Surprise! What unexpected nickname did your child get?

Erm, well, I don’t have children yet, so I don’t know if this counts, but according to my sister, we’re “Boo-Boo, Bon-Bon, Bam-Bam, and Baby”. I think it’s probably a far cry from the Ashley, John (nn Johnny/Jack), Rebecca (Becca), and Natalie my parents had picked out. I almost exclusively call my sister Tallie, too. I’m not sure how my parents feel about that one. I think it’s adorable, and she likes it more than Nat/Natie, but I don’t think anyone really minds. I have noticed my mom and sister call her Tallie after I’ve called her that, though, like when we’re texting. “I’m picking up Tallie from school.” “Don’t forget Tallie’s guitar!” Etc. So maybe everyone else sort of likes it, or at worst is ambivalent to it.

I don’t have any kids yet, but my parents named my brother Douglas, planning to call him by his full name. All of my brothers and sisters and I call him Dougy, and my parents call him Douger/Douger-Rugger.
My dad has silly nicknames for some of us. Steverino (Steven)
Ryno (Ryan)
Camelam / Cam-a-lam-a-ding-dong (me, Cami)
Ava Kay-Kay (Ava)

Yes! Our daughter’s name is Benedikte. My husband’s family (for generations!) always have a kind of unique german nickname that often has nothing to do with their proper names. We wanted to avoid this because we live in Canada and it’s confusing. But there was no getting around the nickname, I assumed she would be called Bennie or Benna, although I secretly liked Dikte. My father-in-law said, “It will emerge on its own, your nephew or somebody will come up with something”. Well, my nickname since my brother was a baby has been Dee because he stuttered over the “t” in Kristen. When Benedikte was a week old, my nephew announced that “Auntie Dee had a baby B”…..he stopped and couldn’t spit it out, so said, “Bea”. We loved it and so did the German side as Bienchen is a family nickname. Now we tell people to call her Bea when Benedikte is overwhelming and the German side gets their hyper-ethnic, traditional Biechen (little Bee). Although now lots of my family calls her Biechen (hard to pronounce that chen) and one friend has affectionaly nicknamed her Beekins (like Bunnykins), which I also love. I love Beatrice/Beatrix but it’s a tad popular for me and not family name which was our criteria, but I still got a Bea!

I always assumed I would call my daughter Rowan “Ro” but I hardly ever call her that. I call her Janie (her middle name is Jane), Monkey, Munchies, and Munkin (munchkin/pumpkin hybrid) =)

I have four children and while neither of my boys have nicknames (even Thomas has avoided being called Tom or Tommy) my girls go by names I would never have imagined when they were born. I gave my girls names that I thought were relatively nickname-proof – my oldest is Hannah and my younger daughter is Faith – but Hannah’s brothers often call her Hank or Hanky and Faith is called Faithy, Fifi, Fi, Feefer and Foofa.

Our 3rd child, Matilda has never been a Tilly which I thought she might.
She was given the nickname ‘Tiddles’ by her older brother when she was a couple of days old and it has stuck, we all call her it now. Not sure how she will like it in the future though! Oliver and Toby are predictably Olly and Tobes!

Eliza is E, Little E and Baby E to us. She’s had some issues with eczema and has pink cheeks a lot of the time and a cute little boy at her daycare calls her “Rosie” and “rosie cheeks.” He says it with such sweetness and I think it’s adorable.

My children only have nn’s online for the most part. We’re expats living VERY far from home. So, we’re very active on fb, for all of our family and friends to feel like a part of our children’s lives. When I’m online and typing Conor (almost 2) is Con or Con’Man. And, most of the time for the new twins (4 weeks), Cormac is Mac and Cordelia is CJ. We intended to call the twins by those nn’s. But, we Rarely call them anything other than their full fn’s in real life.

I’ve always been a full name kind of person though. It doesn’t bother me when people shorten my name, or others. But, personally I call most people by their given name.

Nicknaming is in my DNA. My daughter is Boots, Bootsy, Bootsy-Lou, and Lulu. Sometimes on the same walk to school.

I don’t have kids, but I know a few people who have unexpected nicknames.

I know two Fifis. One is a family friend’s little girl who out of the blue decided she wanted to be Fifi now. The other is my little cousin. Her nickname is actually Titi but when I mentioned it to my sister she thought I said Fifi – so now that’s what we refer to her as

My other cousin is called Mouse, which always confused me when I was younger because her name is Gemma – but apparently it’s because when she was a baby she used to sleep all curled up like a little mouse, and the nickname stuck.

