Hi Swistle!
I’ve been reading through your posts for a while since I named my daughter back in 2022, I enjoyed reading through all your posts. I was hoping you’d help my family out now we’re having our own name dilemma!
Well we’re now in July expecting a little boy into our family, little brother to Cyanna Scarlett. Our last name is very similar to Tomlinson. We’ve been on a total mess when trying to find boys names we both like and agree on! We adore Cy’s name! It feels like the perfect, pretty girls name. It has sweet nicknames and is such a happy name! However we can’t find any of the qualities we’re looking for in a boys name. We have agreed on a boys name we both liked but found that the automatic nickname would be ‘Kai’ and I’d definitely get mixed up having a Cy and Kai! This boys name was Makaio. I’ve been clueless for ideas, my husband’s favourite right now is Ziggy. But it just seems too happy and I’m not sure if it would really work on an adult. His middle name will most likely be August as we’ve decided we both like the name August, just not set on it as a first name!
If he were to have been a girl, he would have been Milani or Marsaili and in the case we have another baby and they are a girl then they will probably take either of these names! We’re not quite sure how many children we plan to have, but we will probably only have one more child if we were to have another at all!
Thank you so much for your time and consideration! We really do appreciate it.
Emi 💗
Oh, Makaio does seem perfect! The happy rhythm, the happy -o, the nickname potential! I wonder if you could call him Mack or Mackie instead. I wouldn’t have thought of Mackie except that a friend’s child goes by that, and now it sounds very natural to me. And maybe Cy and Kai WOULDN’T trip you up!
This is going to be a delightfully subjective category, and I am very much looking forward to the comments section, but in the meantime here are some more boy names that feel happy and/or fun to me:
Alfie
Angelo
Angus
Archie
Barnaby
Baxter
Brecken
Bridger
Briggs
Broderick
Crockett
Crosby
Darcy
Decker
Ezekiel/Zeke
Felix
Finnegan
Fletcher
Gideon
Hatcher
Jacoby
Jennings
Keaton
Keegan
Murphy
Padgett
Peregrine
Phineas
Quincy
Roderick
Roger (with the adorable nickname Hodge)
Rooney
Rufus
Shepherd/Shepard
Sullivan
Terrence
I would mention Kipling, but an earlier post has killed that name for me. I think Harvey would be terrific, but now Weinstein is back in the news again. And I would mention Indigo, but it seems like too much color with Cyanna and Scarlett—or is it? Would you want to make a full-on theme of it? Indigo Grey? Indigo Jet? But that would leave you with a difficult theme if you did have a third child.
Gus and Auggie both feel like a very happy nicknames to me, if it changes your mind at all about using the name August as a first name.
Name update:
Hello again!
Thank you to everyone, we really did look at and read through every single comment and consider every suggestion given; and from the bottom of our hearts thank you! We really appreciate the time people took out of their day to suggest a name for our little boy.
We ended up going to the hospital with three names, Shepherd, Makaio and Murphy. But after meeting him on July 11th we ended up naming him Shepherd, Shepherd Finley. We were sure his middle name would be August, though while talking to one of the midwife’s and her telling us that she thought Finley would suit him very well we ended up choosing that as his middle name over August. Cyanna is just as in love with his name as we are and has been referring to him as ‘Sheppie’ which we think is adorable!
I can’t really get a read on the style of these names, looking at them together. Marsaili, Cyanna, Makaio… okay I’m seeing Hawaiian and Jamaican based on a quick search. So maybe a Polynesian name? I like Inoke, Mali, Malakai…
You might consider:
Albert — Albie and Bertie sound happy, imo. The name means “noble” and “bright.’
Crispin — I LOVE this name. It means “curly-haired.”
Desmond — I like Des or Dez as a nickname. Bishop Tutu was certainly an admirable Desmond.
Felix — means “happy” and “fortunate.”
Hugo — has the ending O of Makaio and can mean “mind,” “intellect,” “soul,” or “heart.”
Isaac — means “laughter.”
Micah — maybe too close to Cyanna and Makaio?
Ray — or maybe a name that contains ray? I like the ray of sunshine imagery.
Simon — this name sounds happy to me, but is likely to similar to Cyanna.
Best wishes to you!
‘
Name him Isaac and call him Ziggy for short! Isaac means laughter so I think it’s the ultimate happy name for a boy. This name/nickname has been on my shortlist for so long, it’s just so perfect!
Isaac Makaio: Ziggy Kai!
Isaac and Cyanna. Ziggy and Cy!
Isaac August is also lovely and so handsome.
Good luck! Please update us :)
Zigmunt (or Sigmund), with Ziggy as a nickname, so he has a more formal name to use later in life if he wants?
Isaac is good, too, maybe called Ike.
Zayden August nn Ziggy
Zeke August nn Ziggy
Mackaio nn Mac
Paxton
Dodi
Tag
Quill
Fabian
Ulysses
What about Keanu? Happy, cool and everyone know how to pronounce it.
I also like Kelani, Fergus, Lazlo, Wylie.
Also Elvis.
My son’s name is Wylie! It’s a family surname.
How did you come across it?
Caspian, Rowen, and Sonny/Sunny are names that come to mind as ‘happy’ to me. I like Caspian with Cyanna; they sound like sibling names but not so similar that you would get tripped up.
I like Caspian too! I know a Cazimir who goes by Cazzy, that nickname could also work with Caspian if desired.
My colleague has an adult son Ziggi (pronounced with an S sound at the start. Afaik it is a stand alone name. He wears it well.
There is also a Ziggy (z sound) that is one of Australia’s biggest CEOs. He hasn’t been held back by the name.
All to say Ziggy! (I like the Z sound myself)
I love all these suggestions. Could Makaio be nicknamed Kaio instead of Kai? Cy and Kaio is cute!
The name Zakai/Zakkai/Zaccai (which is kind of the syllables of Isaac inverted) could be nicknamed Zak or Ziggy instead of Kai. It means pure. If you wanted to invent your own name, you could also go with Zakaio.
I always file Rafferty (Raf) and Zebedee (Zeb) under my mental list of fun names, too. And some of my favorite “-o” enders include Finlo/Finnlo and Inigo.
And Ziggy always makes me think of Ozzy/Ozzie, which could come from longer forms like Ozren, Oswin, Oswell (alternate nicknames Ren, Winn, and Wells, respectively), etc.
Isaac Makaio nicknamed Ziggy Kai is a great suggestion.
Ignatius nicknamed Iggy or Nash could be fun.
Zane Ignatius nicknamed Ziggy?
Zaccai is another way to get to Cai.
Hendrix – Cy and Rix.
Peregrine – I love this name. You could go with nicknames Penn or Pip. I also like Hawk based on the meaning. Plus there is the Peregrine doing Lunar exploration this year.
Aww the update made me smile. We have TWO sons who were almost but not quite named August! It’s just the name that we love but never seemed quite right haha!