Anyway, lately Amie has started to write her name AMY, instead of AMIE. When I asked her why she did that she said it was the short version of her name and she liked it better. Well it's only one letter shorter so that wasn't a good enough argument. I told her about when we choose her name and how we decided to spell it and that you can't just go around changing your name. I've still found her writing like that again but I think she is getting the right idea.
When I was choosing our children's names I also thought about what nicknames would likely go along with the name. Some names I didn't choose because I didn't like the nickname. For example for a boy we like the name Benjamin, but I really don't like the name Ben or Benny so we didn't choose it. It's funny though because Lachlan never really has used a nickname. We don't call him Loc or Lochie, it's always Lachlan. Ever since he was a baby though I have called him Buddy. I remember when my Mum was visiting us when Lachlan was born telling me that maybe I should have called him Buddy instead of Lachlan!
Amie's name can't really be shortened anymore, but I do remember when Grandma and Grandpa Montague came over to visit one time that Grandpa would call her Aim a few times! Buzz also used to call her Beans. I don't actually remember why he started doing this and it was only ever Buzz that said it. He still does it occasionally but not so much anymore.
When Caitlyn came along it took us a little while to actually give her a name. We had a few in mind but none of them really fit. In the end it was between Caitlyn and Rachael. She is definitely a Caitlyn though. There were many ways to spell her name as well. We both wanted it to start with 'C' and I wanted it to be 'y' in lyn. She does get called Cate, which she is fine with. The kids actually say 'cake' and not 'cate' which I think is so funny! Sometimes I play with her and call her 'Catie-weighty' or 'caitlyn-baitlyn' but she always firmly tells me that that is not her name!
Haylie was the hardest of all. We really didn't have a name for her at all. When we came home from the hospital she still didn't have a name. That afternoon we sat around with some friends going through all the baby name books trying to work out the perfect name. In the end Haylie was the one that stuck out to me. When we were still in the hospital she was nearly going to be called Jasmyn. We were even writing in down and working out how we wanted to spelt but it just didn't feel quite right. Again there were many ways to spell it and I love the way that we did. Haylie also has a nickname. Apart from her name being shortened to 'hay' she is often called midget. Again I think it was Buzz that started calling her that. She has always been small and when she started walking she looked really funny because she was so small. It was really funny because sometimes she wouldn't answer to 'Haylie' but you call her 'midget' and she would answer you!
I love all of my children's names and wouldn't change them at all!
