Lori writes:

I have a 2 year-old daughter Piper Lynn (my maiden name) Davis.  We wanted something perky, upbeat and a little tomboyish yet unique enough to go with (the-incredibly-common) “Davis” – I think we got what we wanted.

I am now due with our second (and last) child who is a girl, due May 13, 2013 and would like a name to compliment Piper. Middle name will probably be Anne (it would be a 4th generation middle name).  Obviously longer and traditional names are out.  I also want to avoid anything too trendy or popular.  Letters to avoid:  “D”, “K”, “P” (but not absolutely).  I want to avoid anything like Kaylie, Kayden, Peyton, etc.

I’m not a huge believer in astrology but she will be a Taurus and potentially be born on my mother’s birthday (with whom I had a very rocky relationship growing up), so a name that could “counteract” those qualities would be appreciated.  We had thought of Skylar, since sky is the opposite of earth (Taurus is an earth sign) but it seems a little heavy-handed to me.

I thought Tatum would fit perfectly with Piper but no one can seem to get Tatum O’Neal and her monstrous history out of their heads. We have also considered: Margo, Marlowe, Sloane, Willa. I love the name Wesley but it, of course, is a strictly boy name. I can’t quite figure out what in the sound fascinates me.

The name Wesley is very occasionally used for girls (in 2011, the Social Security Administration reports 2450 new baby boys and 33 new baby girls named Wesley), but with Piper I think it reads boy.

The first alternate suggestion that comes to mind is Lesley: it’s different from Wesley by only one letter, and currently used mostly for girls. I’m not sure Lesley is a good fit with Piper, though.

Presley is another rhyming option. In 2011, there were 1384 new baby girls and 123 new baby boys named Presley. Presley Davis; Piper and Presley. Starts with a P, but I’d still consider it.

Next I think of Waverly. I’m not sure about the repeating -av- with the surname, though, and the initials WAD would bother me.

Next: Paisley. I think this one has a lot of possibility. It’s very similar in sound to Wesley, but it’s used mostly for girls. I think it shares the perky, upbeat, tomboyish sound of Piper. Unfortunately it starts with P, which you’d prefer to avoid, but I still think it’s a good option. If you were planning on more children, I might worry that it would be hard to find a third name to go as well with those two names as they go with each other, but since you’re not, I think they make a very appealing pair. Paisley Davis; Piper and Paisley.

Or there’s Ainsley or Kinsley, though Kinsley starts with K and Ainsley might not work with Anne.

I don’t know enough about astrology to give specific advice, but I think if I were looking for a symbolic name in this situation, I would look for something from a sign compatible with Taurus rather than opposed to it. Using a name opposite to Taurus seems like it symbolizes an urge to cancel out something that she is, or else to symbolically put her in conflict with herself or with her grandmother. I think I might instead look for a name that represents your own astrological sign (to symbolize your hope that your relationship with your daughter will be more compatible than the one you had with your mother), or represents one of the positive qualities of the Taurus sign. Though actually, I think I would abandon this idea entirely: I think a name of this sort might cause you to reflect on your rocky relationship with your mother every time you think of your daughter’s name.

Tamsin shares sounds but not reputation with Tatum. Tamsin Davis; Piper and Tamsin. I’m not sure I like it with Anne, though.

Or Gemma would work well, I think. Gemma Davis; Piper and Gemma.

Or Romy, or Rory. Romy Davis; Piper and Romy. Rory Davis; Piper and Rory. I particularly like Rory, if the initials RAD don’t bother you.

Quinn may be more unisex than you’d prefer (in 2011, there were 1117 new baby boys and 1680 new baby girls named Quinn), but with Piper I’d be more likely to think girl. Quinn Davis; Piper and Quinn. Maybe not with Anne.

I think Cleo would be great. Cleo Davis; Piper and Cleo. The initials would be CAD.

Or Merrin. Merrin Davis; Piper and Merrin. Initials MAD.

Or Brin. Brin Davis; Piper and Brin. Initials BAD. Goodness, the __AD is a little tricky to work with!

I wonder if the movie has been gone long enough for us to use Juno? Juno Davis; Piper and Juno.

Valerie writes:

I have read every crevice of your blog as we try to find a name for our second daughter (and last child), due to arrive in late March/early April and I would be thrilled to the input of you and your fabulous readers.  We are stuck!

