Kimberly writes:

I am due in 3 weeks with baby #2, a girl. We think we have agreed on a first name, but I’m starting to have doubts for various reasons. In addition, we can’t decide on a middle name! The name we have chosen is Zoe. It started a few months ago simply as a suggestion from my husband, but my (almost) 3 year old loves the name and is already introducing the baby as “my baby sister, Zoe.”

We are fairly certain that this is our last child, meaning my husband will not likely get the son he wants (even though he is thrilled with his girls!). I named our oldest child, and suggested he pick a name for this baby. The name he chose was Zoe Jane. For those not familiar with the song or type of music, Zoe Jane is the name of a song by Staind and is about a father’s love for his daughter. While the idea is extremely sweet, I just couldn’t name my child after a song and we are now having a problem agreeing on a middle name. He suggested Grace, which I don’t think goes well. I suggested Elizabeth and he thinks it is too old fashioned.

The other problem (and the biggest problem I am facing right now) is the similarity in sound to another family member’s name. She is the girl’s aunt (my husband’s younger sister), but is still in early elementary school so she is closer in age to the girls than to my husband. My kids will spend every weekday afternoon with her (and my mother in law) while I am at work. Her name is Chloe. I’m worried the names sound too simliar and will cause confusion.

I hope you can offer some input to help us make our decision a little easier.

If your husband is going to choose the name for this daughter, and if it doesn’t bother him to have his daughter’s name rhyme with his sister’s name, then I think having a Zoe and a Chloe will be fine. There will probably be occasional confusions, but it seems likely to be a minor issue.

I think the name Zoe is a particularly difficult one to find a middle name for. I lean toward long middle names:
Zoe Carolina
Zoe Felicity
Zoe Katerina
Zoe Olivia
Zoe Rosanna
Zoe Rosemary
Zoe Savannah
Zoe Veronica
Zoe Victoria

If he likes the sound of Zoe Jane and Zoe Grace, perhaps he would like:
Zoe Faith
Zoe Joy
Zoe June
Zoe Kate
Zoe Layne
Zoe Paige
Zoe Pearl
Zoe Rayne
Zoe Rose

If Elizabeth is too old-fashioned, maybe he would like:
Zoe Elena
Zoe Eleni
Zoe Elise
Zoe Eliza
Zoe Ella
Zoe Isabel

Long have I waited—LONG—for the second edition of The Baby Name Wizard. I believe I started waiting back in 2005, around the time I read the last page of the first edition.

When I heard it was coming out this July, I started planning. I checked Amazon.com every day: “Is it available for pre-order yet? No? How about now? How about NOW?” And finally the day was nigh: it’s coming out on Tuesday. My plan: buy two copies, one for myself and one to give away here.

But OH NOES! It cannot be ordered! We have to wait for stores to sell their remaining copies of the first edition! We have to cruise ACTUAL STORES, sniffing and pawing the shelves to see if they have a Second Edition on the shelf yet!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!

This is torment! TORMENT! The book is NEARLY WITHIN OUR REACH, and yet swinging tantalizingly away from our chilly and trembling fingers.

Ashley writes:

I am due with our second boy in early July. Like a previous poster, my husband and I strongly disagree on names and usually strongly oppose each others’ choices. Currently, we have one son, Leo James Radecki. My husband is Leonard John (he goes by Len). His father and grandfather are Leonard Leo Radecki Sr. and Jr. respectively, so my husband is not a third. The name of my first son was primarily my husband’s choice and he offered it up at the time of his delivery, but I loved the name Leo (and was glad he didn’t say Leonard!) and James is my father’s name. We both would like a name that is not popular and also we both like traditional names, but in a different sense. My husband would also prefer to have a name after a saint. All of the names I like are very popular on the SSA popularity list (i.e. Matthew, Evan, Nicholas, Ryan) and all of the names my husband likes are traditional, just not my taste (i.e Francis, Frederick, Henry, Jacek). Our first son’s name is actually a great example of what we both love in a name, but can’t quite get a hold of anything this time around. My husband is Polish/Lithuanian and I am 100% Scottish. As Leo is a Polish name, I have found the name Alec recently and love that one as well…being that it is Scottish, short for Alexander (who is a saint) and not on the SSA list. We were also looking at giving him the middle name of John, but it is not a definite and are open to whatever sounds good with the chosen first name. Do you have any ideas that would fit our picky criteria?

