What's in a Name?

For Christmas this past year, our younger daughter received her first baby doll.  I guess Grandma thought it best she receive one honestly, for a change.   She already had a doll, but I had helped her lift it from the church nursery.   It is called “Baa Baa” because that is how her then one-year-old words said “baby.”   

That Sunday, she had claimed Baa Baa as her own and would not let it go.  Apparently, this runs in the family as I did the same thing at a friend’s house when I was a kid.  I still have Baby Beans.   She is irresistibly cute.  Like my mom before me, I simplified the minute and just let the cranky child bring the baby doll home. 

The legitimate doll from Grandma still does not have a name.  A few weeks ago, right as our youngest turned two, I realized it was around this age that our oldest named her baby.  So that afternoon, during those never-ending winter hours between napping and Daddy, I asked my little one what she might like to call her doll.

I got nothing.

I went on to point to each of us in the room, including the dog, and said our names.   I then pointed to the doll and waited for my often goofy little girl to produce a name out of thin air.  

I got nothing.

I was a little disappointed, though not surprised that she didn’t perform.  Her sister before her had magically, though curiously, proclaimed her baby doll’s name to be “Sticker” the first time I had asked.  That same sister had been coloring nearby during our brief back and forth about baby.

Genetically incapable of minding her own business for too long, my big one eventually piped up without looking up, “You should name her Cracker.”

The hilarity of this suggestion hit me immediately.  I dissolved into giggles as my two girls sat silent and eyed me with suspicion.   I braced myself on their tiny table, shaking crayons to the floor.  I simply could not get over how ridiculous it would sound; Sticker and Cracker.  

“I want your sister to pick the name herself, but thank you, honey,” I managed to squeak out after a while, wiping tears from my eyes.  

I have since named the baby myself.  I call her Freesia as she is dressed in pink and purple and I love the flower.  The name has yet to catch on.  The doll’s owner can’t even pronounce it.  She can, however, say cracker as clear as a bell.

I am thinking only time will tell what the doll’s real name will be.  I am also thinking we should probably return the doll we stole from church.  Poor baby Baa Baa.    

Our motley crew: Sticker, Baa Baa, No Name (Freesia) and Beans