Update on Baby Naming Issue: What’s the Problem with Ignatius?

Update on Baby Naming Issue: Trying to Get the Nickname Mo

Update on Baby Naming Issue: Trying to Love an Honor Name

Update on Middle Name Challenge: Would a Girl Mind Having Ryan as a Middle Name?

Hi Swistle! Love your blog. I read it when I was pregnant with my first child and have really enjoyed coming back this time around.

Baby Girl Givens is due in early February of 2017. Her older brother is Davis Henry.

My husband has a very specific (& rigid I might add!) list of names he likes and approves. His favorite on the list is Ellis, and he is also open to Ellison. I like both, but don’t love them, and have a few concerns. One, if we have a Davis and an Ellis, does it sound like two boys? And, although we’re not currently planning on it, what if we were to have a third? Would it have to be Davis, Ellis and Ferris or another is-ending name? With Ellison, I feel like she would be called Ellis anyway, so we are presented with the same challenges. And, as you’ve discussed previously in this forum, I think Ellison is easily confused with Allison.

Other first names deemed acceptable per my husband include the following (as you’ll see he likes simple and classic for the most part!):
Ada (this is his second choice – too popular?)
Clare
Cora
Reese
Ruth
Nora

For middle names we are pretty set on using a family name, either Ann or Victoria and I’m going to toss in Josephine as well.

Thanks so much for any thoughts / help / wisdom you can offer here!

All the best,
Kristen

If one parent is highly rigid and picky, my suggested strategy is this: the rigid/picky one makes a reasonable list of acceptable names; then other parent chooses their top three from that list; then the parents work together to choose a joint favorite from those three, perhaps using the middle-name choice to help make things even more fair (for example, if he ends up with his first choice of the three names you chose from his list, you get your first choice of middle name).

If I have misunderstood the situation, and actually both of you added names to that list, then it looks like it is just time for more discussion. If Ellis/Ellison isn’t working for you, how do you feel about his second choice of Ada? What is YOUR first choice, and how does he feel about that? Which names would each of you like to cross off the list? In which order would each of you rank the names on the list? Did one of you have more of a say in your first child’s name, and can that be compensated for this time around? Maybe do some exercises where you each choose your top three and look for overlap, or where you each remove your bottom three and see what’s left, or try combining finalists with possible middle names to see if that helps a first name pull ahead of the pack. And so on.

Davis and Ellis feel too similar to me. Davis and Ellison feel less similar, and are more clearly a brother/sister pairing: in the U.S., Ellis is a unisex name used more often for boys, while Ellison is a unisex name used more often for girls. I think the name Ellison would be more likely to be shorted to Ellie or Ella than to Ellis, and/or that you could encourage the nickname to go that way.

I think any of the other names on the list could work as well. But I would be interested to know what YOUR favorite names are, and which if any you like from your husband’s list.

I have a 1.5 yr old named Lena and am expecting a second girl in Dec, we really like the name Ola for our second daughter, but I’m worried Ola is too close to Ole, which would create endless Ole and Lena jokes. If you aren’t familiar with Ole and Lena jokes they are super common in MN, where we live, in a very Scandinavian area. What do you think? Too close to a joke, or cute enough to be ok?
Thank you!

Erin

My vote is yes, too close. There will be a lot of people who won’t have heard of Ole and Lena, but you live right where everyone HAS heard of them. Worse, it’s not a particularly flattering category of humor: it reminds me of blonde jokes.

A second issue, but perhaps this is because I have three children in the house who have taken or are taking Spanish, is that Ola sounds just like Hola. “Hello” isn’t a negative word, but it’s an unusual one for a name, and I would get weary of “Hola, Ola!” jokes.

Hi Swistle!

You helped us with our second boy, Matthew William Joseph Wrightman in we loved William but didn’t want to honor grandpa bill. We are now on our fourth baby and hoping you can guide us with your expertise.

We have Bennett Patrick- Bennett we loved , Patrick after my late mother, Patricia, his name still makes my heart skip a beat. Name we like plus honor name.