What does your husband think of your Alec John idea? I think it’s terrific.

I also went to the “Saints” section of The Baby Name Wizard and wondered if you guys might agree on any of these:

Adrian
Evan
Jude
Julian
Nicholas
Oliver

I know you said Evan and Nicholas are already on your list so I assume your husband doesn’t like them—but they’re both saint names so I thought I’d bring them up again.

My favorite option is Oliver. First, because I love that name. Second, because it’s a perfect brother name for Leo. Third, because I think it hits that perfect sweet spot between popularity and tradition. Fourth, because I think it’s great with your surname and possible middle name: Oliver John Radecki.

Emily writes:

We are due with baby #2 on July 3rd. We opted to have the sex be a big suprise at birth so now we are struggling to pick a boy’s name and a girl’s name. Our son’s name is Nikolas (after my brother) James (after my father and grandfater) but we call him Kole. We don’t want the kids names to sound too similar or be ‘matchy matchy’ but to be similar styles.

Boy names we like
Kyle (very very matchy matchy and similar to Kole but hubby likes it)
Ryan
Tyler
Chase

Allen is hubby and FIL’s middle name so we would really like to use that with #2.

Girl names we like
Abigayle
Avery
Ansley

Hubbies mother’s name is Gayle Ann, my mother’s name is Anne Elizabeth. Both passed away a few years ago so we would love to honor them by using parts of their names.

We are open to more suggestions. My sister will be having identical twins in Sept and since I will be caring for all the kids daily I don’t want #2s name to be too similar to any of her picks. She would like to name her twins a combination of Haley, Hannah, Brooke, and Katelyn if they are girls. The boys would be Logan and Hunter.

Our last name starts with a D and sounds like Donkey.

Here are some other possibilities to consider if Nikolas has a little brother:

Alexander
Frederick
Grant
Luke
Reid

And if he has a little sister:

Annabeth Gayle
Annalise Gayle
Anya Beth
Bethany Gayle
Elizabeth Gayle

Angie writes:

I originally wrote you back in December (Baby Boy or Girl Drizzle) for help with the names Ruth or Penelope if our baby was a girl. Well, baby is a boy and we named him Henry Isaac. While we understood Henry is by no means an unusual name and has certainly had a resurgence, we had NO idea how many Henry’s there would actually be. We have met quite a few other Henry’s and many of your readers have mentioned Henry as a potential baby name. Even the nurse at our peds clinic who sees an awful lot of babies, said that Henry is the new name around town. Since yourself and your readers were so helpful with our girl’s name, I feel compelled to write again for help with our boy’s name. I need some nickname help for our Henry. I just don’t want him to get to kindergarten and be one of 5. We like both Hank and Hal equally, but neither really sparkle for us or seem to fit our little guy. What are your thoughts and your reader’s thoughts on Hank or Hal? What are people’s impressions of men with those names? Any other suggestions? His initials as an acronym won’t work.

 
Ah! Paul and I had something similar happen with the name of one of our children. We KNEW the name was common, and in fact we LIKE common names, but we hadn’t realized that it was SIGNIFICANTLY MORE COMMON in our state than in the nation at large—like, almost Top 10 in our state, as opposed to Top 50 in the nation. So although we’d signed on for a Popular Name, it was a bit of a worrying surprise to have (1) another baby with the same name in the maternity ward, and (2) another baby with the same name in the pediatrician’s waiting room, and (3) another baby with the same name in the waiting room at the portrait studio, and (4) etc.

In his preschool class of about 25, there were two other children with the same name. We started looking into nicknames/variations of his name, but he didn’t really want to change to anything else, so we just left it and he went by his first name and last initial—as did the other two boys.

When I registered him for school, the registrar said, “Heh! We’ve seen a lot of THOSE today!”—and then heard herself and added, “….Er, it’s a lovely name.”

But! Time for the good news! He hasn’t had another child with the same name in his class since preschool. I looked up how many boys were born with his name in his birth year, and compared it to the number of Henrys born in 2008 (the 2009 info isn’t yet available), and Henry is only about 1/4th as common.

