Name Song

So here's a puzzler for you, valued reader. Both Matt and I have been thinking off and on about what we are going to name our new baby, even though we don't know the gender yet. We have some names on a short list and we've even got a few ground rules. For instance, one of the ground rules is that Matt would like to make sure that if we have another girl, we don't want to give her a name that ends with the "ee" sound. We figure Shelly, Ellie and Annie is enough. So I've been mulling over tons of non-"ee" names - ones that end in "n" or "a" or something else.

But here's something else to consider. Many of you may not know it, but each of our girls names is in the title of a song. Ellie's full name is Elise, hence Fur Elise by Beethoven. And Annie is Annie's Song by John Denver. We didn't exactly plan to do that, but we were aware of the songs when we chose the names and we do actually sing the songs to the girls, particularly Annie's Song. I like it because it's not something that is overly obvious about our girls' names. I'm sure most folks don't notice it. But it's something a little special for them.

So if this next baby is a girl, I kind of feel like we should at least try to think of names that have songs associated with them, even if we don't use them, just in case there's one we love. Problem is I can't think of one I really like. It's kind of difficult, because I want it to be a song I already really like. It has to be a style of music I like and that is sweet, not rock or rap or something like that. And it would be great if the name didn't end in "ee".

The only one I've thought of that I do like is "Maria" from West Side Story. I actually do really like the song. But unlike Fur Elise and Annie's Song, Maria says the name "Maria" over and over and over and gets a little out of hand. While the names Elise and Annie are never actually sung in the their respective songs, they are just part of title. So if we want to put that restriction on it, then we've really narrowed our options. I can't think of any other song that has a girl's name in the title but it is not in the actual song. (Matt claims there's a Simon and Garfunkel song with Emily in the title, but I don't know it, so that won't work).

So there you go folks. If you think of anything, let me know. I'm not sure we'll even do the song thing. We'll probably let it go. But if we can think of one - maybe that will be the name. Then again if we end up having boy, it won't really matter.