One of my best friends is Katie-Louise, all one name, but she usually went by just Katie – until one day, for no apparent reason, we all started calling her Lou. I also have another friend, Jasmine, who was just Jasmine and occasionally Jas until she went to school – and now she’s a Minnie.

I love nicknames, and sometimes I still wish my parents had given me a name that could shorten into one. My mum told me one of the reasons she liked Erin was because you couldn’t shorten it, but I’ll be making sure my kids have ‘nicknameable’ names

In my group of friends, we all call each other two syllable names. For example, my friend Evelyn became Evie, and Christine Chrissy.
I remember Evie’s parents didn’t want for her to be called Evie- they hated it- but they eventually warmed up to it.
Whether you like it or not, every name has nicknames- even seemingly nicknameless names like Clair can be Clairy or C.

Patrick and Nicholas were called the predictable Pat and Nick, my daughter Autumn was called Anum in preschool because the little ones could not say Autumn and some of her friends called her Auddie for a while, but mostly she was Autumn.

My name Tamara was called Tami at home but Tomorrow at school. The weirdest was sister Tannia (pronounced Tanya)she was called Tana at home and Ralph by her friends!

My sister got called Fifi when one of her friends couldn’t pronounce ‘th’ so we ended up with people calling her Fea or Fifi.

I share my first name with my dad’s sister, Katherine. However, I wasn’t aware of this until I was much older. My aunt has never gone by Katherine or any of the it’s obvious nicknames. When she was very little a neighbor started to call her little puddin’ which got shortened to Pud and it stuck. I on the other hand, have always gone by the expected Katie.

Not really unexpected, but my daughter Audrey’s friends call her Odd or Oddy.

My son’s name is Desmond, so we always assumed we’d call him “Des” or “Desi.” Instead we’ve called him at one point or another: Tweetie, Stinky, Tinks, Tink-Pot, and Mr. Pants.

At least in public we still call him by his given name, but in private, he’ll always be “Mr. Pants” to me.

Our daughter’s name is Tallulah & when my sons were little they had a hard time pronouncing it so she ended up with Touee. 8 years later she still goes by it!

My Aunt Dolores had acquired many nicknames by the time she passed away. Growing up, she was called “Ore,” which, to me, seems the most surprising (and unattractive) of the bunch. That is what her family and close family friends called her, however, and some even knew her as that to her dying day. I always called her “Aunt Dee,” which I think must have been of her own choosing (nicer than “Ore”). I know she had friends when she grew up who knew her as “Dee” or “DeeDee”. Towards the end of her life, I, being the “berry” that I am, started calling her “Aunt Lola,” because when I discovered that alluring nickname went with the old-fashioned “Dolores,” I was adamant that that is what she should have been called all along! I only wish she had lived to enjoy being known as “Lola” longer.

@rowangreeneyes
My name is Rowan, and my parents and brother have always called me Row, or Row-the-boat, for a while my friends called me Red, but now its either Rowan or in the case of a few of my best friends, Row.

My son’s name is Corin, and we thought it was pretty nn-proof. Of course when he was learning to talk he started calling himself Coco and it’s stuck around. I think it’s cute but can’t imagine he’ll love it himself when he’s a little older!

I stuck my niece with a nickname that I’m sure her parents never saw coming and I certainly didn’t either but now it has stuck and it’s certainly not the most adorable sounding or feminine nickname for a 9 year old girl to be wearing for the last 5 or so years. Her name is Audrey and it started because she was such a sassy little thing so I called her Sassy Pants which may have briefly morphed to Sassafras but ultimately landed on Sasquatch and it has completely stuck itself to her. So Sasquatch she is! Only among family of course and I’ll never forget her reaction when I first showed her watch a sasquatch actually is. She likes being called Sasquatch even if I would totally understand if she didn’t and I would try my best to drop it if she wanted me to. A couple years ago at one of her T-Ball tournament games I playfully yelled out to her “It’s crunch time Sasquatch!” so that phrase is often thrown at her as a joke which always makes her smile and roll her eyes at us. It’s crazy what absurd things can be seen as endearing between a family!

My given name is Lauren Elizabeth (pronounced like Sophia Lauren). My entire life I have gone by Doonie (pronounced like Dooney & Burke).