So I think you can wait and see. If your Henry seems like a Henry and not a Hank or a Hal, I don’t see any reason to force yourself into a change. If he IS one of a group of Henrys in his class, perhaps the others will already be going by Hank and Hal.

What does everyone else think? What do you think of the nicknames Hank and Hal, and can you think of other nickname possibilities? Do you have experience with this issue you can share?

Jemma writes:

I’m due with my fourth daughter any day now (due date is June 15th) and I’m having terrible trouble finding a name for her. I’ve already used all the names I love on my first 3 girls and haven’t found anything new to love for this little one. Help! I tend to like longer, more feminine names that can be shortened to a cute/spunky nickname. All the (first) names that I’ve ever really loved have also ended in the letter A, but that trend doesn’t have to continue. Her middle name will be either Greta or Erin, depending on what sounds best with whatever first name we find, and our last name is Howard.

My other daughter’s are named Clarissa Brynn (nn Clary), Theodora Elise (nn Thea) and Susanna Lisbet (nn Zanna).

Any help/suggestions would be much appreciated! Thanks!

Kim writes:

Ok, so we are down to the wire and have not been able to come up with a boy name yet. We have a Colin, Claire and a Keegan. Things are already starting and the dr says it might be this weekend. We like Irish names but nothing too far out there. We are not crazy about names in the top 100 either.

other names we are considering are: number is the ssn ranking; bold ones we like, not bold are on the list but not really in the running but not crossed off either.

Cade 293 ( how do you say this one?)
Calden (Cal for a nickname) n/a
Callum (ditto) n/a
Camden 219
Clinton 755
Cullen 769
C(K)ameron
Caleb
Cole
Carter

Keane n/a
Keaton 357
Kellan 882
Kevin 39
Kian (rhymes with Ian) 664
Kieran (husband likes but it sounds too much like Karen to me) 571
Killian 836
Kingston 355 (jumped from 942 in 2006!)
Korrigan n/a
Knox n/a
Kylan (we have a friend with a girl named this so to name a boy???)776

My husband still likes Liam since this is boy number three he is still trying to get that name but I am not crazy for it. Especially since it is popping up everywhere! I like the name just not in our sibset: Colin, Claire, and Keegan. I really like Quentin but he is not fond of it and so we are stuck.

I pronounce Cade with a hard-C sound, rhyming with Wade and Jade.

To my ear, both Kian and Keaton sound too similar to Keegan—but as with most naming issues, this is an entirely subjective thing. My favorite from your list is Callum, even though I find myself tempted to choose a K name to make it come out “even”! But I’m not sure—is Callum too similar to Colin?

What does everyone else think? What name would you choose for the fourth child?

Shannon writes:

We have two girls, Darsie and Elise, and we’re expecting a third child. We have a boy name that we have had picked out since before Darsie – Robert, but we are totally stumped on girls names. We want something that goes with Darsie and Elise (dubbed Robdar and Elrob while waiting to know their sexes), obviously. I like two syllable names but am not really picky. Nothing too modern and popular – no Bailey, McKenna’s, etc.

Pardon me for listing and leaving, but there is a 2-year-old who will be recharged and ready to destroy my house again soon.

Aubrey
Bethany
Bianca
Brenna
Celeste
Clara
Cora
Fiona
Holly
Joy
Linden
Lindsay
Mira
Molly
Robin
Romy
Susana

An interesting discussion got started in the comment section of Sunday’s post Baby Girl or Boy, Sibling to Jonah. One of the main questions of the post was whether Jonah and Ezra were too similar as sibling names, and a discussion started about whether sibling names need to go together at all.

Stephanie wrote:

I’m just not in the has-to-go-with-the-sibling’s-name camp. There are limited years that they will be known as a duo (sad as it may seem to us now). In my adult life, most people I meet don’t ask to hear my siblings’ names so they can decide if they ‘go’ with mine!

And then Frazzled Mom added:

Stephanie just eloquently explained my feelings about siblings’ names going together. I’ve always said, as adults your kids aren’t going to be putting each others names on their business cards! But I agree complementary siblings are a bonus, and might be considered in a tie breaking situation where you love two names equally.

Really good points.

