Juliet Fern's Name Story

When we were pregnant with Forest we had a smorgasboard of girl names that we loved, whereas our boy names were all perfectly fine but just a little 'meh'. Nothing stood out as a frontrunner until towards the very end, but we didn't fully commit to Forest until after we met our little wildling. We fell in love with the name because of the peaceful feeling it invoked, but he quickly proved he was more rugged wilderness than a fairytale walk in the woods. Either way, he grew into it and we continue to love his name and all that it means to us. 

Flash forward to getting pregnant with a little girl and we had the opposite problem. Boy names would have been a breeze. I could have named a basketball team full of little boys. The challenge would have been narrowing all the names I loved down to just 2 (Elliot Wells would have been the hypothetical winner if you care to know- Jonathan's veto power be damned! Seriously who vetoes Elliot??? Irrelevant at this point, but still...). 

Instead we were looking at a girls list that felt stale and uninspired. Four names eventually made the short list: Fiona, Georgia, Juliet and Jane. Evangeline made the honorable mention spot, but the many different pronunciations sadly took her out of the running for us. She would have been Jane's middle name had we gone that route. 

Fiona has been one of my favorite names since I was a little girl. I first heard it from a Scottish penpal who sent me pictures of the castles and landscapes of exotic Aberdeenshire. Little did I know I'd go on to live in that gorgeous gray city by the sea and birth my first child there. If Forest had been a girl, he would haven no doubt been a little Scottish 'Fiona'. I really thought Juliet would end up a Fiona in the end, but several cracks from my family about calling her 'FiFi' soured me on it (especially since I hadn't even told them her name would be Fiona Fern, surely dooming her to a nickname best reserved for a poodle). 

Georgia was a frontrunner in my mind from the beginning. Firstly, Jonathan's dad is named George so  we had the family claim to it. Unfortunately, because of the family connection, baby girl would have also already had a second cousin with the same first and last name, so Jonathan (and his family) didn't seem too excited by the idea. Still, I loved the southern vibes of Georgia Fern and think Georgia really hits that sweet spot of a recognizable but not overly used classic. Plus, I'm homesick, y'all. A US inspired name would have felt right. 

Another recognizable but not overly used classic that we loved was Jane. Jonathan's top name for Forest was actually Ian, the Scottish form of John. So of course his favorite baby name for a girl was the feminine version of his name as well. I think it's sweet to name little girls for their dads (my own name is my dad's middle), plus if Jon and I were a celebrity couple, Jane would totally be our smoosh name. Ultimately, I didn't like that it was too short to pair with Fern which I was pretty hellbent on putting in the middle spot. Forest didn't think it was fair that her name would be so short and easy to write. Ha! I also thought it'd be a little awkward for our names to rhyme, plus we have a niece named Rayne. Laine, Rayne, and Jane might get a little confusing at family Christmases. 

Last but not least there was Juliet. There was no real significant reason for Juliet to make the list. It's just straight up a pretty name. Romeo and Juliet was a movie I watched probably 1,284 times as a young teenager, but at that time I dreamed of naming a future daughter Verona vs the iconic Juliet. We studied the play extensively in high school English and I read for the part of Juliet. I still have most of her passages memorized (which wasn't hard considering how many times I watched the movie). 

Baby girl's birthday being in July leant some additional legitimacy to choosing Juliet as well. But what sealed the deal was how adamant Forest was that this. was. THE. name. 

I have no idea why, but a few weeks before her birth he started saying we should call her Juliet. He never wavered from that and became more and more convinced as her due date approached. With Jonathan and I being still undecided, it was easy to be convinced by the very assured 5 year old. We tried to explain to him our hesitations- mainly because we already have a Forest who gets plenty of Forrest Gump cracks- to choose another hugely famous character name with a plethora of quotes and jokes just felt like we were asking for it. 

Plus, we told him, naming her Juliet would put a lot of pressure on her to be beautiful, to which he responded 'My sister WILL BE beautiful.'. So far, he's correct on that count! 

Forest had fluctuated back and forth between being really excited and really apprehensive about becoming a big brother. I explained to him the meaning of ambivalence and that I too felt it regarding baby sister's imminent arrival. I did think that letting him choose the name (which was a pretty amazing name for a 5 year old boy to advocate for) would help him to feel more connected with her early on. 

Convinced we had a solid short list, we decided we'd wait until we met her to make up our minds. A full day after meeting her and trying on different names, none of them really felt right. We were leaning towards Juliet and started calling her that just to see if it stuck, but we weren't ready to put it on a birth certificate or anything. I woke up from a middle of the night nap to find a ton of text messages from people saying they loved her name. Huh??? Apparently my mom had posted pictures on facebook of baby 'Juliet'. So you know once something is facebook official, it's pretty much official- no backsies. So therefore, Juliet Fern was officially named. 

As far as Fern- it was my paternal grandmother's name. Some of my earliest memories of Grandma Fern were curling up in her lap reading picture books, learning to water ski with magic socks, and always being greeted with tons of sugar cookies and Mississippi mud waiting for me upon my arrival to their lake house in Missouri. My fondest, warmest, and most magical memories of childhood stem from the haven she and my PawPaw Lee created on the Lake of the Ozarks. 
She was a highly educated working woman, very rare for her generation and blue collar upbringing, and well loved and respected (because she loved and respected well) by everyone who knew her. She treated my friends like family and despite great geographical distances, was a very present and supportive influence in all of her grandchildren's pursuits. A worthy namesake indeed. 

It doesn't hurt that even apart from her, I adore the name Fern. First of all, it speaks to our love of nature, especially woodland settings. Forest's name was literally inspired by the woods of Scotland, which are carpeted in beautiful ferns year round. 
Had we not already had a Forest, perhaps Fern would have made into the first name spot, but I do think a sibling set called Forest and Fern is a bit too on the nose. 

There is also Fern from Charlotte's Web, of course. A classic name from classic children's literature, and one of the first chapter books that Forest and I read together (and reread about 20 times). 

I hope when my children grow up, they remember the safe and comforting feeling of snuggling up to me and reading and I hope it inspires in them the same love affair with literature that my Grandma Fern sparked in me so many years ago. Just like when I hear the name Forest I am instantly transported to the quiet and still woodland trails of Scotland, when I hear Fern, I am 4 years old, safe and warm, on my grandma's lap reading Brown Bear, Brown Bear for the hundredth time. 

I hope my children always have similar touchstones in their life where they find comfort and peace and I hope that they'll appreciate the depth of meaning behind their monikers. Because unlike Juliet from Shakespeare's famous play, I think there is a lot of significance in a name and maybe a Rose (or a Juliet Fern) called by any other name wouldn't smell quite as sweet.