My older brother and I are only 13 months apart and he just started calling me that and it stuck. I almost didn’t get into college because my high school sent in my transcripts as Doonie and not Lauren!! Now I use Lauren professionally, but outside of the office I am still Doonie and always will be

My name is Scharla (Shar-lah), but my younger sister Lexy always had trouble pronouncing her r’s when she was a toddler. I quickly became Scha (pronounced “Shaw”) to my younger sister and then younger brother. Now, I’m Scha to my parents, family members, and even some close friends!

Lets see, my nephew is Jason Patrick, and he has many nicknames. My sister called him Bugaboo or Bug from the time he was born. I call him Bebo, which evolved from calling him Baby Burkert, to Baby B when she was pregnant (he didnt have a name till he was born) to some how becoming Bebo and Bebolicious over the years (I was 13 when he was born and he is now 14) I also call him Bubba or Budgie. He is also called Ace, and calls himself Ace to outside people because my friends son had trouble with J’s when he was little.

My niece Kiki her real name is Kristina but Kiki actually comes from Wookie. My sister had a lot of heart burn when she was pregnant so we teased her and said she was carrying a wookie and kept calling the baby that after she was born and she she learned to talk it came out Kiki and there it stuck. She is now 9 and most people think it is her real name.

I am Jeannie and I have been called Bean, and Beannie and Bean Dean over the years by everyone. My little nephew Jack however started out calling me Jean Jean and got lazy and it became GG, and he insists it is GG and nothing else. He is now 5, and I love the name but seriously, I spent my whole life telling people my name is with a J not a G and my name became two G’s. I guess its Karma

When I was seven my little sister was born, and being the name/nickname lover I am, I gave her a bunch of nicknames. Her name is Kylie but I ended up calling her Boobaloo or Boob for short. Everybody else started calling her that too, and by the time she was two we realized that she didn’t respond to Kylie. It was funny. I remember she wandered off in the grocery store and my cousins and I ran around looking for her yelling BOOB! So everyone in the store looked at us in disbelief and disgust at our uncouth ways. We didn’t realize until we left that we were screaming about breasts all throughout the store. My mom was horrified.

That’s our best nickname in the family! But others include Bubbles, Peanut, Junie B, June Bug, (the standard Princess and Pumpkin), Crylie, Boo-Boo Phooey (my other sister cried ALL THE TIME. No exaggeration. She cried when she was angry, sad, happy, confused, frustrated ECT. So she cried like she had a Boo-Boo and she was always kicking like Hong Kong Phooey.)

Oh Yea… I dubbed my cousins Melanie, Megan and Shannon…Smell-Mel, Nut Meg, and Shenanigans.

My son has had sooo many completely unrelated nn’s (as did my younger sister when we were growing up) that he will pretty much answer to anything silly I yell in his general direction lol. I am seriously addicted to making up something and using it… The day he was born I started calling him “Piggy” which stuck until he was around 10 months old. As a variation of his own name though, I knew we’d use Dom but he also likes to be called “Domi” which makes us ‘Domi and Mommy’ (cue the hundreds of made-up songs, haha.) It is completely adorable right now, though I know he won’t purposefully go by it when he gets older. =]

A former boss insisted on calling me Pete as he thought that a single syllable male name was more suitable than a 2-syllable female one. (Let’s face it, there’s not much you can do with Paula, apart from shorten it to Paul, so why he decided on Pete is beyond me!) Another guy in the same office thought that Pablo was more appropriate. Otherwise my online friends have a variety of names for me depending on what nn I use at the time. Perhaps oddly, my husband and I do not have nicknames for each other, despite the fact that my parents have a bookful…

My sister is Anna, she has been called all the nn under the sun. Anna-bananna, Annie, Annabell, I however call her Nan or Nana. I turned it from Anna to Naan to Nan/Nana. It helps since their are so many Anna’s Hannah’s Joanna’s around, it does get confusing when I call Nana when she is cheerleading, people look for an old lady =)

Well my brother is Matthew nn math and nothing else and I’m Amy Louise nn aim by friends (which i hate) Lil or amylou by family. My dad calls me lily Powell off a tv program where the character was always moaning lol. Can anyone think of an nn for Amy? my children will have nicknamable names!

I’ve got a good friend Elisabeth. Her mom spelt her name with an “s” to avoid the nickname “Liz” but we all call her Eli.

