My partner and I can’t agree on any names for our identical twin boys due in early October.

Last name is Boulerice.

We have 1 son who’s named Declan John Robert.

He likes scottish / Norse names – some examples include Ayrton, Barron, Calder & Soren.

I like celtic/ Scottish / Welsh names – some examples include Lowen, Griffin, Malcolm, & Tristan.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

I feel optimistic about this: your styles are so adjacent/overlapping, it feels FATED for success. And you need TWO names, so maybe BOTH of you will get your favorite!

But oh, goodness, I remember how difficult it was to name twins! I’d thought it would be DELIGHTFUL, and then it was so DIFFICULT! What I finally had to do was pretend I was naming them one at a time: pretend I was pregnant with one baby, and what would I name this one? and then pretend it is like two or three years later and I am pregnant again with one baby, and what would I name this one?

And yet it’s impossible to ignore the fact that they WILL be born together, and their names WILL be considered together! (And in my experience, people lovvvvvvvvvve to hear twin names.) So I ended up with two “separate” lists (pretending they were born separately) plus a “twin” list (pairing up all the names from the other lists). My dear hope was that I could find SOMETHING twinny about the names: not the Sharon/Karen or Timmy/Tommy thing from generations ago, but maybe just the same number of syllables/letters, or maybe starting with the same letter, or maybe a similar sound. I failed in that goal (I liked my favorites too much to trade them for something twinnier), and it’s absolutely fine but I do still wish I’d succeeded in finding something a LITTLE twinny! (Their middle names do start with the same letter, which scratches the very edge of that itch.)

Commenters brought it to my attention recently that Norse names are currently favored by white supremacists, not just casually/coincidentally but in a This Is Part of Our Mission kind of way, so what I suggest is that we leave those out for the time being until we find out if those names are going to feel regrettable later on. Of course I don’t mean I think parents CAN’T use them, and of course many names belong to multiple cultures, and of course one such name in a sibling group of non-Nordic names will not make it seem as if you are Trying To Promote White Supremacy. But just in situations where there isn’t a strong reason to use one of those names, I’m suggesting maybe we put them aside for now and see how things go. And in this particular case, your overlap is Scottish names, so that seems like the first area to explore anyway.

I need to say at the outset that I am not generally clear on which names are Scottish and which are, say, Irish, or Celtic. I have them all mixed together in my mind, as well as in many of my baby-name reference books. This may lead me to suggest a name that is RIDICULOUS, and please do tell me gently in the comments section so I can remove it and pretend I didn’t suggest it.

I’m going to start with The Oxford Dictionary of First Names, because it has a specific section for Scottish names.

Aidan

Okay, wait, time out: on this list is Ailbeart, which it says is the Gaelic equivalent of Albert. Would Albert then fall into the category of Scottish names, or is it completely unScottishized by the conversion? Because I am very keen on the name Albert, and would like to see it come back into style, but I want to save my pushiness for the posts where I have a chance. All right, let’s start again:

Aidan
Alasdair
Alec
Angus
Archie
Calum
Cameron
Conall
Douglas
Evander
Ewan, or does it have to be Eóghan to be Scottish?
Fergus, or does it have to be Fearghas?
Findlay
Finlay
Fraser
Gregor
Ian
Lachlan (probably not with Declan)
Logan
Lyall/Lyle
Malcolm
Murray
Neil
Niall
Reid
Roderick
Rory
Ross
Shaw
Teague, or does it etc.

And now a list from The Baby Name Wizard‘s Celtic section:

Aidan
Alastair
Alec
Angus
Bowen
Brennan
Broderick
Brodie
Brogan
Callan
Callum
Camden
Casey
Conall
Connor
Cormac
Cullen
Darby
Desmond
Douglas
Ellis
Evander
Ewan
Fergus
Finian
Finlay
Finn
Finnegan
Flynn
Garrett
Graham
Gregor
Griffin
Ian
Keane
Keegan
Kellan
Kian
Kieran
Lachlan (probably not with Declan)
Logan
Lowen
Lyle
Malcolm
Morgan
Murphy
Neil
Niall
Owen
Quinn
Reid
Rhys
Rory
Rowan
Shaw
Sullivan
Teague
Tiernan

Would anyone like to have some fun coming up with pairings? This is your moment!

