Name Confusion

I was in the car with the Babe and he asked me what his other name is. Being confused, I asked what he was talking about. He said well like your other name is Kendra (the first obviously being mom). I was quite surprised that he knew my first name but not completely shocked because lots of people call me that. If there is anything about being a parent that I have learned, it's that children absorb everything! Then they'll typically bring it up when it's the most embarrassing. So I knew he had figured out his name, the Babe, already but what trying to figure out his name where he fit into the family (like my being called mom). So I struggled on what to tell him. The hubby came to the rescue and told him his other name was brother. That satisfied him.

This brings me to my other story. The hubby and I were talking. I told him how comfortable I am with my maiden name and how proud I am to be associated with my family. Then I said that I am very happy that I married him and I loved taking his name to be associated with him. But that I didn't have the same feelings of gratitude about being associated with his extended family. Not that I don't like them! They are just different than I am. Which is ok! It's ok to be different. Perhaps it was just that I don't know then ALL very well (extended family and so on). I guess the conversation was going no where and I really didn't have a point. I was just thinking about how when I'm 39 how I'll have been with my married name longer than my maiden name. I realize that I naturally am drawn to my own family. It's just weird automatically being a part of a family I didn't grow up with. And it's completely weird when someone I met casually says, "oh do you know so and so (with my married name)." Since I married into this family, I don't know all their distant relatives or really their not so distant relatives. Please, don't get me wrong. I love my in-laws. They are the nicest people ever and I enjoy how they've accepted me into their family so willingly. It's just hard mixing two different families.