In my family we are a little nickname crazy. Growing up I got called Jazzy, Jazz, Jabs, Jabawoki, Guacamole, etc (my name is Jasmine) When our eldest was named Elizabeth we planned on calling her Libby (I liked Beth also but that is my sister-in-laws name) but we never used it. It didn’t fit right. Somehow I ended up calling her Miss Elizabeth and then Miss E (Missy) and it stuck! We also call her Moves, I actually have no idea where that nickname came from!
Our seconds name is Annabelle and we thought we would call her Anna but call her Belle or Belle Belle most of the time as Anna was to hard for her sister to say (came our sounding like arrow)
My little brother gave most of my family nicknames because he couldn’t say our names growing up, Kristen was Diddy (and still is), Dale was Maydo, Aimee was Ay Ay.

When my sister was expecting her first girl, she wanted something unusual and settled on Seraphina (this was before the starbaby). A relative said, “Oh, so you’ll be calling her Sarah?” My sister vehemently replied that she would never go by Sarah; if she had a nn, it would be Feena. And we have always called her Feena or even Fee” But now, as a ten-year-old, she introduces herself to new people as Sarah and goes by Sarah at school. My whole family sighs a bit, since we all like the more uncommon names, but if that’s what she wants, that’s what she’s gonna do.

My sister is named Jamie Michele, but she _loved_ the Buddy Holly song “Peggy-Sue” when she was little, so we’d all sing “Jamie-Sue.” It stuck.

My son’s name is Luther and we have been calling him Lu-Lu once in a while. We were doing it as a joke and it kind of stuck. Not the most manly nickname. His middle name is Wolf and I figured that would be his nn. We will wait and see as he gets older I guess, he is still only 9 months!

My 17 month old daughter couldn’t pronounce her new baby sister’s name, Betsy, and called her Beppy instead. Beppy has totally stuck.

My daughter’s name is Sylvia and she gets called Sylvie (predictable), but pretty rarely. My son is named Jasper and sometimes we call him Jibberty-Jabber for fun. But mostly I like names that can’t really be shortened much and have deliberately chosen names without regular or traditional nicknames.

My son Owen is O, Bubbas and Face. My mother calls him Onie, which I don’t love but I tolerate, and my sister sometimes calls him O-Dawg which I HATE. We had planned to call Eloise “Lola Mae” but we almost never do. Instead she’s Lola, Lolz, L’Mae, Sissy and Butters!

My sister Laura and I are twins and when we were in junior high, we began calling each other Bea. The origin is a long story, but now that we’re in our 30′s, we still call each other that. It’s our special little nickname.

My only child so far, is my dog, Sunshine. She goes by lots of nicknames. I thought we would call her Sunny, but she’s never used that. Her nns are Shiny, Shiner, Baby S, Essy, Baby Sweetheart, etc. She’s so much like a child to us, so it’s natural. Shiny fits her personality so well! I can’t wait to have human children so I can name and nickname them!

My daughter’s name is Ivy, but my husband and I call her Boo or Boo-Boo at least half the time. It’s the first word-like sound she made and she always said it so sweetly that it just stuck. I never, EVER, in a million years could have imagined calling my daughter this but it is what it is!

Our 3-month-old is Catherine, meant to be called Kate. After we noted her grumpy personality, we started calling her Grumper, Grumper Girl, and Baby Grump. All this led to GG (short for Grumper Girl) or Baby G (short for Baby Grump). Baby G is the one we use most often. I have a feeling this girl is going to have a hard time learning her name because of the many names we use to refer to her!

Our family is nickname crazy…I once listed over 125 nicknames I’ve been referred to as throughout my life. A few off the top of my head are Lou, Omer (from me saying “omer poppy dirl” (i’m a poppy’s girl) as a baby), Godal (don’t even know for that one), Jinx, Roseabella, and Lilac.

We have called our son, Leo, “Budgie” for forever; I can’t even remember how it got started. He actually answers to the nickname as routinely as to his given name.

My little brothers are named Adam and Benjamin. When they were just learning how to talk, they had these coats with little teddy bear ears on the hoods, and Adam, who learned to talk first, would call his brother Teddy. For a while we all called him Teddy, but now, 7 years later, I’m the only one who still does. People get really confused because it’s clearly not a nickname for Benjamin. Adam gets called Addy occasionally but that’s even more confusing because our sister’s name is Abby.

