It's all in the name.

Linna Jane Saigh

It still amazes me how many people cannot pronounce my daughter's name. From the nurses at the pediatrician's office, to the friends I bump into who have seen her name on Facebook, poor little Linna has been called everything from "Line-ah" to "Lee-nah". Dude, it's pronounced "Lynn-ah". Not "Lenea", not "Line-ah"... just "LYNN-AH". Pair her first name with a last name like Saigh (it's pronounced "sigh" by the way), and it's amazing the combos people can come up with. My favorite so far... "Lee-nah Sag". I literally want to look at these people and say, "Do you really think I would name my daughter Lee-nah Sag?". Come on!

Yesterday, I came across an article on Babble, about the top 20 girl names on the rise. The names Adele, Bryn, and Aubree made some pretty big jumps in popularity, but I am very happy to say that Linna did not make the list!

When I was pregnant with Linna, my husband and I went through every name in the book. A couple names we both agreed on were Nora and Harper, but the more we thought about it, the more we really wanted a unique (not weird) name with "meaning". Right around the time we were trying to "finalize" the baby's name, AJ's Grandma Pollard mentioned that her mom's name was Linna. The second we heard the name, we fell in love. From that moment on, Linna's name was Linna, and we never turned back!

Linna with Great-Grandma LaVonne Pollard. She "gave" us Linna's name.

We did, however, ask ourselves how we were going to spell it. Would it be "Lynna" or "Linna" (AJ's great grandma's original spelling)? We asked other people if "Linna" would be pronounced "Line-ah", and literally everyone we asked said "no way". I really didn't think there'd be any confusion either, but I guess I was wrong.

According to the Babble article, girl names ENDING in "Lynn" are a growing trend. Woohoo! Not only did we not fall into one of the rising "trendy" names, we did the complete opposite by STARTING our baby's name with one of the "trends";) Coming up with the name of your baby is hard work. A lot goes into selecting your baby's name. I am a fan of some of these "trendy" names like Charlotte, Pearl, and Harlow, but I don't want my kid to have the same name as every other kid once she's in school. I guess our next baby will have to be named something like "Linger" or "Ling Ling". Oh wait, those are my daughter's nicknames;)

I don't know how it started, but Linna
somehow got the nicknames "Ling Ling" and
"Linger". I took this pic at Target when she
was like 4 months old.