Dear Swistle,

Help! My second baby boy is due in a month and my husband and I can’t come up with any names we love, or even really like-a-lot. Our last name sounds like C@nyon but with a G, and we have an older boy and girl whose names came quite easily to us and were chosen months in advance: Eliza Willow and Lincoln Andrew. This will be our last child and we both feel like we used the best names already, and are seriously stuck. Middle name will most likely be Lamar as a family honor name. I’m worried that this baby will be born nameless, and we will feel pressure to name him quickly, and come to regret it. Please help us name Eliza and Lincoln’s brother!

Here are some names that we have both agreed on that we “don’t hate”:

Augustus
Anderson
Holden
Hamilton
Grant
Zane
Daxton
Everett

We are very open to any suggestions! Please help ! :)

Thank you,
Mama C@nyon with a G

I see a lot of surnamey names on your list, and I think that’s a nice way to go. Some surnames give me an immediate historical/political association when used with Lincoln: Hamilton and Grant leap out as examples. That can be a plus or a minus, depending on what you’re looking for.

My absolute top favorite from your list is Everett. I love it. Eliza, Lincoln, and Everett. HEART EYES. I also really like Anderson. More possibilities to consider:

Alistair
Carlson
Clark
Crosby
Edmund
Flynn
Franklin
Frederick
Harris
Hatcher
Marcus
Mercer
Merritt
Meyer
Miles
Miller
Nicholson
Oliver
Phineas
Redford
Redmond
Reid
Russell
Silas
Spencer
Sullivan
Theodore
Thompson
Victor
Wesley
Wilson
Winston
Yates

(Note to commenters: With a familiar historical name such as Lincoln, name suggestions will be particularly susceptible to meaningful connections. I hope if you spot any that seem really Off, such as if I’ve inadvertently suggested a name connected with pro-slavery or whatever, I hope you won’t feel shy about saying so. History was one of my weakest subjects.)

(By the way, in case you are looking for something fun to do, Baby Name Mini Posts in the Comments Section is still going strong. I love threaded comments for this: everything is kept so tidy! you can scroll through, seeing each question and its associated comments separately!)

Hello Swistle!

We are expecting our second little girl in early October. My firstborn is named K3nna Tyl3r. Her first name is the nickname I have always called my beloved sister, Br00ke McK3nna. Telling my sister her niece’s name when she was born was one of the sweetest moments of my life. I would do it again a million times! It also honors my husband’s grandfather and great-grandfather, both named Kenneth. I wasn’t 100% sold on the name when we picked it, but it suits her perfectly and it meant the world to all the people who were honored with her name.(Your posts about how using honor names sometimes means giving up your favorite names to honor someone you love helped me navigate this tension. It’s so true – THANK YOU! I’m attaching a photo of the moment I told my sister my daughter’s name. Feel free to use it as proof of your point if you want!) Tyl3r is my husband’s middle name, which he goes by. Our last name is S@muel.

I am very sentimental, and I love honor names. I have a brother I adore and would like to honor, but it’s difficult to name a little girl after her uncle. His name is L@ndon. The name we have most seriously considered is June (his birth month). This feels like a little bit of a stretch to me, but would also honor my husband’s other grandfather who is called Junior. I like the name ok, but don’t feel sure about it. Is it “close enough” to count as a namesake? Is there a better way to honor him? Additionally, do you feel like June is about to explode in popularity? It feels like it is on the verge of a big jump, and when I saw someone else asking the same question in the mini-post comment section, I felt affirmed in my concern and wanted to hear your thoughts. Is it one of those names people talk about a lot but don’t use? Or does it feel familiar because it is everywhere as middle name? We hope to have 1 more child, and it will have my maiden name, T@bor, boy or girl, though I prefer it for a boy. K3nna and T@bor are both very clear namesakes, and June seems a little random. It’s also not a great match with the other two in popularity. Or style, I guess?

Potential first names:

Callan (No sentimental reason. I like the sound and the meaning. Uncommon for a girl.)
Alice (forever and always my favorite. My great-grandmother’s name. I hate the way it sounds with our last name. Also, husband has a family member with exact first and last name. More popular than I care for.)
Double name Alice-June? (too much with simple K3nna? Called Ali-June? Hyphen, no hyphen? Feels a little too trendy.)
T@bor (I use my favorite boy name on this baby because who knows if we will have another baby, much less a boy?)

