To be upset that I've been told by relative we've spelt DD's middle name wrong!

[lazzaroo]

so, we got a card from this relative at the weekend as it was a special occasion. Which was nice of her. In the card was a letter, 'that's nice' I thought. But the sole purpose of the note was to say we'd spelt DD's middle name wrong. We gave her 2 middle names, after nan's on both sides. 2 nan's had the same name, but she wanted to point out that her mum did not spell it how we have. She did it in a 'hope you don't mind me noting but....' way which really pissed me off.

We tried to do a nice thing by including both nan's and spelt it how we liked it (the normal way, we didn't do some random modern twist!). I just don't get the point of her saying anything. What does she expect us to do?! why say anything?!

I know I just have to ignore it but can anyone explain to me what her thinking was?!

annabelle read the thread properly before being so rude to the OP - she never said ancestors, that was another poster, said in fun to, bit much having a go at someone for something someone else said!

Well OP at least this thread will have made your Aunt seem more reasonable than some random people on the Internet , and it could have been worse I only found out that DH's gran, known to all as Lilian, was actually called Elizabeth at her funeral.

Well obviously a lot of people feel strongly about names!
Certainly by the amount of posts and letters in the post!!

Now, as I see it the OPs aunty was being a bit of a busybody. IMHO Lillian is as nice a spelling as Lilian - and Lilian is as nice as Lillian. But nobody's hurt, so let's get on with the 'vipering' on other threads.

Oh and OP congratulations on your baby!! Hope you get some decent sleep soon xxx

Lovely name. You had to spell it somehow and you've chosen the more common, intuitive spelling, which can only be a good thing for your daughter.

My daughter is Kathryn and we were informed that it was really spelt "Catherine" and even "Kathleen" (!) by some members of the extended family. I think it was kindly meant, so tried not to get stroppy about it. We just stuck to our guns and now, finally, her name is being spelt correctly in correspondence. :)

Themaltesefalcon - i am a kathryn too. Have spent a lifetime having my name misspelled. Doesn't bother me at all. It's a fab name :)

oh goodness WHAT a huge storm in a teacup! poor OP!!!

You can change your child's name quite easily up to a year old, after that it gets harder. You could change it to 'Lily Anne' I suppose but tbh Lillian is lovely and does the job fine

Lazzaroo you haven't done anything wrong.

I have known someone for years now, since I was fourteen, and only found out yesterday that his name is really James. He is known as Seamus, which I think is the Gaelic for the name James, but everyone thought Seamus was his actual, official name. I think this sort of thing happens more often than anybody realises.

I also know a whole family who give their eldest boy the first name Graham but refer to them all by a different middle name, because actually calling them all Graham in conversation would be confusing apparently. So the friend I knew as Stephen, and his father who I knew as John, were actually Graham Stephen and Graham John. I'd known them ten years before I found that out and even some members of their own family were surprised to find out about the Graham part.

As I said, families can be strange with names, and I don't think you've done anything wrong by not checking the spellings. At least this way, you haven't had to choose between the two, you've picked the spelling you prefer without anyone being able to accuse you of preferring one Nan above the other and your daughter has a beautiful name spelled just the way you and your partner like.

About the note. It's hard to say without reading it, but I think it sounds nit-picky for no good reason. But I would let it go and perhaps when your daughter is older and you tell her why you chose her name you can tell her that one Great-Nan used a different spelling as an interesting twist to the story.

I think I'd be interested in that if I were her. But you can make it a fun addition to the story rather than a nit-picky one.

I just realised my Great-Grandma was known as Minnie, but my dad has no idea what her full name was. Minerva? Wilhelmina? Something else? I love the name Minnie, but there's nobody left to ask who might know her full name.

ExcuseTypos thank you. I read the thread three times to find that ancestors post and I see what happened now.

photocopy your arse and send it back to her. she sounds just like my older sister. pedantic and smug!

"photocopy your arse and send it back to her."

Best advice ever!

I am definitely taking that advice the next time I get an unwanted letter from certain relatives

Lazaroo you do know that if you had given your poor DD the name Lilian she would have had to spend the rest of her life specifying the one 'L' whilst people gave her a funny look and then explaining that one of her Nan's had it with one L.

Your relative is a pedant. I am one too and so is my MIL. We drive each other fucking nuts but we mean well. She probably will not have meant to hurt your feelings, she will honestly have thought this is important information that you may not have known and that might inform your future decisions in some weird way.

Obviously if she is spiteful in other ways it is possible the letter was sent just to make you feel crappy about your DD's lovely thoughtful name. But probably not. She probably did not think it through that much.

*swampytigga another Kathryn here. I'm really not bothered by the frequent misspelling either, though it does make me when I have to spell it out to someone (I only bother if it's for something official) and they just CAN'T get their head around the lack of an 'e' in there.

My best friend gave her DD1 the most traditional spelling of my name as her middle name, but everyone knows she's named after me. My knickers remain twist-free about it.

There is nothing "poor" about the OP's DD -and should wouldn't have to keep spelling it as it's her middle name.

I was in a class at school with 6 Katherines but each was spelt differently.

I'm wondering how old the aunt is - some people get a bit like that when they're getting on a bit - on the rude, pedantic side, and forgeting that there's a nan on both sides of the family with the name.

If your relative had not known both your DH's nans were called Lillian / Lilian I would have said that she was trying to be helpful and couldn't let you carrying on misspelling the name without saying something. But given she knew there were two nans with very similar names and both were being honoured she should have kept her thoughts to herself. You had to go for the version of Lillian you preferred and in that case one of the nan's was unavoidably going to have a slightly different version of the name to your DD.

JugglingFromHereToThere read the whole thread. We've covered the age thing.

You are being ageist.

You could always drop the Lilian altogether since she has another middle name.

I realise there is often un-warranted discrimination based on age, but on the other hand it can be a factor in people's behaviour. I think it's only ageist if it's un-founded. So, how old was the aunt then ?

I think you are reading too much into it TBH.

She has probably been sitting at home thinking (every now and again), I wonder if Lazzaroo knows that isn't how Nan spelled Lilian. The fact that she mentions in her note that she doesn't know if that is how the other Lillian is spelled suggests that she thinks it might also be Lilian.

If someone I knew named their child to honour a relative but didn't spell it the way they did, I would worry that that was because they'd got the spelling wrong rather than a conscious choice and might try and point it out to them. I think she was clumsy, but I don't think she was mean.

Lazzaroo congrats on your DD, and Lillian is a lovely name and a very sweet sentiment behind the name.

My DDs middle name is Elizabeth, both her nans have the same middle name, so Elizabeth was my little nod to them, if they had been spelt differently, i still would have spelled it with the Z, because that is the spelling i liked.

So bin the letter, enjoy your gorgeous baby and the names you chose.

MMcanny Why would the OP want to drop one of her DD's names??? The child is named. The spelling chosen. Job done.

Well said Ezio.

op some people have way too much time on their hands.

be glad it's not her first name! when I named my dd, one thing I liked about the name was that the spelling was easy, obvious I thought. Well, all adults who are called this spell it the old way but apparently this new way of spelling it is more common now so a lot of people spell her name this new way. As I see it, it's new. New but more correct. Ah well.

I do know a woman who called her son Tadgh which baffles me. Now that is wrong! But I won't send her a note! I'm sure she must have her reasons for switching the g and the h around.