Our older daughter is Stella Grace and our last name is Falcon with an e at the end (sounds like Capone).  Naming Stella was easy for us, as it was a name that we had fallen in love with many years before we were finally able to get pregnant.  We loved the slight Italian feeling of it, and it’s meaning of “star”, and once we saw her little heartbeat flickering on the ultrasound and my husband offhandedly commented that it looked like a little star, we were sold and never looked back.  We did not realize at the time that it had/would become a popular name. 

We are having a harder time naming this little girl, I think because we don’t have the same type of long term attachment to a name, or any sort of a meaningful connection or story to go with it that makes us feel like “Yes, this is it!”  Who knew that naming a daughter based solely on finding a “name we both love” could be so hard!?

I’d describe the name style that we are looking for as having an antique charm with classic sound, being familiar but not too common.  We’d like it to be a nice complement to Stella (but not too matchy) with a bonus for having some Italian roots in either the first or middle spot.  There are two names that continue to bubble to the top, but my husband and each love a different one more than the other. So we are trying to put them both to the side while we consider other names, as it’s hard to imagine choosing a name that either of us is at all hesitant about.

Scarlett Noelle Falcon(e)-this is my top choice, and my husband really likes it, but isn’t sold.  Our concerns (though minor): Is Scarlett too sexy? Is Stella and Scarlett too matchy?

Ivy Caprice Falcon(e)-this is my husbands top choice, and I like it, but don’t love it. I am stuck on the concern that if Ivy becomes a more popular name she could end up being called Ivy F. (IVF) in school.  My husband thinks I’m crazy for being worried about this but I can’t help it!

Other names we are currently considering:

Serena-my husbands current fave

Gianna nn Gia or GiGi

Corissa nn Cora (love that it has a tie to meaning heart in Italian, even if it’s loose, as a way to connect it to Stella’s star meaning). We are open to other ways to getting to Cora, or maybe just using Cora alone as well.  I love Coraline, but we struggle with the movie connection.

Caterina Patrice (an Italian version of our mom’s names, Catherine and Patricia).  This has the meaning we are looking for, but we don’t LOVE it, and don’t think it’s a great match with Stella

Names that we’ve considered, but taken off the table:
Emilia-I love, my husband does not like it

Luciana or Lucia-I love (and my middle name is Lucille), my husband does not like it

Seraphina-we both like, but don’t like it’s nicknames, especially Sera

Juliana-we have close friends who just used this

Please help us! You and your readers always give such fabulous advice, and we would be so grateful for a nudge in the right direction.  I promise to update with our decision and a picture once she arrives!

Thank you so much, 

and

An update since I last wrote:

We are both still feeling strongly about our first choices (mine: Scarlett, his now: Serena) but neither of us likes that it’s not the top choice for both of us. We’ve continued to brainstorm other names, or other variations of names we’ve been considering, as well as pairing middle names to see if that helps us.  Nothing has emerged as a common favorite, and we’re not sure now how to resolve the fact that we have different top choices. 

Here is our current list:
Scarlett Noelle-my first choice, my husbands 2nd choice. He struggles a bit with the “scar” part of the name
Serena (having a hard time with a middle.  I like Rose and Rae, as a one syllable “sounds” right to me, but my husband doesn’t like either middle. Perhaps we’d go with Noelle here?)-my husbands 1st choice, my 3rd or 4th.
Caterina Patrice (versions of our Mom’s names as I described below, a sentimental favorite that we’ve had on our list for years, but it’s not our favorite name and we’re not sure it flows with Stella)
Everly Noelle
Noelle Seraphina
Ivy Caprice-I still have my “IVF” concerns, and my husband has let go of the name now since he loves Serena.
Cora Noelle – I love Cora, Rich likes it. This has been my 2nd choice for a while, but it’s a bit more complicated now as our good friends who love this name just had a miscarriage.  We had agreed to both be free to use it, but now I feel like it would be insensitive, especially since it’s not our top choice. This is probably Rich’s 3rd choice, but he said it’s distant to Serena and Scarlett.

Is there any other feedback or info I can give you that would help you to help us? 

