Hi, my name is...

We've been trying to think of a girl's name. The boy's name was easy. We agreed on a name quickly and without much effort: Steven Conrad. The girl's name, however...well, we haven't been able to think of anything that we both really liked, so last night while I was at a Relief Society dinner, I was making a list of girl's names, trying to remember all the ones that Andrew and I discussed. We both like Rachel, but Kristi and Ryan named their baby Rachel and...they're in our ward, so that could be weird, even though Rachel will be almost 2 when our baby is born.

So, last night I came up with the name Annalyse. That's one of the names that Andrew and I had discussed and we both liked. It happened like this: I liked Lisa and he liked Anna and so we just said, "How about Annalyse?" Last night I was thinking of middle names and I thought that Annalyse Pearl would sound alright (I know, both Conrad and Pearl are family names on my side--we'll work on Andrew's side with the next one).

I decided that I really liked that. But then I started thinking...if we did happen to relocate to the Middle East sometime, things could get really confusing. See, Anna is very similar to the Arabic word for "I." Most people that I met in the Middle East were extremely interested in children. The instant anyone found out we were married, they wanted to know how many kids we had. We didn't have any, so they would then ask if I was expecting. We weren't, so they would ask when we were planning on having children and how many. That might be considered a little nosy here, but over there it is perfectly normal.

If we happened to be out with the Slades or Palmers, everyone would croon over their blond children, kiss their cheeks, ask to hold them, and take their pictures.

So, naturally, if we moved back to the Middle East, I'd have to do quite a few introductions. I kept playing the scenario over in my head and it always went something like this:

Stranger: Oh, how cute! What's her name?
Me: Annalyse.
Stranger: Nice to meet you, Lisa...but your baby. What's her name?
Me: Annalyse.
Stranger (mumbling to a counterpart): This lady doesn't speak Arabic well at all.
Stranger (slowly, to me): What's her name?
Me: Her name is Annalyse.
Stranger (chuckling to a counterpart): She just said, "Her name...me Lisa." That doesn't make any sense.
Me (clarifying): No, my name is Nancy, like Nancy Ajram. The baby's name is Annalyse.
Stranger: So, is your name Nancy or Lisa?
Me: I'm Nancy. The baby is...Lisa.
Stranger (cooing): Hello, Lisa...
Me (rolling my eyes and thinking to myself): Probably shouldn't have named her Annalyse.

And thus we see that it should just be a boy because Annalyse is the only name we've agreed on for a girl thus far and it could prove to be problematic down the road.