Baby name woes!!!!

When you name your baby, you're shaping their identity. I mean Cooper is Cooper no matter what. It fits him so perfectly. It's who he is. The way he talks, the way he walks, the way he laughs, his hilarious personality....it's all Cooper!!! Although I was disappointed when the name became so popular AFTER he was born (ha), it was still his name. It's a family name, and no amount of popularity was going make us change our minds. He is a Cooper. Period.

I'm sure everyone has seen the latest headlines of the insane rise of the name Cullen. WHAT?!? I swore we were choosing a name that was so under the radar that there was no way it was going to become popular the way Cooper had. I second guessed myself only because I worried that we were going to have to spell it for everyone; I didn't care if people liked it or not. It only mattered what Josh and I thought....and we thought it was a pretty cool name! Now I'm worried that I'll have to explain, "His name is Cullen, and no, not after the vampires. And, no I did not read Twilight!!" When I try to call our baby another name, it feels like I'm talking about someone else's baby. I've had several people tell me this is the reason they keep their baby names a secret. First of all, I can't keep a secret if I tried!!!!! = ) I'm all about the surprise effect...but I just can't do it! I get way too excited!!! But the more specific reason is that it is so very important to me that my family and friends can pray for our baby by name. It just makes it more personal...makes the baby seem more real!

So here we are wondering what to do! It's one thing to have a popular name! No biggie! But to have a popular name because of some teen heartthrob book is a little corny if you ask me. It's a "cult phenomenon" and it makes me so sad. My mom tried calling our little one by another name at lunch today to "try it out". I do really like the name, but is it who he is?? It felt wrong. I'll ask Cooper to say one of the names we are trying out and he always repeats back "Cullen"! Ha!! I mean, I guess the names sound similar...but still, they don't even start with the same letter!!! So, I guess for now we are going to play around with some other names. We have about 6 lined up, and we're just praying that we land on the right one...and hope that there is not a book/movie in the works with a character that has the same name!