So you've finally decided. After months of careful consideration you've found a moniker that does justice to the little one growing inside of you. The only hang-up? The name you've chosen is, well, unique. One of a kind. Just like your little miracle. But how should you handle the strange looks or family backlash that may accompany your decision? And how can you help your little one as he or she grows to be comfortable with a name that stands out among the school-age crowd?

As the director of communications at BabyEarth.com, Cathy Hale had seen her fair share of unique monikers. And when she was pregnant with her first baby in 2004, she was bombarded with the onslaught of "interesting" baby names that celebrities were choosing: Apple, Audio-Science, Denim, Puma.

"My husband and I were totally stressed out about giving our baby a cool name," Hale says. "After all, we're Cathy and Steve, which is not original at all. We didn't know if it was a boy or a girl, so we started out by going through the list of family names. We had plenty of girl names but no good boy names. Steve's great-grandfather was Jesse Steele Hale. We both lived with the name Steele for a while and liked it. It made the list as a middle name."

Hale ended up delivering a bouncing baby boy, whom the couple named Jacob Steele. For the first few weeks of his life, he went by Jacob. But then Hale decided her little man needed a more striking name and told everyone – via e-mail – to start calling him Steele. The family balked at first.

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