My son Jay?

On Sunday night in the car, Ryan asks me why we named him Ryan. He said, why didn't we name him "Jay" because "it's the coolest name ever." We had told him once that Darrell liked the name Jay but I vetoed it because we already had one in the family ~ my cousin Marcus' middle son is Jason, but we sometimes called him Jay when he was little. I didn't think there were that many Ryans, but now he seems to have a lot of classmates by that name.

We picked Ryan because I liked the sound, but the meaning made sense for us. The meaning is "little king" and my dad's name Richard means "king" so we say he was partly named after his Grandpa. I found his Hawaiian name in a Hawaiian name book. This book assigned Hawaiian names based on meaning rather than just Hawaiianizing English names, like "Kalolina" for Carolyn, which may have a weird meaning, if it means anything in Hawaiian at all. My father-in-law's name is Conrad, which means "bold counselor." The Hawaiian transation of bold counselor was A'okoa. I had never heard the name before, but I liked the way it sounded, very different. Found out later that we should have had a Hawaiian relative or friend name him, or gift him with a Hawaiian name. One of Darrell's friends Puna on Kauai did comment once that A'okoa was a "powerful" name.

His Japanese name is Toshiki, a name I heard on a Japanese daily drama when I was pregnant. The show was "Kimi no Na wa" about wartime Japan, and a little hapa boy (half-Japanese, half-Caucasian) was named Toshiki. Besides being a little unusual (Toshio or Toshihiko would be more common), my mom's Japanese name is Toshiko and my sister's is Toshie, so he's partly named after them too.

We put a lot of thought into naming our little boy.

I just called him "Jay" and he was a little freaked out...why are you calling me that, Mom? Oh, well, maybe he changed his mind, after I wrote a whole blog entry about it.

Darrell said he never thought about wishing for a different name. I maybe would have wanted a different middle name, rather than Gene. His cousins still tease him by calling him "Darrell Gene." I guess his mom thought Gene was sophisticated or something :).

I used to think I wanted to be named Julie. Besides being a big fan of Julie Andrews when I was little (saw "Mary Poppins" and "Sound of Music" many, many times, and this was before the age of videos). Thought that since my sister was named Jan for being born in January, shouldn't I be called Julie for being born in July?! Well, I got over it. I was actually named for my dad's sister who passed away when she was five, Carol Sumie.

If he had been a girl, Ryan would have been Kayla Leiana Kiyomi. I loved the name Kayla since hearing it on "Days of Our Lives" (Kayla Brady) years ago. And Darrell and I just made up "Kayla Leiana" long before we were even married. Don't know what kind of Hawaiian meaning Leiana might have, but we liked that it sounded Hawaiian and that it was pretty and went well with Kayla. Kiyomi is a combination of my Grandma Kiyoko and my Babachan Misao. I also like Ayame, the Japanese name for the iris flower. My Japanese name is Sumire, or violet flower, so I liked the idea of giving another flower name. Love the ayame too, with its beautiful blue color and representation of strength (since it is associated with Boys Day).

I love names...I had a page in my planner for years of names I really liked, in case we had another child. Would have had to have a LOT of kids in order to use all the names I liked! Love to watch "Jon & Kate Plus 8," partly because I love all the kids' names:
Cara Nicole and Madelyn Kate are the twins
Alexis Faith, Leah Hope, Hannah Joy are the girl sextuplets
Aiden Jonathan, Collin Thomas, Joel Kevin are the boy sextuplets.

So Ryan is still Ryan, at least for tonight. Gave him a lot of names so he would have options...he's the only one of his cousins on his dad's side that goes by his English name; the rest go by their Hawaiian names ~ Ipo, Ehu, Nainoa, Pono and Kamalani.