Potential Middles:

Alise (my middle name, derived from my aunt Allison who was named for the aforementioned Alice)
Adelaide (comes from the nickname my grandfather always used for me, Adelheid),
June (only if I can choose a different first that I love)
Mae (obviously not with June, but I find it charming!)
L@ndon (just to make the tribute clearer, and I obviously don’t have an issue with masculine middle names on girls.)

Names I like but have been nixed for whatever reason: Georgia, Margaret, Merritt, Haven, Elle, Evangeline

My mind feels like a tangled web or possibility and I’m begging you (and your tribe of phenomenal commenters) to help me straighten it all out!

When I first saw L@ndon in the letter, I mis-read it as London. I wonder if London would work: the current usage in the U.S. is more common for girls, and I think it’s nice with K3nna and a possible future T@bor. Or Linden would be pretty. But do either of those feel to you as if they honor your brother? And would either of them feel that way to your brother? That’s the most important thing. We can come up with tons of possible variations, but if we think your brother would hear London/Linden and think “But…that’s not my name,” then I think it would be better to go straight to L@ndon.

Perhaps a feminized spelling? Landyn? Landynn? I usually prefer to avoid alternative spellings, but I think that’s what I might do in this particular case; Landyn is my favorite spelling. Or actually, I might just say heck with it and use L@ndon: people might occasionally assume it’s a boy’s name, but that’s easily dealt with. I suggest for the middle name using the name you go by, to mirror your first child’s name. Or maybe Adelheid!

June as the honor name feels like too much of a stretch to me. I ran the Honor Name Test: I imagined someone telling me they named the baby after the month I was born, and then waited to see if I felt any prickling of tears. Result: no. However, if her first name is L@ndon/Landyn, THEN I think if you went with something like Landyn June it could strengthen the association with your brother. Plus it can refer to Grandpa Junior.

The name June is coming into fashion again, but I don’t think that necessarily means there will be a huge spike—though of course these things are very difficult to predict (I would not have predicted Charlotte and Oliver would end up in the Top Ten, and yet here we are). Here’s what it’s been up to lately, according to the Social Security Administration:

(screenshot from ssa.gov)

Notice that the chart skips right from 2008 to 1986: June was not in the Top 1000 in 1987-2007. If I scroll back further (not pictured), I see that the last time the name June was in the Top 50 was 1922-1934—so we’d be expecting to see it coming back into style around now. I think it’s getting a lot of chat because it sounds fresh again: we’ve all been using the heck out of Jane as a middle name, but now June and Jean are catching our interest as well. I’d expect it to continue to rise for awhile as it continues its time in the sun, but the classics that cycle in and out for centuries never sound trendy to me, even when they get popular. I also think you’re right that it might feel more common because of its use as a middle name. Jane and Rose are the same way: they feel like such common names, but I hardly know any kids with those names as FIRST names. One Rose, and no Janes!

The T@bor issue is a difficult one. I think it’s going to come down to putting the two possibilities on the scale and seeing which one weighs more: on one side of the scale, the possibility that you will save the name in case you have a boy, but then you will not end up having more children; on the other side of the scale, the possibility that you will use the name for a girl, and then later have a boy and wish you’d saved the name. Which possibility is more upsetting? I too prefer the name for a boy—but I love it so much when the mom’s surname can be used as a first name, it’s painful to think of losing that chance. I don’t know what I would do if I were you. I’m pretty sure if it were me I would save it and then use it for the third child, because the “having a boy later and wishing I’d saved the name” weighs more for me, but you and your husband will have your own answers.

We are considering buying a new house and I am finding it so distracting. I am sitting here trying to pick a letter to answer but instead I am thinking only about various house-related things.

Here is what I thought we might try. What if today we did MINI posts in the comments section? That is, anyone who has a name-related question they can ask rather briefly (asking for a vote among a few names, or asking one question, or asking for feedback on how people perceive a particular name, or asking if two names go together—that sort of thing, but not a complicated multi-layered situation that requires eight paragraphs and is looking for answers to lots of different questions) can post it in the comments section, and then interested commenters can cruise the comments section and answer any of them they want to? I wonder if that would be fun, or if it would be messy and overwhelming? LET’S FIND OUT. I think it would be especially charming if question-askers ended up making the rounds answering each other’s questions!

