Rick Bradford was the first to tell me. I suppose it is a sign that I do not read enough people magazine*, but I was barely aware that Jay-z and Beyonce were even expecting a child – much less did I know they named their little girl Blue Ivy. I would say Meg and I are trend setters but really we wished we had copy-righted the name “Ivy”. I want her to be the only one, as with Phoebe and Darcy. We set out to find beautiful names that were also rare. So I pray “Blue Ivy” catches on like “Apple”.

*The thing I am most proud of this week is that I could not recall a website to get pop culture information. I guess people magazine probably has a site, but it is nice to know that my personal pop knowledge ceased in the twentieth century before the magazine’s demise.

By “Apple” I am not referring to the I-pad company, but Gwyneth Paltrow’s little girl. This knowledge could contradict my previous claim of star ignorance, but this trivia bit came from my sister. She still shops at American Eagle (No matter how often I mention her age! Not to mention she is writing her doctoral discertation and just interviewed to be prof at William Jewell – say a prayer, I would love for her to be in our area!). But more than just knowing the styles, she is often a step ahead of the trends. I can remember making fun of her for scarves years before every girl was wearing them… All to say, after the arrival of Apple, she declared she loved the name and would name her first little girl Pear. I asked, a little slowly, “A pair of what?”

Unfortunately it seems there are at least a pair of Ivy’s. But in the fourth grade I was a triplet. I went by Sean T, while there was also Sean W. and Shawn S. I suppose this is part of why I wanted original names for our girls. Something unique, to set them apart from the crowd.

Really, though, we could have found something utterly original. Even outrageous. A nurse mentioned a little girl born while we were in the hospital, Kansas Unique (K.U.). But we did not want to make our girls so different as to be laughable.

And in many ways this is how we live life as Christians. We want to be different, but not so different as to be laughable.