I wonder if it would help to go through these lists, or the Scottish/Celtic section of a name book or website, and each of you write down all the names you are willing to even consider (like, any name you don’t actively dislike); then put those names on little slips of paper and spread them out all over a table and start pairing them up. Sometimes a name you’re just sort of okay with can change into a name you LOVE as you start experimenting with it. Or it can go the other way: you can have a name you think you want to use, and then when you start actually trying it out, it fails to please.

More things to experiment with: Do you find you like names that have something in common, like a shared first initial or shared number of syllables or shared sound, or do you find you are more inclined to find names that are quite different? (My twins were fraternal girl/boy twins; I might have felt differently about the twinniness of names if I’d had identical twins.) Do you find your lists are ranked oppositely: that is, your favorites are on his list but way down at the bottom, and his favorites are on your list but way down at the bottom? Is there any joint happiness in the middle of the list, or would you perhaps prefer the method of a friend of mine who had an opposite-ranking issue with her husband: they ended up each choosing one name (the name had to be on the other parent’s list, but it could be way down at the bottom), and in time she said they both came to love both names. There is also some work to be done with middle names: perhaps one parent would come closer to the other parent’s favorite if they could choose the middle name.

Do you find as you makes lists and pairings that actually you are not feeling the Scottish names? It might be necessary to go one level back, and start again with the entire pool of names. Maybe it will turn out that you liked Scottish names for your FIRST baby, but now you want something else.

I have also found it useful, when feeling very stuck on a baby’s name, to think to myself that it is not actually important that we both love the name. What’s important is that we give the baby a serviceable name they can use throughout their life, and I always felt confident we could achieve THAT goal—and also that with time, we would come to love their name because it was THEIRS. Talking with relatives from previous generations, I found they seemed a little baffled by how much energy and stress the current parents (me, they meant me) were putting into name-choosing: they’d gone with a route more like “Well, how about Nancy? Oh, your sister is using it for her daughter. Well, then, how about Barbara? Great! Oh, wait, what about the middle name? Ann? Sure! Done!” My mother-in-law, when questioned on my favorite topic, said for each of her pregnancies she was just thinking about the baby’s name and it was just the name that came to her mind, and then she checked with her husband and he was fine with it, so then they were done. This method does not resonate with me, but it soothes me.

Dear Swistle,

We are expecting a boy this year and are struggling to find a name we love. Our last name rhymes with Inpin@relli, which is obviously a mouthful, so we prefer one or two-syllable first names. Our daughter is Quinn J(oo)liet (but spelled with a u). We have basically eliminated names ending in the -in sound due to our last name, although we decided to break that rule with Quinn and it somehow works. We prefer names that aren’t super popular but are recognizable and easy to pronounce. My husband doesn’t like what he deems “preppy/pretentious” names such as Sawyer, Spencer, and Parker.

The middle name will probably be Simon after my grandfather, although we could also use the S initial or a J initial for my grandmother.

First names we like but aren’t sure about:

Reid- This is currently our front runner. Would this be annoying for the child in school considering how often the word “read” is said? Does it sound nerdy with Simon?

Miles- Seems a little bland to me- maybe because of the similarity to the word mild. It also eliminates a middle name starting with S.

Cole

Graham- Would he be called grammy or graham cracker?

Theo- too popular

Nolan- has that -in ending

Hayes- my husband doesn’t like it

Our original favorite boy name was Ryder but two friends in our orbit have recently used it.

 

I look forward to hearing your thoughts and suggestions! I will definitely provide an update once the baby is born.

I think Reid is great. Perhaps some Reids and/or parents of Reids can weigh in on the Reid/read issue, but my own opinion is that it wouldn’t stop me from using it. I don’t think it seems nerdy with the middle name Simon.

Or would you like Reeve? Reeve Inpin@relli; Quinn and Reeve.

I wonder if Milo would feel a little more interesting than Miles. Milo Inpin@relli; Quinn and Milo.