Matthew William Joseph- after grandma Martha (a stretch, I know), grandpa bill and grandpa Joe. I love that we honored all living grandparents yet his name doesn’t quite seem original enough for the entity that is my son Matthew- who at 2 years, declared that his name is actually “Matthias”. If I could go back, I would name him Maxwell Theodore and call him Wells or Teddy. Something a little more spunky. My “dear” unmarried childless sister in law called dibs on Theodore many years ago after their grandpa Ted. This will not deter us now that we are on our fourth child and she remains single and childless with no prospects.

Annabelle Joy- her name is like magic to me. She is every bit as wonderful, beautiful, delicate and joyful as her name. It is perfect.
Ann is after my and my mother’s middle name and joy has special meaning to me.

Our next daughter will have Ann in her name or middle name, and/or Joy as a middle name, ideally. I love this connection and it is important to me.

We love and hope to find a double letter name- can we do this and fulfill everything I love and want in a name to make it magical. ?

I have always liked Lillianna, Lilly for a nickname. The double letters and loveliness is there, with Ann, Lillianna Joy is nice. I worry it with end up in the same compartment as Matthew to me, a wonderful, strong name that my husband and I agree on, but a bit of eh factor as time moves on, because it is common and there are a ton of other Lillys. Thoughts?

I love the nickname Liv- can we make this happen with double letters?
I adore Olivia but feel like it is so popular. Husband loves Olivia as well.
We call Annabelle: Belle, Bells, Bellsies or Annabelle.
I love Belle and Liv, Belles and Livs, Bellsies and Livvies, pitter patter goes my heart. We may spell it Livvy or Livvie if that’s what we go by.

My thoughts are:
Livianna- Livianna Joy. Bell and Liv
Husband says this is a made up name.
I also love Livia as a shortened name.

I love it because it has Ann, double letters, the nickname Liv and can have Joy as a middle name like Annabelle.

Annalivia
Husband says this is even more made up.
Again, love Liv, Ann, double letters plus Joy as middle name
Annabelle and Annalivia- too much? Not enough? Belle and Livvy

Husband would rather do Olivia to get Liv as nickname but it’s way to popular and no double letters.

Other names I love:
Seraphina no double letters, husband thinks its too much,
Livianna Seraphine?

Caroline- going down the ranks for me lately

Everly- adorable but getting too popular, husband says made up, no double letters

Thoughts? Opinions? Ideas? We would possibly want one more after this baby. Next boy would be Maxwell Theodore.
Thoughts on Lilly vs Livvy?

Katie

I would like to start by discussing what will happen if you do have one more child after this baby and the next child is another girl. If you have two girls who have Ann in their names and Joy as a middle name, will you feel the same has to be done for the third girl? And if so, are you able to come up with a third name that meets that requirement? My feeling is that you could get away with Annabelle and Lillianna, or Annabelle and Livianna, but that it could be somewhere on the difficult-to-impossible spectrum to come up with a third -ann- name that didn’t seem like too much of a duplicate. Annabelle, Lillianna, and Livianna? No. Annabelle, Lillianna, and Annalivia? No. I hear you when you say it is important to you to use Ann and Joy for both daughters, but I feel the risk is high of getting truly stuck.

If this is a risk you’re willing to take, then onward we go. Lillianna seems great to me. I like Livianna even better, because it makes your heart beat faster and you love the nickname, and because it introduces a new sound. It doesn’t strike my ear as “made up”-sounding, I think because Anna- and -anna mash-up names are so traditional and common.

I would not personally want to do another Anna- name. Annabelle and Annalivia seem way too close. If that doesn’t bother you, and you’d like us to continue looking for more Anna- names, I would caution us before we begin about the potentially sensitive nature of Anna+L names, especially if the N is not doubled. Because you specifically want double-letter names, it is less of an issue—but I would still feel wary when playing with names such as Annaleigh.

Annalynn
Annamaria
Annarosa
Annasophia
Annastasia
Anneliese/Annalise
Annika
Annora

Options that don’t start with Ann-:

Adrianna
Alanna
Arianna
Aubrianna
Audrianna
Avianna
Ellianna (repeats -ell- as well as -anna-)
Evianna
Gianna
Giovanna
Illianna
Joanna
Julianna
Lianna
Lucianna
Olivianna
Orianna
Savannah
Susanna
Vivianna

My top choice from this list is Vivianna. Vivvy/Vivi is similar to the Livvy you like.