There’s a spectrum of how well names go together. Madison and Mikayla are the same style. Madison and Sadie are different styles but compatible. Madison and Brooklyn on one hand go together perfectly—but on the other hand, now the place-name style is getting a little strong. Madison and Addison are matchy. Madison and Velma aren’t the same style at all.

But—style categories are so subjective. When you were reading the paragraph above, maybe you thought “Madison and Mikayla are a terrible clash!” or “Madison and Sadie are the SAME style!” How many times have I suggested a sibling name and you’ve thought, “I really don’t think that goes together at all”? A lot, probably. What sounds like “the same style” to me or to you is going to depend on where we live, what we grew up hearing, what names are common in our families, what names we like and dislike. This is one of the ways in which sibling name coordination DOESN’T matter much: even if you choose names that go together, other people may think you didn’t.

A problem is most likely to arise when a family uses the same style for all their children—except one. A family with four girls, say, named Alissandra, Anastasia, Arabella, and Carson. Possibly Carson will feel she really dodged a bullet on this one, or perhaps she will feel left out. The overall effect, though, is “one of these things is not like the others,” and other people may wonder why. Perhaps they will think this means the family really wanted a boy. Carson may wonder about that herself.

It works better if it’s the first child whose style is different, especially if that child is a namesake. Carson, named for her mother’s maiden name, followed by Alissandra, Anastasia, and Arabella—well, that’s different. A boy named Wisdom, followed by brothers Matthew and Ethan and Joseph—well, sometimes people start out with one idea about names, and then change to another idea.

While sibling names needn’t coordinate, a family with a daughter named Madison may want to avoid the name Addison—not because a future coworker will care what Madison’s sister’s name is, but because rhyming sibling names can be a hassle during the time when the family shares a household.

Or let’s say a family has one son named Michael and another named Ulysses. Any reason this is something that will plague them as adults? Nah. But they’ll be children for a long time first, and during that time they are going to get sick of discussing it with every nosy Swistle parker.

A good explanation (as with “Carson is her mother’s maiden name,” above) goes a long way to oiling a style difference. The twin daughters of former U.S. president George W. Bush are named Barbara and Jenna, and those names are very different styles. But the girls are named for their grandmothers, and so in that way they DO go together.

I also think style differences matter less if a family has one style for the girls and a different style for the boys. A family with an Alissandra and an Anastasia can easily have a Mark and a John. A family with a Jenna and an Erin can easily have a Saul and a Jonah. It’s common enough for people to have different style preferences for boys and for girls, so it doesn’t strike that “Why so different?” note.

Where do you stand on the issue of sibling name coordination? Where on the spectrum are you?

R. writes:

I’m due with my first baby, a girl, on June 1st & I haven’t been able to find a name I like yet. Despite the fact that she could arrive any time now, I’ve really only started thinking about names in the past few days. I’ve been having a really horrible time of it these past 9 months so names haven’t really been on my mind till now. You see, the very day I found out I was pregnant was also the day I lost my husband to a freak heart attack (he was only 30 and in seemingly great health. I’m still in shock). We had been trying to conceive for 6 months, but everything happened so fast that he was gone before I ever got to tell him about the baby.

We were always both a little superstitious & so had decided not to discuss baby names until I was pregnant for fear of jinxing ourselves. Sadly this means that I have no idea at all what kind of names he would have liked.

If this baby had been a boy I wouldn’t be having this problem as I would have named him after his father. Since it’s a girl though, I’ve been thinking that a nice way to honor my husbands memory would be to give her the same initials as her daddy. My husbands name was Phillip Gregory & our last name is Moore. I think I’ve decided on Genevieve as the G middle name, but for the life of me I can’t think of a girls name that starts with the letter P that I like at all.

P names that are out because I just don’t like them:
Paris
Paige
Paloma
Pamela
Pansy
Patricia
Paula
Phoebe
Phyllis

I’m having lots of trouble even finding more P names than this! Please help, any & all suggestions welcome!

I think the name Philippa would be an excellent choice. It’s a name I love already, and in this case it seems like the perfect way to honor her father Phillip. It goes beautifully with Moore and with Genevieve: Philippa Genevieve Moore. It has cute nicknames, too: Pip and Pippa.

Other P names to consider:

Pandora
Patience
Pearl
Penelope
Philomena
Piper
Polly
Priscilla

But I lean strongly toward Philippa.