Nolan + Cole makes me think of Noel, but I suspect in the U.S. it would be irritatingly often confused with Noelle. Noel Inpin@relli; Quinn and Noel.

I do think a Graham would sometimes hear the graham cracker wordplay; perhaps some Grahams or parents of Grahams can weigh in on how much of an issue it is.

I wonder if you’d like Grant: similar to Graham, but no crackers. Grant Inpin@relli; Quinn and Grant.

Or Emmett. Emmett Inpin@relli; Quinn and Emmett.

Or Wyatt. Wyatt Inpin@relli; Quinn and Wyatt.

Grady. Grady Inpin@relli; Quinn and Grady.

Clark. Clark Inpin@relli; Quinn and Clark.

Gage. Gage Inpin@relli; Quinn and Gage.

Lane. Lane Inpin@relli; Quinn and Lane.

Rory. Rory Inpin@relli; Quinn and Rory.

Our last name is Lee (which cuts out a lot of names— more than you’d realize. Can’t use names ending in -ly sound for example, Kelly Lee). Our son is named Henry. Due date December. This is our 2nd and final kid. This one is a Girl.

We will be using Lurlyne as middle name after my grandmother. Yes, slightly weird name but I recognize it’ll be made middle name to not be called that all the time and still honor her.

Names thrown around that my husband hasn’t X’d yet:

Madison
Lauren
Eliza
Rebecca
Cameron
Avery

Names X’d/vetoed by my husband:

Scarlett
Sophie
Anne
Georgina
London
Athena
Hazel
Kelsey
Vienna
Amelia
Kennedy
Eleanor
Charlotte
Caroline

Any suggestions or recommendations? We generally like traditional names for first names that the masses would spell only one way I.e. No “it’s Catherine with a C… or K… or I… or Y… “ I hated growing up and always having to correct people or watch my siblings spell their names etc.

Thanks for any suggestions!

Starting with the list not yet vetoed by the husband, I would say Eliza and Rebecca most fit the preference for traditional names; Madison, Avery, Lauren, and Cameron feel more modern/contemporary. Eliza seems the most straightforward in terms of spelling; Rebecca can be Rebekah, but Rebecca is currently the predominant spelling: according to the Social Security Administration, in 2022 there were 1,065 new baby girls given the spelling Rebecca and 277 given the spelling Rebekah.

Henry and Eliza gives me a strong My Fair Lady association, but I have seen that movie dozens and dozens of times and may not be representative of the general public. Henry and Rebecca is a pleasing combination: I feel as if a current Henry would be most likely to have a little sister Charlotte, Eleanor, or Violet, so the still-traditional-but-less-currently-in-favor name Rebecca feels fresh. And it appears to me from your email that Rebecca is part of your own name, and I am immensely in favor of mothers passing on their names to their children. So as much as I love the name Eliza (it is one of my enduring top favorites), in this case I vote Rebecca with all my heart. Perhaps with the nickname Bex.

I feel disinclined to look any further, so committed am I to Rebecca. But just for fun, a few more combinations:

Bridget Lee; Henry and Bridget
Claudia Lee; Henry and Claudia
Cora Lee; Henry and Cora
Eloise Lee (maybe too much L); Henry and Eloise
Felicity Lee; Henry and Felicity
Florence Lee; Henry and Florence
Josephine Lee; Henry and Josephine
Margaret Lee; Henry and Margaret (nicknames Meg, Daisy, Greta, etc.)
Melinda Lee; Henry and Melinda
Meredith Lee; Henry and Meredith
Rose Lee; Henry and Rose
Rosemary Lee; Henry and Rosemary
Ruby Lee; Henry and Ruby
Sabrina Lee; Henry and Sabrina

Today I heard Henry telling his friends his naming story and, let me tell you, it sounds different that way. “Wow,” one of his friends said, “I take it your parents really love [the TV show that brought the name to my attention].” It made me wonder what happens with those kids who are named after the place where their parents had sex to conceive them. Think ahead, is my feeling here.

His friends were pitching in with their stories, and I couldn’t hear the ones with quieter voices, but one boy said he was pretty sure he was named after [hot male actor] in one of his mom’s favorite movies. This generated some nauseated responses.