A sampling of names with double letters but without the -ann-, just in case:

Amaryllis
Brynna
Camellia
Camille
Charlotte
Clarissa
Corinna/Corinne
Emmaline/Emmeline
Gemma
Juliette
Lillian
Linnea
Livinnia
Lucienne
Lucille
Marietta
Marilla
Millicent
Mirren
Molly
Philippa
Priscilla
Romilly
Stella (repeats the -ell-)
Vivienne
Willa
Willemina/Willamena
Willow
Winnifred

On another note, I think it would be a kindness to leave the name Theodore behind, if you can bear to. I realize it’s annoying when someone who may not even have a child calls dibs on a name, but in this case I would measure your fortune and happiness (marriage, buckets of children) against hers (no relationship prospects so far, childless so far), and consider leaving her something to hold on to. If she’s truly a pill, I can see the temptation; and I don’t believe in dibs on names, especially if it means a grandfather may go unhonored—but there is something a little sad here that is bringing out my feelings of mercy. Perhaps you could use Dorothea or Theodora as a middle name for a daughter, honoring the grandfather without claiming the name. Or perhaps you could use Theodore as the middle for a son, but with a word to her about how you are remembering she wants to use it as a first name, and that you think it’s lovely to use the name more than once.

[Edited to add:] On re-reading, I see I have misunderstood the question. I was thinking the plan was to use another Ann name for the first name, plus Joy again for the middle; the actual plan is to use Ann and/or Joy for the first or middle. In that case, my top choice is to use Joy as the middle, and not use a first name with Ann in it. This also removes the risk of getting stuck with a third daughter’s name: it would not be difficult to use Joy as the middle name again.

My top favorite choices:

Vivienne; Annabelle Joy and Vivienne Joy
Clarissa; Annabelle Joy and Clarissa Joy
Emmeline; Annabelle Joy and Emmeline Joy
Philippa; Annabelle Joy and Philippa Joy

Update on Baby Girl Write, Sister to Mabel, Gemma, and Alice

Hi Swistle,

An acquaintance (husband’s coworker and his wife) are expecting their third baby. They have two adorable children with pretty “normal” names; recognizable, relatively easy to spell, easy to pronounce, etc. Their last name is [     ].

Yesterday, there was an office baby sprinkle for the family (we got together for a meal and everyone brought them diapers). During the lunch, they revealed the name for the new baby: [     ].

I’m all for people choosing names to their tastes, and I know that I’m not going to like everyone’s names (and that’s fine!), but I can’t believe they haven’t thought how terrible [the name] sounds. Like it sounds like someone is [cheating or scamming a commendable organization]. I’ve been saying it out loud over and over since yesterday and I can’t shake how troubling it sounds to me.

We’re seeing them again this weekend and I’m wondering if this is something I should mention to the mom-to-be. All I can think of is if the name is brought up in conversation, I could just say, “Hey, did you consider that the baby’s name sounds like this? Are you and Husband comfortable with this?”

I feel so awkward about the entire thing. Am I overreacting to my impression of this name? Do I just stay quietly to the side and watch this unfold? I’m leaning toward keeping my mouth shut and learning to contain my cringes whenever we see them.

Thanks for your help!

CC

I’m uneasy about posting someone else’s baby name here, so I’ve removed that part. It’s too bad, because having an example really helps when considering the issue. On the other hand, many of us have probably wondered a similar thing about a totally different situation, so perhaps we could just discuss more generally whether it’s a good idea to speak up when you see an issue with a name that has not yet been officially given to a baby.

Here are the reasons FOR speaking up:

1. The parents may seriously not have thought of the issue, and may agree it’s a serious concern, and may end up with serious name regret later if they don’t realize the issue ahead of time.

