In the past 10 years I have rarely run into anyone whose baby is named Janessa. That has actually been a good thing, because I couldn't bear up until this point to have heard her name being used everywhere. It has also made me sad to rarely see her name anywhere. It is just not a popular name, never has been. The closest it has come on the popular baby names list was #524 about 20 years ago. I had come up with her name from a couple of Barbie movies that I had watched with my other daughters, Barbie Thumbelina--Janessa is a friend of Thumbelina and in Barbie and the 12 dancing princesses Janessa is one of youngest triplets--just a side character in each show.
A couple of years ago I found a book at a library sale that I instantly grabbed up after reading the back of the book--WHY??? Because the main character's name was Janessa! Unfortunately, at the time it really bothered me to see her name all over the book so I shoved it into a shelf and forgot about it until this year when I was cleaning the shelf and found the book. I was still a little hesitant about seeing her name throughout the book, but, after reading through the first chapter I was hooked. This Janessa character had red hair just like my little Janessa. She was an action adventure CIA agent. I absolutely LOVED seeing her name on almost every page of this book. It was like a beautiful reminder of my own Janessa and it gave me a little chance to peek at a life for her, even if it was purely fiction. I cherish this book now and I was thrilled to see that the author had written 3 more books in the same series all with the Janessa character in them.