My mother-in-law told me she chose her two children’s names casually: the names just came into her head while she was pregnant. (Yes, both names were Top Ten names for their birth years.) Later she pushed me to read one of her favorite books from her college years, and it turned out to have some pretty racy scenes in it, and the two people being racy together had the same names as her two children.

(If you wish to tell your baby’s naming story here to see if it passes the “Telling it to Teenaged Friends” test, feel free.)

Last time we talked about the middle names of one specific graduating high school class. Today it’s first names.

My repeated contention over the years has been that even a Top Ten name is not all that common: parents may be remembering their own classroom experience with the name Jennifer, but Jennifer at its peak was used at well over four times the frequency of the current most common names. In addition, many of us have seen from our own experience that it can come down as much to local trends/whims/coincidences as national statistics: a classroom might have not a single child with any of the top five names, but two kids with the same name ranked down in the 500s.

Here was what I was interested to see: how did the Top Ten shake out in this particular graduating class? These are babies born in 2004-2005; according to The Social Security Administration, here were the top ten names in those years:

(screenshot from https://www.ssa.gov/OACT/babynames/index.html)

(screen shot from https://www.ssa.gov/OACT/babynames/index.html)

Most of those are repeats, which makes things easier. If we include all the names from both years, we get our own custom Top Eleven:

Emily
Emma
Madison
Olivia
Hannah
Abigail
Isabella
Ashley
Samantha
Elizabeth
Ava

Jacob
Michael
Joshua
Matthew
Ethan
Andrew
Daniel
Joseph
Christopher
Anthony
William

In 2004, the top eleven girl names were used for 9.15% of new babies assigned female at birth, and the top eleven boy names were used for 11.59% of new babies assigned male at birth. In 2005, the top eleven girl names were used for 8.80% of new babies assigned female at birth, and the top eleven boy names were used for 10.98% of new babies assigned male at birth. Statistically, we would expect to see approximately those percentages for our own combined Top Eleven for our two combined birth years: an average for 2004/2005 girls would be 8.98%; an average for 2004/2005 boys would be 11.29%.

I’m going to copy my two Top Eleven lists below, and add a tally of how many of each name were in this particular class of 190 students:

Emily 3
Emma 1
Madison 1
Olivia 1
Hannah 3
Abigail 0
Isabella 1
Ashley 1
Samantha 0
Elizabeth 1
Ava 1

Jacob 1
Michael 0
Joshua 0
Matthew 3
Ethan 1
Andrew 2
Daniel 0
Joseph 0
Christopher 4
Anthony 0
William 2

For girls, that’s 13 names in the Top Eleven. I have just realized that to make this strictly accurate, I would need to count how many of the graduates are girls and how many are boys; we are not going to do that, for several reasons. Instead I am going to estimate it’s 50/50, which gives us an estimate of 95 girls, and 13 Top Eleven names: 13.68%, compared to the expectation of 8.98%. For boys, there are also 13 names in the Top Eleven, which gives us the same estimated percentage: 13.68% of the names were Top Eleven names, compared to the expectation of more like 11.29%

So in my particular area, parents are somewhat more inclined than average to use Top Ten names—and especially for girls. And even so: imagine being hesitant to use the name Emma/Jacob/Olivia/Ethan in 2004/2005 because of popularity, but being able to peek into the future and see that your Emma/Jacob/Olivia/Ethan would be the only Emma/Jacob/Olivia/Ethan in their entire graduating class. Imagine avoiding Abigail/Joshua/Samantha/Michael because of the popularity, and then there’s not a single Abigail/Joshua/Samantha/Michael in the entire graduating class.

On to the interesting anomalies. Most of us have an anecdote or two about a classroom that had no Isabellas but two Isadoras, or no Avas but two Avelyns and and Eva and an Eve, or three Josephs going by Joey and two of them also had the same middle name. In this graduating class there were TWO Mavericks. Wouldn’t you feel a little intense about that, if your child were one of the Mavericks? In 2004 the name Maverick was #768 in the U.S., given to only 236 boys in the entire nation! The name Michael, for comparison, was given to 25,465 new baby boys that year! You would feel pretty safe assuming your baby would not have to be Maverick S. in school! And yet! In this particular graduating class, no Michaels and two Mavericks!