I think I’d like to start by making one long list of all the first-name candidates from both letters:

Scarlett
Ivy
Serena
Gianna
Corissa
Cora
Caterina
Everly
Noelle

And now I’ll start crossing off. First I would cross off Noelle, because Stella and Noelle are both “elle” names. (I think it would be a nice tie-in if used as the middle name.)

Then I’d cross off Ivy. I love the name, and I don’t think children generally know what IVF is, and IVF isn’t an insulting or negative thing, and I don’t think the name Ivy is going to be common enough among your daughter’s peers for their to be a high likelihood of more than one Ivy per class. But on the other hand, flukes can happen (there can be not one single Isabella in a classroom, but two Isadoras), and the IVF thing would bother me a little too even though I can mostly talk myself out of it, and anyway your husband has dropped it as his favorite so the motivation to make it work has faded.

Then I’d cross off Everly. I feel like it’s an outlier among your other name choices. (It might work very well as a middle name, however.)

I would cross both Cora and Corissa off the list, out of sensitivity toward your friends.

That leaves us with:

Scarlett
Serena
Gianna
Caterina

One thing I’ve noticed about a second child’s name is that it can give spin to the first child’s name. If a couple has a child named, say, Esther, it’s difficult to tell yet how to take that name: is it more of a biblical/devout choice, or is it more of a hipster choice, or is it a family name, or WHAT? The second child’s name can tell us more information: a little sister named Ruth tells us one thing, and a little sister named Matilda tells us another.

Stella is for me a name like Esther: I can picture taking it a few different ways. The name Scarlett clicks with the name Stella for me, I think because of the movie association (Gone With the Wind and A Streetcar Named Desire, respectively, plus the additional impact of the actress Scarlett Johansson). For me, using Scarlett puts a red-lipstick/Hollywood spin on both names.

With Gianna and Caterina, the name Stella instead spins more Italian: strong and pretty.

With Cora, the name Stella would have spun a different way: still strong, still pretty, but more sweet/vintage.

With Serena, the word-name aspect is brought to my attention. (I might also have noticed it with Cora.)

And so on. The names on your list all work very well with Stella, I think—but in quite different ways. One exercise that might help you narrow things down is to talk about what kind of images you get when you picture each of the possible sister pairs. Which set can you most easily imagine as Your Family?

I thought perhaps in this next paragraph I’d say which was my own favorite name from your list—but I’m finding it very difficult to choose. When I did the exercise where I pretended to cross off each name in turn, the one that gave me the most pain was Caterina. I think it’s beautiful; I love it with Stella; I love it with your surname. Most of all, I love that Caterina Patrice would honor both grandmothers in one shot. Imagine the happy weeping! And each girl would have a special story about her name.

I was reading over your letters again to see if I could figure out which name was your joint favorite, but what seems to be the overall theme is that none of the names strike both of you as being just right. Perhaps we’d have more luck looking for names that are similar to the ones on your list.

Let’s look at Scarlett, for example. Violet, Charlotte, and Skyler are all similar, though of course quite different in style.

Calista also seems similar to me. Stella and Calista. They do share several sounds, maybe too many sounds. I’m picturing introducing them (“This is Stella, and this is Calista”) and sometimes the pairing seems to have too many sounds in common and sometimes it just seems very well coordinated.

Now I’ve gotten distracted by the Italian section of The Baby Name Wizard, while looking to see if Calista is by any chance Italian (it’s Latin, so sort of pre-Italian, and also Greek). Oh! Oh oh oh! What about BIANCA? I love that name, and I think it goes beautifully with Stella! Stella and Bianca! Oh, I want to go back in time and have two girls and use those names! Stella Grace and Bianca Noelle.

Or Claudia. One of my favorite girl names was Claudia; it was unfortunate that Paul had a Significant Claudia in his past. (She was a very nice girl, but he still didn’t want to use the name for a daughter.) Stella and Claudia.

Or Elena is lovely, and somewhat similar to Serena. Stella and Elena. The Oxford Dictionary of First Names says that the meaning of the name is uncertain but may be connected with the words “ray” and “sunbeam”—what a nice coordinating meaning with Stella’s! But again, perhaps they have too many sounds in common.

Selena is similar to Serena, and may mean “moon.” Or the spelling Celina may tie it more to the meaning “celestial.” (The Oxford Dictionary of First Names says both names are of uncertain origin.)

Carys would be pretty. Stella and Carys. It does make me think of Stella Maris, but that’s not negative.

