t that far off, but the fact that my dad used his waist in comparison to her belly was pretty hilarious! Mindy actually won that game, it was literally almost the exact same length, and everybody was in agreement!

Honestly, Brandon wanted to do the games, he found two that had a similar theme: poop! We did the infamous, “guess what kind of candy bar is inside the diaper” game. I have to say, they originally had 7 diapers, but Blondie burnt the Kit Kat and the plate so she had to throw it outside!

The other one has the same origins with “Stick The Tail On The Donkey” except it’s “Stick The Poo” I don’t know who drew the outline of the diaper, but it’s actually very good! The rules to the game, is everybody gets a paper turd, they put their name on it, their eyes are covered, they’re spun and place it on the board.

A lot of people were very close, we only had a few guests actually miss the diaper entirely, but there were like three who were like inches away from the middle, shockingly, we had one person basically place it just right. Don’t ask how I did, I didn’t play this one or the other. Anything to do with poop, kind of freaks me out! And what’s funny is that, I actually want to see if I can change Nolan’s diaper!

One of my favorites we did was a game they played at their baby class! It’s called “Sweet Child Of Mine” and they had a list of things where you had to guess a different piece of candy below, so like “girl’s name” could be Babe Ruth, Kit Kat, and Candy (as my dad put down!) and I have to say, I think dad had a lot more fun with this one! He and our family friend Russell literally stood in the kitchen area and were giggling as they were filling out the paper, we were excited and absolutely nervous about their answers!

And the last one we had time for, was “The Price Is Right”. Blondie has a special talent, she can create beautiful bubble lettering, everybody thought she had traced it, but nope, she did it all!

This game was a bit more difficult as it’s been an extremely long time since I’ve watched The Price Is Right so I was a little bit out of my element here. We were all given of the things listed on the poster board and we had to guess what the price is for each of the baby items, and mom just did it on her own and didn’t get a single one right! Everybody was either too high or low, only Raven was the one who actually got one right, so she got the prize.

At the last we ate cake and Blondie and Brandon opened presents. Now there were pictures of this, but where they sat, there is a huge glare directly behind them and the pictures themselves are very hard to see and I don’t have any way to fix it anymore!

They got a lot of diapers and wipes, one couple actually came with two large boxes of diapers! They have a swing, bottles, monitor, lotion, etc! Shockingly, only three people brought superhero themes onesies! Two were Batman themed, while the other is a full on Spider-Man outfit. People were also considerate to the mommy as well, as she was given facial masks, a necklace with the name “Nolan” on it, and even this little onesie that we now understand had to be left until last, because it made everybody cry! It says “hand-picked for Earth by my great-grandpa in Heaven” this would dedicated to our papaw, who died two years ago.

After that, one by one, people started to leave the party. The ones that helped build everything up, were there helping tear it down, except the layout of “Oh Baby” that pretty much came down on its own! For the ones who wanted to get last minute pictures with mommy-to-be, there was a stack of balloons on the far left side, because poor Raven was in the corner holding up the banners a little longer! I had to get a picture with my sister, and since she’s had contractions off and on after 34 weeks, I didn’t want her squatting down to get down at my level, and I literally told her she didn’t have to do that, but she did it anyways!