Similarly, though less dramatically, this graduating class had two Savannas and no Samanthas. The name Samantha was given to 13,786 new baby girls in 2004; the name Savanna, at #273 that year, to 1,198 (another 5,814 were named Savannah). In this graduating class: 0 Samanthas, 2 Savannas—and you can imagine how you would feel if you were parents who chose Savanna to avoid the popularity of Samantha.

This graduating class had two kids named Kira, which is a little remarkable: the name was #275 in 2004 and #241 in 2005. But to ramp up the remarkable: both of them have surnames starting with G.

The most popular name in the graduating class was Connor, given to six students. In 2004, the name Connor was #38 and was given to .4755% of new babies assigned male at birth; in 2005, it was #48 and .4381%, for an average over the two birth years of .4568%. In a graduating class of 95 boys, we would expect, statistically speaking, approximately 1/2 child named Connor. Instead, we have six. SIX! (Interestingly, not a single repeat of middle name or surname initial among the Connors.)

I recently attended a high school graduation ceremony. My absolute top favorite part of these ceremonies is getting to see everyone’s middle names. This was a batch of approximately 190 babies born in 2004-2005, and here are the middle names that were used more than once:

Rose 11
Elizabeth 10
Marie 10
Lynn 6
Grace 5
Ann/Anne 3
Michelle 3
Renee 3
Catherine 2
Faith 2
Jacqueline/Jacklyn 2
Jane 2
Leigh 2
Madison 2
Riley 2

Michael 6
David 5
James 3
Patrick 3
Andrew 2
Daniel 2
Francis 2
Joseph 2
Matthew 2
Nicholas 2
Richard 2
Ronald 2
Stephen/Steven 2
William 2

I was especially interested in Rose and Elizabeth: my own Elizabeth, whose graduating class this is, has said numerous times over the years that “EVERYONE’S middle name is Elizabeth.” It was neck-and-neck as I was doing the tally: going through the list, I’d add a Rose, then two Elizabeths, then two Roses, then one Elizabeth.

I was a little surprised by how many kids had Lynn and Marie and Ann/Anne as middles: I think of those as being from my own generation—along with Nicole, which at least in this batch of kids seems to have disappeared, so I wonder if its simultaneous use as a first name in the ’70s is what caused it to drop out of sight.

There was a nice assortment of older middle names: Paula, Dorothy, Marion, Lorraine; Bruce, Clarence, Laurence, Conrad.

There were several middle names I hoped were the birth surname of the child’s other parent.

There were quite a few where I wondered if it might be the name of an aunt/uncle/parent, or if it could have just still sounded current to the parents at the time the baby was named: names from my own generation such as Michelle, Allison, Jacqueline, Eric, Scott, Jason.

There were quite a few where I wondered if it was the second-choice name, or if it was The Other’ Parent’s Favorite, or whatever: Olivia, Riley, Ava, Cole, Henry, Jack. (Or Riley/Cole/Henry might have been family surnames.)

There were several middle names that looked to me like they were attempting to honor more than one person. I want to be careful not to put distinctive/identifying information in a public post, but they were names LIKE: RuthEllen, Rose-Leona, Michelle Amanda.

There were only a couple of the sort I would put into the category Objectively Fun: names such as Morning or Magic or Sunflower, where you think “Oh, that’s FUN,” and maybe you briefly wish you hadn’t gone for the family name that was in the top ten for a hundred years and so is the same as pretty much EVERYONE’S family name.

Really what I would have loved best is if each graduate had stood up and told us their name stories. Less talking about bright futures and the first day of the rest of their lives, more talking about was this a family name or did their parents just like it.

Update (and photo) on Baby Boy Paw-Starting-with-an-Sh, Brother to Everett Jude

Update (and photo) on Baby Naming Issue: One Parent Is Getting to Make the Name Decision, and Is Feeling Odd About That

Update on Baby Girl Woodruff, Sister to Mila

Update on Baby Girl or Boy Mavis-with-a-D