Everyone is generally so good about this I don’t know if I even need to remind—but I remind MYSELF of this pretty regularly, so I will go ahead and remind you as well that the goal is helpfulness and kindness and working with what the questioner is looking for: that is, it is not about what WE PERSONALLY prefer (unless of course that is what we are being asked) but about finding the right name for the preferences of the parents asking the question.

Dear Swistle,
We are expecting a baby boy in 4-5 weeks and having real difficulty agreeing on a name for him.

Our surname rhymes with Suplurch and we have a two year old daughter named Eva. She is named after my great grandmother. Her middle name is Lake and we love how the two sound together. We are very outdoorsy adventurous sporty people so it felt like a good fit.

We have struggled much more with finding a boy’s name this time around. Ever since we spent time in Iceland a few years ago, I’ve loved the name Thor (in fact, I was considering the feminine version Thora for our daughter, but it was an outright veto from my husband). My husband is somewhat reluctantly considering Thor, but he prefers the very conventional name George. He has suggested calling our son George Thor but I prefer Thor George. While I don’t love the name George, it is a family name, so I could live with it (but am really not sure I could do it as a first name).

I really like less conventional names. And my husband likes more conventional names.

I think he could be convinced to go with Thor but he is worried that in the USA, our son will always feel conflated with superhero movie Thor.

My other top name pick is Tristan, but my husband says he hates the name (a surprise to me, because it’s also the name of one of his closest friends).

Do you think Thor is too difficult a name to use in the USA? And if so, can you suggest any other less than conventional names that we might both agree on? I should add that although we live in the US, we are English, so we want a name that can be pronounced in both countries and that isn’t emphatically American.

Thank you for your help!

Best wishes

Julia Suplurch

I do think Thor would be a challenging name for a child/adult to carry in this society. I think the percentage of people who would think “Oh, yes, the Icelandic name Þór!” would be vastly outweighed by the percentage of people who made the immediate association with the superhero/deity. I think the jokes and references would be endless. I think if the child/adult were the skinny intellectual non-athletic type, he might feel the contrast keenly—and that even a bulky athletic guy would get tired of it. Putting it through the “Would I want this name for myself?” test, for me it fails instantly and dramatically. If it were your husband who was rooting for the name Thor, I would suggest he try the Starbucks test: order a coffee and tell the barista his name is Thor, and see how that feels to say.

With a sister named Eva, I’d be reluctant to suddenly go too unconventional—but on the other hand, it’s not uncommon for parents to have different tastes in boy names than in girl names. Still, my favorite would be to repeat what you did the first time: a more conventional name for the first name, ideally an honor name, and then something unconventional for the middle name.

I think the right unconventional middle name can really perk up a more conventional first name, so if I were you I’d first make a little list of unconventional names you love, and then try out each more-conventional first name by combining it with those. Maybe you’re meh about George, but George Blaze or George Ranger or George Sterling is another story. If I were your husband, I’d get reallllllll flexible on middle names as a bargaining chip to get something more to his tastes as the first name. (And if the two of you end up going less-conventional for the first name, then I’d suggest letting your husband have a lot more say on the middle name.)

I think it might also help to see if you can pin down what KIND of unconventional you’re looking for. Do you want an Icelandic name? Then I’d search some lists of Icelandic names and see if you can find something that would work well here: Arni, Jonas, Oskar, Otto, Stefan, Viktor. Do you actually kind of like the superhero/deity thing? Then I would search lists of god/goddess names and/or superhero/comic names and see if you can find something that would work well here; I’ve seen Odin work on a real-life child. Does it just need to be less common? Then I would go to the Social Security database and call up the Top 1000 names, and start looking at the bottom: Decker, Lyle, Ira, Leif, Alistair, Gibson. I’d also highly recommend the Exotic Traditional section of The Baby Name Wizard: Aidric, Barnaby, Dashiell, Felix, Roman.

Hi Swistle!

I have been a longer time reader and in need of some solid naming advice from you and your readers!

We are due with second baby in October and we will keep the sex a surprise.

Our first son’s name is Connor Brant Care-again with a K. Connor is a name we both agreed on and middle name is a combination of our Father’s names, Brian & Anthony.

Last time, we had agreed if we had a girl, her middle name would be another ‘combo’ name honouring our Mothers, Carol and Janis- Caris. We have agreed to use this middle name again if Baby #2 is a girl.

