Carolina?

[name]Hi[/name] everyone! I need opinions on the name [name]Carolina[/name] (as in [name]Caro[/name]-[name]LEE[/name]-na, not [name]Caro[/name]-LIE-na like the state.) My mom’s name is [name]Carolyn[/name], and I was thinking about giving her a namesake one day. I love [name]Carolina[/name], but I have one setback. As I live in the south, I’m afraid it would be pronounced with a short i instead of a long i. I love how pretty and romantic [name]Carolina[/name] sounds but I don’t think it would be pronounced right and I would be constantly correcting people. What do you think? I thought about spelling it Carolyna, just like my mom’s only adding an a at the end, and I think it might help with the pronounciation issue, but would that look too weird? Or…I could always use the nickname [name]Lena[/name]. Would that help? What do you think?

I think if you live in the south, people would be saying [name]Caro[/name]-[name]LINE[/name]-a like the state. Have you thought of:

[name]Lena[/name]
[name]CaroLINE[/name]
[name]Alina[/name] (pronounced A-[name]LEE[/name]-na)

I think you’ll run up against a lot of pronunciation problems if you use this name (though I do agree it’s pretty).

A friend of mine named her daughter Madalina ([name]LEE[/name]-na, not LIE-na) and has been kicking herself ever since. Basically, nobody [name]EVER[/name] says it right–including some of her own extended family.

I actually know someone that named her little girl [name]Caroleena[/name]. People do seem to pronounce it correctly, but I find that the spelling looks so strange to me. on a side note I think [name]Caroline[/name] is beautiful…

Yeah, I love [name]Caroline[/name] too! My mom doesn’t though, she was born just a few years before [name]Kennedy[/name] was elected and the name [name]Caroline[/name] became super popular…she gets called [name]Caroline[/name] all the time.

I would say [name]Carolina[/name] as [name]Ca[/name]-ro-Lie-na

I think you’d definitely run into pronounciation issues unfortunately, it is a pretty name. I also think spelling it Carolyna is not a good idea. I would want to pronounce it Car-oh-lyn-ah definitely not Car-oh-lee-nah. It also looks a little silly, and I hate made-up spellings. I do think [name]Caroline[/name] is lovely, and probably the safest choice, unless you want to correct people’s pr. all the time.

I have a co-worker whose daughter’s name is [name]Carolina[/name] pronounced the way you want it to be. We live in a largely Hispanic area though, so it isn’t mispronounced too often. However, most non-Hispanics do seem to pronounce it like the state more often than the way it should be pronounced.