Unfiltered Story #294827

I am staying with my parents briefly before flying out to start my new job. My sister, her husband, and her two boys are frequent visitors. Here younger son is three and when he was two, I surprised her by teaching him how to say his full name. Since then, my sister has been getting him to learn other names, such as her and her husband’s first names. This comes up in conversation and we try to teach him our full legal names. My sister has a fairly common female name and prefers to call herself the common short version of that name.

Sister: “My full name is [Nick name] [Middle name] [Last name].”

Me: “[Nick name] isn’t your legal name, your first name is [First name].”

Sister: “Oh yeah. Well, I never go by that.”

Me: *chuckling* “Only you could screw up at saying your own name.”

Sister: “He doesn’t need to know that, it’s just going to confuse him.”

Dad: “I think [Nick name] [Middle name] [Last name] sounds fine.”

Me: “Why would you be formal by including your middle name but informal by using your nick name? It sounds weird! It’s like the name version of a mullet.”

What do you guys think? Should I just let it be or does it sound weird? I don’t think the concept of legal names and nick names to be too complicated for a three-year-old; he already knows me by both my legal name and my nick name.