Here comes the problem, if we have a boy, how can we still honour our Mothers?

My husband proposed using my maiden name, Mc-IrishName (which is my Father’s last name) for Baby Boy #2. Although I thought it was such a sweet gesture when he shared this, it made me feel like we would be leaving my Mom out. PAUSE for back story:

1. My parents are divorced and my husbands parents aren’t; I think/know my Mom would feel slighted if my Dad was honoured twice and she/her family wasn’t (especially since she is aware that Caris will be used for a girl).

2. My MIL has been honoured already with other grandchildren so I don’t think it would phase her if we did not chose to honour her and her family. However, if we only honoured my Mom’s family, I think it would appear odd that we honoured 3 out of 4 grandparents.

So, I am left with this, can we use Caris as a boy’s middle name? Or, should we consider using maternal grandfather’s names? The names are:

Mine:
Jan (dutch name for John; pronounced sort of like ‘yawn’) VanV-dutch name
My maternal uncle is John.

Husband:
William Sr. Martin
His maternal uncle is William Jr. (Bill).

Ideally, I would like my son to have to one middle name but I realize this may not work. I have two middle names. Back story #2: I was born with one middle name however when I was 2 years old my Mother added a second middle name, Jane, into my name to honour her dying Mother’s request. My grandmother (Joyce) had a ring with her birthstone & J engraved in it. It was passed to my Mom (Janis) who is also born in same month as my Grandmother. I also happen to be born in that month and therefore my Grandmother mentioned in one of her last conversations with my Mother that she would like me to have the ring but it was too bad I did not have a “J” name. Fast forward, my mom added Jane into my name. So perhaps it would be nice for our son to have 2 middle names?

The last bit of info I guess I should include is we have not settled on a boys’ first name. Top contenders are Riley, Archer (Archie),Grady, Brody, Sawyer or Lachlan.

I hope you can help us!
Take care,
Amanda & Pete

After reading the letter, my first answer to the question “If we have a boy, how can we still honour our Mothers?” was “Don’t. Honor someone else instead.” You have a perfect way to honor them if the baby is a girl, and that symmetry is very pleasing so I hope it works out that way, but that doesn’t mean you have to twist yourselves up to find something the same if the baby is a boy. It’s not that you CAN’T, and in fact I love the idea of honoring women in boys’ names, but it doesn’t sound as if anything is working out in this particular case.

One option not mentioned in the letter, perhaps for good reason, is to use your mom’s maiden name. You mention all the problems with using your own maiden name, and I agree with all of those: your dad has already been honored, your mom could feel quite slighted by that considering they’re divorced, etc. Is your mom’s surname a possibility or is it no good as a name? (My family is Dutch, so I know those VanV names vary widely in usability.) Or are there other names/surnames from your mom’s branch of the family tree? I think “leaving out” your mother-in-law makes sense in this situation, and would not seem odd to anyone in the long run: it’s clear to you in the midst of the naming process that you’re honoring three-fourths of the grandparents, but that’s not something that will remain clear over time, especially if you have more children and use more honor names.

Wait—perhaps you could use Janus, the masculine version of your mom’s name and also a pretty cool mythological guy. Was your mom named in part for her dad Jan? And was your middle name Jane chosen with Jan/Janis in mind? That would make it extra appealing to hand down another version of the name: Jan to Janis to Jane to Janus. This is my favorite solution, and I love how it hands a name back and forth between men and women in the family. I feel excited about it in a way that makes me not want to consider any other options. Honestly, I considered putting my foot down and insisting, or emailing you every day in an attempt to wear you down. Instead I will now subtly try to talk you into it by mentioning it again and again as if it’s a done deal.

For first names, I think you have a lot of good options, and that they all work fine with the middle name: Riley Janus, Archer Janus, Grady Janus, Brody Janus, Sawyer Janus, Lachlan Janus. I am slightly less in favor of the ones with repeated endings: Connor and Archer, Connor and Sawyer. Not enough to rule those out, just enough to knock them lower on the list. I find Lachlan a bit of a challenge with the surname: Lachlan Care-again almost rhymes, and has a tumbling feel in the mouth; for me, it’s enough to knock it off the list, but I wouldn’t expect that to be the same for everyone. And I’m feeling unusually opinionated and bossy today, so if it were up to me I would also take Riley off the list: according to the Social Security Administration, it’s currently used much more often for girls in the United States (6,343 new baby girls and 1,454 new baby boys named Riley in 2017, and that doesn’t even take into account all the Rylees and Ryleighs and so forth), while the name Connor is used almost exclusively for boys. Your spelling of “honour” makes me think you may not live in the U.S., though, so this may not be a factor.

