Masculine, feminine or neuter?

This question is weighing on my mind just now. Two reasons:

1) Our baby is due in the Spring and I don't know what it is going to be. At the last scan it was impossible to tell the sex as the baby decided to draw its limbs up into its body in an act of extreme coyness.

If only I knew I'd start planning its Spring/Summer '07 wardrobe and perhaps I could create a mood board for the nursery based on rose or aqua hues... Then, there is the tricky issue of names. We currently have three names for girls to one name for a boy on our very short shortlist. To be honest, we haven't put too much effort in yet. Maybe we'll just get to the hospital and ask for suggestions in the delivery room? That way we could end up with a 'Helmut' or a 'Velma'. Would that be a case of irresponsible parenting?

2) We had our first German lesson last week - in which we were told that nouns can be masculine, feminine, or neuter. Neuter is a new one on me. Having done French at school I thought remembering two genders was enough of a burden. Now I find I have come to a country where there are masculine nouns, feminine nouns and inbetweeny nouns.

I do hope our baby decides to stick to the French system.