Actress and singer-songwriter Zooey Deschanel has announced the birth of a son, Charlie Pechenik, a little brother for Elsie.
The star of New Girl, who converted to Judaism (the religion of her husband, Jacob Pechenik), decided to continue an animals theme when it came to her children’s names. Charlie has the middle name “Wolf”, while Elise’s is “Otter.”
The 37-year-old explained the thinking behind Elsie’s name soon after she was born, in August 2015:
“In a sense that we’re all mammals. We thought Elsie is a classic name—a lot of people have grandmas and aunts named Elsie. And then we were like, the middle name can be a little bit like wild.
“We both found that we had a mutual love for otters. There were some more normal middle names… but I realized that nobody else likely had the middle name ‘Otter.’”