Lulu it is

So I really don't like nicknames. There have been several times in my life when someone has introduced themselves like this: "My name is Tony, but everybody calls me T-Bone." Nope. Never. Never, ever will I call you that. Me and your mom will be the only ones to call you Tony and I'm good with that.

We've been calling our daughter by her full name, but it's just not flying for many reasons. Here's one of them.

Phone conversation with a SPEECH AND LANGUAGE PATHOLOGIST:

SLP: How do you pronounce your daughter's name?
Me: Lu...yah...nuh
SLP: Lu...nanna?
Me: No...LU.........YAH......NUH
SLP: Nu...nan?
ME: LU.......YAH......NUH
SLP: Well, I'm not even going to try because I'll never be able to say that.
Me (in my head of course):...Ummm, seriously??

I can totally understand not being able to read it but so many people can't even repeat it after I tell them how to pronounce it. It really boggles my mind; I don't think it's that crazy of a name. So I've been telling Mark we need to settle on a nickname so that when people give me that look, I can say, "You can just call her T-Bone (or whatever)."

So pre-adoption, we called her Lulu, but it never stuck once we got her. Randomly a few days ago, I said, "Lulu, you want some cereal?" The girl lit up, smiled, and pointed to herself and said, "Lulu". I didn't think much of it.  Several hours later we were at the grocery store and she starts smiling at me, patted her little chest and said, "Lulu!" And today every time I called her Luyana, she corrected me, "No," (pats chest) "Lulu". So, Lulu it is. The girl has an opinion and I like that.