We Can Call Him…

My family has always been big on nicknames. It may not exactly seem like it, but it’s true. Before I was born, my sister Shelly took to calling me “Shannon Bananon”. I can hear the retelling of my mom saying “she may not like that, don’t get used to calling her that!”

There was a cartoon on television when ai was in..middle school maybe? I don’t remember what it was but I distinctly remember one episode where they talk about nicknames and one friend starts calling the other “Pumpkin Pie”. My dad thought it was the dumbest thing. And of course hat made my sisters and I find it even more hilarious. Needless to say, we call him that or “PP” any chance we get.

One of the familial names in our family is Nihls. For whatever reason, the nickname has always been “Bud”. Sometimes nicknames don’t make sense but still stick.

When Stacey and Josh found out they were having a boy, they started thinking more specifically about names. They wanted something that would also come with a nickname. Many of the names they considered were regal or presidential. So as we were all on a cruise to celebrate my 30th birthday, we kept bantering about names one even at dinner. Because of my love of presidents, I was all about this. It got to the point where names were getting more and more ridiculous, I threw my hands in the air and said “find, we will just call him ‘HOOVER’ “. Everyone looked at my in shock (and probably horror). No one was on the same page yet, because with my mind they rarely are. “Shannon, how are we going to get a nickname out of that?!” And in true Shannon fashion, I said “We can call him Sweeps. You know, like Hoover is a vacuum?” And it stuck–the nickname, don’t worry, they didn’t name their kid after Hoover.

Today is Sweeps’ birthday. And so, here is a photo for each month of his life.

The cutest all snuggled up, still with his hospital bracelet on his wrist. September 2018