My kids both have expected nicknames, but I actually got a funky nickname when my niece was learning to say my name. So, instead of Kristi, I’m now Aunt Kiki. Quite frankly, I really like it

I’ve been a nanny for years. My first was a Bodhi, who I called Obie when he was a toddler. Then, I had Abbott and Beckett, “Abby and Becks/Becks.” Now my little ones are Caelan and Micah. Their parents began to call them Lion and Bear, sometimes C-Lion and Micah Bear, because Micah was a hairy baby and Caelan’s name was mispronounced as Sea-Lin by the automated machine at the doctors. I call them Cael (Kale) and Meesh/Mischa/Micah-Bear. They didn’t want a Mike or Mikey, so Mischa/Meesh evolved. Meesh has many songs about his Bear Hair. I hope they keep them as they get older.

For me, Sara-Lee was turned into Sasha when a young cousin couldn’t pronounce it yet. It has stuck with that side of the family. I also know of 2 young girls, Marley and Amelia who are always referred to as Moo, or Milly Moo. Super cute.

No kids for us yet but my sister and I wound up as..

Jessica – Jess Jess ( my niece now calls me aunt ess ess, not so good with the Js yet). Why Jess Jess instead of Jess or jessi- both shorter than Jessica.. No idea.

Jennifer- niffer, niff.

I’m Isabel.

My mom intended to call me Isa, but that didn’t ever stick. I was Bella until I was 7, when I thought Izzy was a lot cooler. I also decided the spelling Isi made more sense.

Now I go by Isabel, but family and family friends call me Bella, because they’ve known me since I was young. Plus in sports I’m normally Izzy, because it’s easier to call out.

Other unexpected nicknames: My sister Grace was Jimmy as a baby (she was bald forever and often mistaken for a boy). I have a family friend named Elliott who’s mom calls him Googs. I don’t know why.

my nickname is JJ, it just stuck after its was my character in the school play

I don’t have kids, but my family is a big nickname family as well!

My name is Shannon but over 18 years I’ve been called: Munchkin, Munchie, and Shan-Lou by my dad, Belle and Shannie-Belle (from belly button, I have also been called belle-ee-button) by my mom, Shan and Shannie from my sister, Shannie-girl from my aunts and uncles.

My friends have taken to calling me Shan, Shan-Shan, Shanonagon (which we’ve decided is a circle), and Shenanigans.

My sister Hayley gets lady bug, Bug, and Hay-Bug from my mom, I call her Hay, Hay-Hay, Jalea (it means Jelly in Spanish, but that’s beside the point, haha), and Hizzle/Hizz as well as sis and sistie-sue.

My friend Lauren gets Lolo, Lo, and Wowen, haha. My name for Katarina is Rinarinarina. And my friend Archana gets Arch, Archie, and Ar-chih-chana because everyone mispronounces her name.

I’m really excited to get to nicknaming future children, haha!

I don’t have kids but my mom tried to name us things that couldn’t get nn.
i’m Bailey — i got Bay, B, Bumble B, bails, bailster, shmails, bailey baby
My brother is Max — Maximus, Maxi, Maxi million, Mr. D
My eldest brother Connor — Conrad, Big D, DriGuy, Conno
Then our dog… Our dog has the most. His Name is Beau — Beauregard, Beaucifus, Bojangles, Beausidon (like Posiden), BoBo, Moron, chubbers.
I’m excited to see what nicknames my kids will have.

My son Gabriel is of course known also as Gabe. But what I wasn’t expecting was for his even more prominent nickname of “Dude” to appear. I would have never guessed that we would end up calling him that more than just about anything else. So he knows his name is Gabriel, but will also answer to Gabe or Dude. Accidental nickname…

My name is Carolyn, after my grandmother. I get called Coraline after the movie. I get mistaken for a Carol or Caroline all the time. My hairdresser and all the other ladies in the shop call me Carol Ann, from The Poltergeist, and are constantly telling me to go to the light… (sigh)

My dad, as a joke, started calling my mom Honey Boo Boo Bear to make fun of those awful rednecks. Now it’s stuck, and it’s now reflex for my dad to call her that. Haha. Kind of funny, but also not!

My cousin’s name is Skyler Lynn, but her grandmother called her Murphy Mae from the day she was born, mostly due to her bright red hair and Irish background. She has gone by nothing but Murphy her entire life. There are very very few people in her life that know that Murphy is not her real name. She goes by it in school and it’s what she is introduced as.