Or Geneva: a little like Serena, a little like Gianna. Stella and Geneva.

With Serena, I like the idea of the middle name Noelle. I also like Celeste or Corinne. Or to coordinate with Grace, I like Kate or May or Pearl. Oh, or Joy! I love Serena Joy, unless that’s getting a little too wordy.

I see I never answered if I thought Stella and Scarlett were too matchy. I think if you were planning more children, I might worry that the combination would make you feel like you had to choose something equally well-coordinated for a third child; because you’re stopping at two, I don’t think they’re too matchy.

It’s true that it may come down to one of you liking the name more than the other does. I think that must in fact be typical: I think it’s less common for both parents to love a name equally. Sometimes retrospect takes care of these things: if one parent loves the name almost as much as the other does, it may feel to them later on as if they always loved the name just as much.

One way to make things feel more balanced is this: let the preference tip the other direction for the middle name. So for example, if you end up choosing your husband’s favorite of Serena, perhaps the middle name could be one of your favorites such as Luciana or Rose or Scarlett.

Jenn writes:

I’m due with my first baby July 12th, and it’s a girl!  I want her middle name to be Cara after my sister.  The first names we narrowed down are Lana, Olivia, and Lily.  My husband and I are really favoring Lana at the moment, but I’m wondering if that name really goes with Cara.  (the pronunciation isn’t Care-uh, but Ca-ruh – the a sound as in cat).  Our last name is Weber.  My sister doesn’t know yet I’m honoring her with the middle name, so I don’t want to ask too many friends or family or they might spill the beans.  I’d love input from you and your readers.

Thanks!

I think it depends on a few different things. First, are you pronouncing the La- of Lana more like the lla- of llama (so that Lana rhymes with Donna) or more like the la- of land (so that Lana rhymes with banana)? Now that I say both aloud, I think either one works with Cara in its own way: one by repeating/enforcing the vowel sound of Cara, the other by contrasting slightly with it. But some people might like one way and not the other. (Though I’m having a little trouble figuring out how Cara is pronounced. Is it like the word car, followed by an -ah/-uh sound?)

Secondly, is yours the sort of family where children are routinely called by first and middle names together? If so, it’s more important that that names go together. If not, I consider the honor name to completely trump issues of whether the fit is perfect.

Thirdly, what do YOU think? The sound of two names together is highly subjective: one person may love a sound combination while another can hardly stand it, but neither person’s opinion means the name objectively DOES or DOESN’T work. We could all vote on every name combination, and you would find us split on every single one, with some people saying “It’s great! I love it!” and others saying “Dear me, no, that doesn’t work AT ALL!”—so the important thing is whether you think the name works well enough to use, taking into account the considerable benefit of being able to use an honor name.

But in any case, my vote is that it’s fine: if when you say it aloud you’re not immediately thinking it’s an obvious and impossible clash, then it’s not too much of a clash for an honor name situation. And depending on how Lana and Cara are pronounced, I might in fact think they’re wonderful together.

Michelle writes:

Hi Swistle! My husband and I aren’t having a baby yet, but I have a question about the name Helena. I love it and would definitely consider using it if we were to get pregnant and find out we were having a girl. The only issue in having is I’m not sure which pronunciation I like most (Heh-lay-nah or Heh-lee-nah) or which most people would say on first glance. I was hoping you could put up a poll to find out (I also think this would help me figure out which I’d prefer, if I was disappointed/happy in the way the results ended up). Thanks!

I have also heard a third pronunciation, which is like HEH-leh-na, with the emphasis on the first syllable instead of on the second—sort of the rhythm of Eleanor, or like Helen with an -ah on the end.

My own favorite pronunciation is heh-LAY-na. The name Elena (with the eh-LAY-nah pronunciation) has been on my own girl name list.

Let’s have a poll over to the right! …Wait. Do you want a poll about which pronunciation people like the most, or about which one they’d use at first glance? Let’s have TWO polls, one for each question. [Polls closed; see results below.]

Samantha writes:

I love your blog and naming style, and I am hoping you can help us out. My name is Sam and my husband’s name is Danny and our last name is Giddings. We are expecting our second daughter at the end of May and are kind of stuck. I absolutely love our first daughter’s name: Magnolia Jane (we don’t use a nickname yet, but if we start it will likely be Nolie or Mags). Magnolia has a special meaning to us, it’s unique without being too weird – plus she has her own Grateful Dead song – I just think it’s perfect.  I hope to find a similarly awesome name for baby girl #2.

