Each week, the TODAY Parents team highlights a favorite baby name or set of sibling names. It may be unique, trendy, newsworthy, classic, or just … fun! And there will always be a fascinating story behind it.
When Britney Donley became a mother at 20, she wasn’t carrying a carefully curated list of baby names into the delivery room.
Exhausted after labor and overwhelmed as a first-time parent, she asked a nurse a simple question: “What day is it?”
“Sunday,” the nurse replied.
That was all the inspiration she needed.
Her first child became Sunday.
Each week, TODAY.com spotlights an unusual or meaningful baby name and the story behind it. This week, that distinction belongs to Sunday, and to her six siblings who complete the calendar: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday.
It sounds almost too perfect to be true. But Donley says each of her kids was born on the day that would become his or her name.
“I can’t make it up,” the 37-year-old mom in Michigan tells TODAY.com with a laugh.
Her oldest, Sunday, recently turned 18 and graduated from high school. She hopes to become a teacher. Monday is 16. Tuesday is 10. Wednesday is 5. Thursday is 4. Friday is 2. Saturday is 17 months old.
The names often stop strangers in their tracks.
“When we’re out together and I call for Monday or Tuesday, people turn their heads,” Donley says.
For her, the names were never about attracting attention.
Growing up in a family of eight children, Donley dreamed of having a large family of her own. She also hoped her children would share a bond that went beyond biology. Because her children have different fathers, she wanted them to have something that uniquely connected them to one another.
“I wanted them to be close,” she says. “That has always been really important to me. And they are close. They do everything together.”
That closeness, she believes, has become one of the greatest gifts of the unusual naming tradition.
At first, she says, her son Monday wasn’t fond of his name. He preferred using his last name at school and rarely introduced himself as Monday.
That changed after the family began sharing their lives online.
As viewers embraced the children’s names, the children began to see them differently.
“Now they love them,” Donley says. “People tell them how special they are.”
Although she says she isn’t planning to have more biological children, she hopes one day to become a foster or adoptive parent.
Asked what she would name those future children, she didn’t hesitate.
“The months,” Donley said. “I’d start naming them after the months
This story first appeared on TODAY.com. More from TODAY:
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