Here are the reasons AGAINST speaking up, at least in this particular example:

1. It seems like the kind of feedback people generally dislike.
2. They haven’t asked for feedback.
3. They haven’t said it’s a name they’re considering, they’ve said it’s the name they’ve chosen.
4. As people living with that surname, it seems likely they’ve thought of the issues with it.
5. There really isn’t any good way to say it. Asking if they’re comfortable with it seems to imply that the only natural answer is “No.”
6. I think most of the possible outcomes of such a discussion are going to be negative outcomes.

I think what we’d need here is a balance scale to figure out whether the possible reasons to speak are worth the possible reasons against it, but the trouble is we can only guess at all the weights and measurements. On one side we’d put “How serious a problem is this?”—and as we know from letters and comments on this blog, there is wide disagreement on this kind of thing. One person’s “Oh, man, stay WAY away from THAT!” is another person’s “Who cares? You can find a problem with ANY name.” And there are all the places in between: for example, parents noticing the issue but concluding that it’s worth it for this particular name.

On the other side of the scale we’d put “How likely are they to shoot/resent the messenger and/or be thrown into unnecessary doubt and turmoil?”—and again, we just don’t know. If they were to easily change the chosen name and thank you with great relief, that would probably be okay; if they keep the name, they may always remember you as a person who disliked their baby’s name and tried to talk them out of it. Or they may decide in the end not to change it, but spend the rest of the pregnancy feeling very unhappy and stressed about it. Or maybe not! Maybe they’re extremely laid-back people who believe in frank talk and would easily shrug off anyone’s input if they didn’t agree.

Here is how I think I’d think it through, if it were my husband’s co-worker’s wife:

1. I am uncertain how big of an issue this thing bugging me actually is: would it seem like a problem to LOTS of people, or just a few? This is not something I can know; I can only guess.
2. I am distant from these people, relationship-wise.
3. If it IS a big issue to a large number of people, and they have been telling everyone the name, SURELY someone has already pointed it out to them.
4. If not, that still doesn’t mean it needs to be ME who says something.

That is, I think I would let the “How serious of a problem is this?” side of the balance scale be in charge of automatically generating a response from someone other than me. If it’s a big deal, someone else will say something: there are always people who don’t give a single thought to whether or not their input would be welcome (*thinks briefly of my late mother-in-law*). And if it’s not a big deal, then no one will say anything and I will be glad I didn’t either.

It’s a tough call, though. Even with my strong interest in baby names and all my careful attention to detail, we realized only a couple of years after one child was born that we’d given initials that spelled something (in a license plate / text speak kind of way, or else we would have noticed it earlier). Luckily it wasn’t anything BAD. But if it HAD been bad, I would have been glad to have noticed it beforehand. And perhaps my husband’s co-worker’s wife would be the perfect person to point it out: none of the baggage of hearing it from my mother-in-law, for example.

Dear Swistle,

First, I must tell you how much I love your blog. I recently had a baby and find myself reading the archives during those middle of the night feedings, sometimes long after baby has fallen back asleep.

I’m writing because I’m curious about a particular name I couldn’t even get my husband to consider for our daughter. I am a huge The Sound of Music fan and have always loved the names, particularly Liesl. My husband thinks it’s atrocious. I think it’s beautiful. I’ve never come across the name on your site and was curious what you and your readers thought. Is everyone with my husband on this one and that’s why we never hear it?

We had such a difficult time naming our daughter, I thought I’d get a head start on the next one, and maybe you could help me convince my husband it’s not such a terrible name. Looking forward to your thoughts!

 

I started by searching for the name on the blog, and found four posts that mention Liesl:

Baby Names from The Sound of Music
Baby Girl Aronoff
Baby Girl Korph
Baby Girl L_____

I went through the comments quickly, and saw several positive remarks and several negative. The negatives were:

1. sounds like diesel
2. sounds like lethal when said in child’s lispy voice
3. hard to spell
4. husband doesn’t like it

“Sounds like diesel” was the main reason Paul and I crossed it off our list, but we also considered the style to be an outlier for us.

Let’s have a poll to see what everyone else thinks. I always have trouble choosing poll options: no matter what I choose, it doesn’t really cover everything. So let’s use the poll to get a rough distribution of feeling, and then we can use the comments section for more specific opinions.

[yop_poll id=”72″]