We are set on a middle name, which will be June after our grandmothers. I am not concerned about the one letter difference between it and Magnolia’s middle name since they will both be named for special people. However, when it comes to first names, I don’t want to repeat the same first letter or ending sound.

Here’s our short list of names:

Penny (just Penny, not short for anything) – Our top name thus far

Clementine – We both love it, but hate all the possible nicknames and Clementine is quite the mouthful

Charlie – This is would make an adorable girls name, but am hesitant because it may be hard to carry and I’ve also seen it as a nickname for Charlotte, which is quite popular (I think). Also, it rules out both Penny and Clementine if we go for a third and it’s a girl

Jude – We’d have to change the middle name for this one, but my husband just brought it up and it’s growing on me

If she were a he our short list would be River and August. Samson was our top boy name until it dawned on me that as Sam, my son would literally be the son of Sam.

Can you help us? I would be forever grateful!  I promise to email you an adorable picture with an update right after she is born. 

It’s not relevant for this baby, but if you have a son later, he’ll be the son of Sam no matter what you use as his first name. Using Samson for him might cause some confusion (because of having two Sams in one house), but avoiding it doesn’t take away the son-of-Sam issue: your name will still be Sam, and he will still be your son.

From your list, I think the only name that fits with Magnolia is Clementine: they’re both long, feminine, unusual names, and Clementine doesn’t seem like any more of a mouthful than Magnolia. Penny-short-for-nothing seems too nicknamey and casual with the long and fancy Magnolia. Charlie has the same problem, plus it’s used more often for boys while Magnolia is used exclusively for girls. Jude would be nice for the song issue, but it’s a short snappy mostly-boy name next to a long fancy only-girl name. It’s not that sibling names must coordinate, but it’s nice to avoid the kind of contrast that suggests different expectations for each child, or that causes them hassle.

If you hate all the nicknames for Clementine, it’s not quite the issue it would be if you hated all the nicknames for Elizabeth: there aren’t any familiar, natural nicknames for Clementine. I think you’d end up using the full name as you do for Magnolia, and maybe a non-name-related nickname would happen naturally over time. Or even though I see only Clem and Tina listed as nicknames, Minnie seems like it would work just as well, and it’s similar to Penny. Or you could call her Darlin’. Or it would be a big stretch, but I suppose you could call her Charlie.

Do you have a special reason for wanting to use just-Penny and just-Charlie, after giving your first child a non-nickname name? For example, did the name Magnolia seem like a good idea before the baby was born, but since then has felt too long or too fancy or too feminine for your style? Magnolia and Penelope are a good sister pair, as are Magnolia and Charlotte to a lesser extent (larger popularity difference; maybe Magnolia and Charity would work better). Maggie and Penny would also be a good combination. But once you’ve gone with Magnolia (and so far haven’t used a nickname), it makes for a startling contrast to switch.

Unless you’re deliberately trying for a style change or a startle factor, I’d look for something more like:

Anastasia
Anneliese
Arabella
Athena
Augusta (rules out August)
Aurora
Bianca
Briony
Calliope
Catriona
Cecilia (song)
Christabel
Clarissa
Delilah (which would rule out Samson) (song)
Emerald
Eugenie
Eveline (song)
Felicity
Francesca
Genevieve
Giselle
Gloria (song)
Gwendolyn
Imogen (probably not with June)
Isabeau
Isadora
Jemima
Josephine
Juliette (song)
Juniper (probably not with June)
Karenna
Lissandra
Livinia
Lorelei (song)
Persephone
Philippa
Philomena
Romilly
Rosabelle
Rosalie
Rosalind
Ruby (song)
Seraphina
Susannah (song)
Tuesday (song, sort of)
Valentina
Veronica (song)
Virginia (song)
Vivienne
Willemina

Many of those end in -a, but I left them anyway in case what you meant was more that you didn’t want to match the -lia. So many girl names end in -a, I don’t think of it as a noticeable “matching” thing the way it would be if both names started with M.