Let’s see, so that means my own favorites with Connor are Grady and Brody, then Sawyer, then Archer. My own top favorite is Grady. Connor and Grady. Grady Janus Care-again.

Hi Swistle,

We are expecting our first son in November, and wanted to give him a “classic” name. Last name starts with S and rhymes with “skippy.”

My husband’s name is James Robert S___ and goes by Jim. We both really like the name James for this baby (I’d love to call the little one Jamie but am open to all possible James/Jim-based nicknames as he grows).

The issue is, I just never wanted to name my son Husbands Whole Name II – honestly it seems like a mess paperwork-wise, and for what? Is it weird if I give him a different middle name? I would love to honor a beloved family member who doesn’t have a first-name-worthy name with the middle, calling the baby James Lloyd S____. I feel like this would be a good compromise, my son has a little bit of his own identity while honoring family traditions, and wouldn’t have to deal with suffixes on everything that asks for his name. I’m fine if he ends up called Jimmy Junior (which my in laws are currently doing), as long as I don’t have to make sure the “the II” or “Jr.” box is checked on all his paperwork, and that he and his dad don’t get each other’s mail for the rest of their lives.

But there’s a nagging voice in my mind saying maybe it’s weird to not go all the way with naming for his dad, should I suck it up and just go with James Robert S__ II? (FWIW, my husband doesn’t seem to care either way).

The other name that my husband and I both love is Benjamin (middle name probably still Lloyd), but (a) that’s his sister’s husband’s name so we’d feel obligated to clear it with them and (b) if we name any kid James, I’d want it to be this first one.

Thanks for your insight!

It is not at all weird to give him a different middle name, and in fact that’s the common solution to the suffix/mail issues you mention. I think it’s a great idea, considering your own preferences and your husband’s lack of preference.

If you do decide to duplicate your husband’s entire name, the traditional suffix would be Jr. rather than II: II is traditionally used when the original name is not the name of the child’s parent. That is, if you were naming this baby after his grandfather or uncle (using the grandfather’s/uncle’s exact full name), the child would be II and not Jr. But since in this case the full name would be the child’s parent’s name, the child would traditionally be a Jr. It is not that you cannot use II if you want to: there are no suffix police, and the government doesn’t care; I mention this only for general interest.

But if I were you, I’d skip that whole thing and give him a different middle name as you’d prefer.

I have seven minutes before I have to do something else, but I wanted to tell you I’m reading a book in which a man’s middle name is Rejoice, and I think it would be fun to return to this type of thing—which I think of, perhaps incorrectly (history has always been a weak point) as Early American, or Colonial, or Settlers, or Pioneers. Is that when we had names such as Peace-That-Passeth-Understanding Jones or whatever it was? I’m not suggesting we go that far, but middle names such as:

Benevolence
Bravery
Charity
Compassion
Considerate
Constance
Courage
Diligence
Empathy
Endurance
Equality
Equanimity
Faithful
Fidelity
Fortitude
Freedom
Generosity
Gentle
Gracious
Gratitude
Happiness
Happy
Harmony
Heart
Honesty
Honor
Hope
Independence
Integrity
Joyful
Justice
Kindness
Knowledge
Liberty
Love
Loyal
Loyalty
Luckiness
Mercy
Merit
Patience
Peace
Perseverance
Persistence
Pleasant
Practicality
Providence
Prudence
Reason
Reliable
Rejoice
Service
Simplicity
Sincerity
Strength
Sympathy
Temperance
Tenacity
Thankful
Tolerance
Tranquility
Trust
Truth
Unity
Valentine
Verity
Victory
Virtue
Wisdom
Worth

would be fun/interesting. (I am avoiding Chastity/Modesty/Purity.) And I wonder if you could add to this list while I go balance the checkbook and then start dinner. I put “virtue” in the post title but they don’t have to be virtue names per se.

Update on Baby Naming Issue: Can a Name Be Haunted?