making kids with weird names happy

My daughter has a unique name. Some would say it was strange, but it's actually a name that I discovered while doing genealogy research. So it's not a weird, hippie name - it's a family name. And it suits her perfectly. We all love the fact that she's the only person we know with her name. She's a special kid...with a special name. It's actually the name of a flower, too, so it's not like we named her "stardust" or "dotcom" or "kewl" or some other fad-based moniker.

Occasionally, we have trouble with strangers over her name. Although it is a word that is very common in the English language, they forget how to pronounce it for some reason when it is attached to a real person. Either that, or they think that she is a boy based on her name. (Probably due to all of those boys out there that are named after flowers...ahem.) The only other problem that we've had is when we have tried to get anything personalized for her. In most cases, you can only select from a list of the most popular names. While this works fine for people like my sister, who chose to name her daughter with the most popular girl's name of that year, it does occasionally cause some disappointment for my daughter.

So when I had the chance to review a new service specializing in children's personalized books, toys and DVDs, I jumped at the chance. Instead of picking from a list of predetermined children's names, they allowed me to enter her name into a blank field. So I figured there would be no problem. I uploaded my daughter's photo, and placed the order for a personalized Care Bears DVD. (The Care Bears have actually been experiencing a revival over the last few years, which is funny because I remember seeing them on TV when I was a kid.)



A couple of days after I ordered, I received a voicemail indicating that there was a problem with my order, and that I needed to call them about it. "Crap! I bet it's her name," I thought to myself. Foiled again. As it turned out, it was her name that was the problem. But instead of canceling the order, the customer service rep asked if I would be willing to wait an extra week or two for them to custom record her name. Awesome!

A short week later, the DVD arrived in the mail. Anxious to see how it worked out, I popped it into the player for my kids to watch. I hadn't told my daughter that it was personalized - just that it was a surprise for her. Soon enough, there's my daughter's face on an animated body, skiing down a mountain with the Care Bears. Both kids got a kick out of it. It was hilarious. The voice didn't always match with the characters voice when they said her name, and at times the Bears' mouths seemed to move without any audio (almost like an old Kung Fu movie), but overall it's a great gift for younger children who haven't grown old and crotchety enough to let such minor inconsistencies bother them. I'd order it again and definitely recommend it to other parents, especially those who may have trouble finding personalized gifts for their children due to unusual names.



The site is called Kids Personally and they offer personalized books, DVDs, and toys featuring Disney, Looney Tunes, comic book characters, and of course the Care Bears.