(And How to Pronounce It!)
At the time, we figured her "full" name would probably be Margaret. However, as my passion for Ireland grew throughout my undergraduate years, we also began exploring Irish names. I bought an Irish baby name book called Beyond Shannon and Sean and was thrilled to learn that there was an Irish version of the name Margaret - Mairead.
Learning how to pronounce it was not so simple. Ireland is home to several very distinct accents, which often pronounce the exact same word quite differently. The book's pronunciation guide listed Mairead as may-read. But when I asked some Irish speakers, I was also told mar-ud, may-rud, and my-rud. Since each pronunciation was equally valid, Nate and I decided to choose the one we liked best, and we settled on my-rud.
We had a little more difficulty choosing Maggie's middle name. For a very long time, we were settled on Roisin, the Irish for Rose, which most will agree is pronounced ro-sheen. However, the longer we thought about it, we wanted to give her a name that a) was not as difficult for English speakers to pronounce as her first name, and b) had some family significance. And then one day it hit me. I'd always wanted to honor my paternal grandmother in some way, who passed away on March 21, 1998, but her first name, Florence, didn't fit right and another family member had used her middle name, Yvonne. All along, I forgot that her maiden last name was the beautiful Kelly. As soon as I remembered this, I asked Nate what he would think of naming our first daughter (if she was indeed a girl - by this point, I was pregnant, but we still didn't know what we were having) Mairead Kelly. He agreed it was very beautiful and flowed nicely, so that was what we settled on.
So, long story short: Maggie because I like it, Mairead because it's more Irish than Margaret, Kelly because I love and miss my grandmother, and it's pronounced my-rud. :)