I don’t have kids, but I have a brother Benjamin who my mother SWORE would never be called Benny. Guess what everyone calls him now?….
My mother herself comes up with some unusual nicknames for us 9 kids, though.
Juju – Jessica (me)
Vidmeister – David
Hambone – Brigham
Pokeroni or Momo – Adam (although those nicknames mostly come from his middle name, Moroni)
Lewis or Loodle-Poodle – Laura
Jimbalaya – James
Buddha – Benjamin/Benny
Eetherbeeth – Ethan
Thom-bomb – Thomas

And she (Susannah) gets called Sukie. My dad (David) is called Dade and has a brother Joshua who goes by Joff.

My sister Mariah has had so many nicknames in her life I’m sure I’ll forget one but…here goes.
When she was a toddler, she was very demanding, my parents started to call her Mimi (as in “me me!”) which brought about Mimi Mouse, Miss Mouse, and Screaming Mimi.
As she got older she became Riah, Meem, Marvin (my dad’s “boy name” for his little tomboy) and Meep. I started to call her Buddy one day, and that turned into Bud. Somehow Bud became Budsauce, until my mom yelled at me to stop calling her Buttsauce. From there Budsauce was shortened to either Bud or Sauce. She’s in my phone as Sauce, and even my mom calls her Sauce from time to time.

As a kid I had the lovely nickname of Spork. My last name is York and my grade seven math and science teacher gave me that wonderful name. Everybody still calls me it today.

When I was younger, my mother would call me “Little Miss C”, which eventually shortened to “Missy” until I was school-age, although that is what she STILL calls me. LOL. Then my oldest brother christened me Rinnie, because I was a tomboy, today I go exclusively by Rinnie. That’s how I introduce myself, although people always ask what my real name is.

Well my oldest is Johnny. His preschool teacher called him Johnny bananas then just bananas. The baby is Graham we didn’t know his gender and if he was a girl he would have been grace so he was baby g for awhile. Now he is Graham bam bam or bam

My siblings and I have mostly avoided nicknames outside of the house — my brother Ruben is sometimes Rujo (as in Ruben Johnson) and in grad school I ended up MJ (as in Em. J.) in deference to a longer-established Emma, but most people call us and our sister by our full names.

IN the house is another matter! Aside from Auntie Em, Emmalina, Emacita, and Emma Lou from all my various extended family members, I’m called Elmo by my father, Mema by my mother (which I much prefer), EmIEe by my little sister (spelling invented to annoy me when I was a teenager), and Ephraim or E-Bone Bigs by my brother. That last name comes from his nickname for my sister Tessa, T-Bone Smalls, which eventually morphed into Ski Bone Waffles, which we all call her almost as much as her real name. She also gets Teta from our mom and Tess or Tessa Grace from me.

Ruben has a legacy name, and we all expected him to be “Ben” to distinguish him, but he ended up Ru (or “Roo” if you ask my mom — the spelling debates are endless).

On the very unexpected nickname front — my aunt Ruth hated that name so much that she ended up Cookie. (Ruth –> Refugio –> Cuca –> Cookie. Don’t ask me to explain how Mexican nicknames work or we’ll be here all day.)

My first two kids are Alexander (Xander) and Madelyn (Maddie). I really wanted number three to have a nice formal name with a cute nickname as well, so we named her Genevieve. We couldn’t settle on any of the established nicknames (Genny, Vivi, Evie, Gigi) and in the meantime my dad started calling her GV. It has totally stuck and now that’s even what she calls herself!

Our daughter is Cosima Rose, and we call her Cozy Rosie. When she started talking, she referred to herself as Coey. We’ll see which one wins out in the end!

Cozy is so adorable!! Love GV too.

I was named with my spelling, Michaila, so that I could be Haili. Now I just use it online since it never stuck in real life.
I’ve been called Caila, Mick, Mickey…Miss M…and most surprisingly, Matilda and Kiki…(I shut down Kiki pretty quickly…Matilda is a whole ‘nother story)

My brother Martin hates nicknames, made it very clear when he was in preschool and the bus driver called him Marty…but we still call him M2G2 sometimes since his initials are MMGG

Daniel likes Dan and DJ, but we called him Digger for a while.

Kerilyn likes her full name, but we still call her Keri and Kare-bear, or Keri-Berry. She also likes Ellie, for her middle name Elizabeth, but like Haili, it never stuck.

