What's in a name?

Names. What a dilemma! We need a name for Baby J and that's proving to be a lot harder than I thought it would be. We've had a girl's name for many years, well before we were seriously considering having a baby. That's one name though and we'd need a middle name too, so it's not a fat lot of use.

We've bought ourselves a name book - a really thick name book with literally tens of thousands of names. You know, keeping our options open and giving ourselves plenty of choice. Too much choice as it turns out. Good grief, what a lot of names there are! Also, how many truly awful names there are. If there are any parents out there that actually choose a lot of these names, they should be arrested for child cruelty. There are many, many ways to screw up your kids and naming them Willibert, Oege or Balbina is certainly an option. Whilst flicking through our name book recently, R found the name Ludwig, which made us both laugh so we have now resorted to calling the baby Ludwig. If it's a girl, we could always call her Ludwina...

Ludwig is a very active baby in any case. I have frequent gymnastics sessions going on in my belly, sometimes at the most inconvenient moments. I find it very distracting and quietly amusing, so if the baby is doing cartwheels while I'm trying to discuss marketing strategies with my boss, it's very hard to remain focused. One morning this week, I was still asleep and R had his arm around me with his hand on my bump. The baby was also awake and they had their own little tête-à-tête (or hand-à-tête). My mum is really looking forward to the first time she can feel her grandchild moving around, but I think that moment won't be too far away if the baby keeps up its current level of activity!