My Kingdom for a Name!

It has taken us no fewer than five days to arrive at a name for our new puppy. Why is it so challenging to come up with a moniker for a pet? I mean, really?

But, it is like naming a new family member so we needed to give it a lot of thought and consideration. It had to have two syllables and had to start with a consonant, to make calling the dog easier. It couldn’t be too common, nor could it be way out there. It would be nice to have some connection, like Scottish or Celtic, Finnish or another family reference. Musical would be even better. Even a reference to the type of dog or personality we assume it will have.

Well, we tried out a host of names, some fitting our criteria, some not. For example:

Skye
Isla
Oreo
Dee
Onyx
Maggie
Ruby

And, in the end, it sort of fit our criteria but just felt right.

We had narrowed it down to two names – Martha and Molasses (Molly, for short).

Martha had mounds of meaning that Daddy Crumb loved.

The Beatles song.
Paul McCartney’s dog (or possibly his muse, by some reports).
The poem ‘Sons of Martha’ (by Rudyard Kipling) which lead to The Ritual of the Calling of the Engineer (in Canada) which is part of the iron ring ceremony for new engineers. (Daddy Crumb is an engineer.)
Saint Martha is the patron saint of the helping profession (she’s a border collie).
Martha means mistress of the house.
As you can see, lots of references Daddy Crumb really liked.

I, on the other hand, thought Molasses sounded way cute (and it’s black and sweet, like her) and we could call her Molly for short. Do you get the sense Daddy Crumb analyzes things far more than I do? (don’t get me started…)

So, in the end, we agreed upon:

Martha Molasses Grace

Yes, our dog has not one but two middle names. Suvi had been loving the name Grace all week and said that since I got to choose a middle name that she should, too. Thus, Grace was added.

And, here’s what the naming ceremony looked like.

"Psst! Martha! Look at Mommy!"




"Martha, sit here! Sit, girl, sit!"


"Stay over here, Martha. Wait until Mommy takes the photo. No, stop running at the camera!"



"Wai..."


"Sto..."



Finally, I was able to score this shot. Our little Martha Molasses Grace.

Cross that one off the 'to do' list! Phewf!