I met a woman once who was determined that her son would NOT have any nickname. She chose the name Jack because (in her thoughts) it couldn’t be shortened and had no obvious nicknames. Unfortunately, grandparents started calling him J (or maybe it was Jay), which frustrated the mother to no end… her un-nickname-able-name ended up with a nickname :/

My eldest son is named after his father’s best friend. While we used the full name of Matthew, hubby’s best friend used Matt most frequently. When I tried to call my newborn son “Matt”, my hubby objected. To him, “Matt” made him think of grown-up Matt, and just didn’t mesh with his new son’s name/identity. I ended up conceding and let our son just be Matthew (and I learned to discuss names AND nicknames beforehand). However, I love nicknames… My son soon became Peeka (because he loved peek-a-boo so much). Eight plus years later, he still answers to it and loves his special nickname.

My little son is named Atticus (I LOVE the name) and I usually get two reactions:

1. What a cool/beautiful name
2. What is his nickname? Atty?

It is funny how concerned people are with his nickname! We don’t call him Atty, we call him Lovie, Buba/Bubby Crab Apple (when he is being crabby), Baby A etc – endless nn!

One unpleasant nickname that I didn’t anticipate (and I am going to have to watch out for now) – one of my friend’s little 2 year old can’t quite say Atticus’ name…so it comes out as “Ass-kiss”…yeah…:)

Our daughter is Eloise. We call her little squeeze. It happened while still in the womb and has stuck into her 4th year at least.

My family over uses the names William and Michael; three of my four uncles are named William and the fourth uncle is Michael, with my dad and little brother also being Michaels.

So my uncles are usually called Billy (Surname), even by their wives; my uncle Mike is also known as Mike (Surname), my dad is Mike and my brother is Mickey. I started calling him that when I was little and I have no idea why; he also calls me Sissy and Bop (my name is Bailey).

I’m called Vampira by Mom, Pocahontas by Dad, Vickster by my brother-in-law, Vampire by friends, Vic by friends, Vicki-Vic by my best friend, and Sis by several friends.

Everyone calls me by my preferred nickname: Vicki. I introduce myself by that name and unless it’s an official document or something I use that name.

My most unexpected nickname is Raymond! My name is Rachel and for a while I went by Ray which one of my friends turned into Raymond!
I also had a friend called Cath who’s full name was Catriona. She was originally Cat but there were several other Cats so she became Cath because her surname began with an H.
Cat H = Cath
I always thought that was cool.

I once had a very good friend named Juan-Antonio. We started a college program together – everyone was new to everyone else. He was so laid back and wore Nirvana t-shirts and drove a big silly van. He was just not a Juan-Antonio to me – that name seemed too formal and serious for him. After knowing him all of two days, I said he seemed more like a Jimmy or something. And it stuck. Everyone started calling him Jimmy. We worked as lifeguards together over the summer and our boss put him on the schedule as “James”. That’s when I knew the name had fully been accepted!

My name is Margaret, which has about a million nickname possibilities. Since I was born, everyone has called me Maggie (this was chosen by mom) and occassionally Mags. But up until I was about ten my dad called me Bob. Apparently he started calling me baba (like baby) and it got shortened to Bob and stuck.
On another note, my dad and his brother’s names were chosen because of their lack of nicknames: Scott and Mark. It didn’t work. My dad was known as Scooter for a fair amount of his adult life.
I have a great-aunt named Kathleen who has always been called Kak. (Pronounced like Jack with a k.)

My siblings and I often call eachother by our middle names. I call one of my sisters Ouise (pronounced “Weeze”, as in Louise) and another sister calls me Algae (my middle initials are L.G.) – not my favorite, but she also hates that I still call her Trishy. I usually go by Kat, sometimes Kay, and my nephew calls me Aunt Kitty.

We live in the South (US), where nicknames are less common, but my parents & extended family are Yankees. So when I named my daughter Aurora, my grandmother announced that she would be called ‘Rory”. She told everyone in the family this. So I threw a fit & told everyone in the family that noone was nicknamed in the South, and that if they called the baby that she wouldn’t know who they were talking to. Plus, I didn’t like the nn. I acually won this argument (no Rory!)…
BUT my daughter when she started to talk thought the “A” in Aurora was an article. As in “a cat” “a bow” “a Rora.”
So she was “Rora” when she was little.