J. writes:

Hello! We’re looking for some help deciding on a name for our baby girl due in June. Her older brother’s name is Wyatt. We would like to use a family name, Rose, for her middle name. Our two favorites right now are Stella and Tessa. Our last name is similar to Thorstenson. Which name sounds better with our last name, and is there one that sounds better with Wyatt? Also, we are not set on either of these names so if you have any other suggestions they are quite welcome! We like names that are not overly popular but also not too “out there”. Other names we have considered are Clara, Savana, Maisie, and Freya. Thanks so much!

and

I’d just like to add a few things.  First, our last name – Thorstenson – doesn’t roll off the tongue so nice.  So I’d like to find a first name that comes out smooth and simple and flows well.  I think that is the main thing keeping us from committing to Stella – Is Stella Thorstenson a bit of a tongue twister with the two sets of “st’s”? And same with Tessa – is there too much of an “s” sound? Also, we are pretty set on having Rose for her middle name, so with such a short middle name and longer last name I feel that a two-syllable first name might flow best (although you are the expert on that!).
So our biggest issues seem to be finding a name that flows nice with the middle and last name, as well as finding one that sounds consistant with brother Wyatt`s name. Like I mentioned before Clara, Savana, Maisie, and Freya are some other names on our list.  More names we`ve considered are Maya, Olive (although our good friends have named their dog this, so I`m thinking that name is off limits), Aubrey, Zoe, Samara, Marylou (I love this but husband doesn`t quite as much, plus it doesn`t sound great with Rose) and Anya. I don`t know that we have a consistant style, as there are some old-fashioned names and some newer names on the list. We`d prefer a name that is timeless and one that will grow well with her (sound good as a baby, child, and adult name – this is what is keeping us from committing to Maisie or Zoe, do they sound too childish?).

Your opinions are greatly appreciated! Thank you!

Both Tessa and Stella seem a little tangled to me with Thorstenson. It’s the Thorstenson part that’s doing most of the tangling—but adding more S and T sounds seems to increase the problem. I don’t think either of them is BAD with the surname, though.

Clara is the one that stands out to me, not only because it avoids S and T sounds but also because of the pleasing early American sound with Wyatt. But for some reason, the L sound (or maybe it’s more the L blend) does something similar to the S/T sounds for me. I was thinking maybe Cora instead, but the repeating -or- sound doesn’t appeal to me.

So then I think maybe Freya. No S, no T, no L; nice with the surname; nice with the middle name; nice with the brother name. But I think Stella or Tessa (or Clara) would also work fine.

Kristin writes:

please please tell me what names you think bo (for a girl) could be a nickname for.  like, since elizabeth has a million nicknames: eliza, liza, eli, bette, bette, bess, liz, lizzy, elle, ella, bitsy, bee, bebe, betsy, and so on and so forth, could bo work? 

i’m open to random suggestions.  i heart bo.  bo.  swoon.  see? 

i couldn’t imagine using it “as is” but i would love a list of options that i might be able to squeeze it out as the baby’s nickname…  i’d love to know what you & your peeps could come up with.

I know an Isabelle whose family calls her Isabeau (her grandpa started it as a joke, and it stuck); from there it would be a short leap to Beau/Bo. But it seems like that’s a route to the nickname that would need to happen on its own, as it did for that family; it’s harder to picture putting “Isabelle (Bo) Andrews” on a birth announcement. (Though maybe that would work. Hm.)

I could see it coming from Sophia in the same way: Sophia to So-bo to Bo. Again, it seems like this would have to happen on its own.

Same thing once again: Zoe to Zoe-bowie to Zo-bo to Bo.

I don’t know if it would work for Elizabeth or not. It comes up pretty often here that someone will say “If Peg can be a nickname for Margaret, then why not [random nickname] for [any name]?” Well, because it’s not how it works, that’s why. For the most part, when a nickname comes about on its own, it’s considered a legitimate/traditional nickname; otherwise, it’s not. This is not to say you can’t pair up any name and nickname you want: you definitely CAN do that, and many people DO (and some of those then STICK and become accepted/traditional)—but the Margaret/Peg reasoning doesn’t back it up. Using a non-established nickname is a choice that comes with other people’s furrowed brows: they’ll get used to it if you want to use Zoe as a nickname for Elizabeth or Ella as a nickname for Lillian, but they won’t think it makes perfect sense the way they do when they hear of a John going by Jack. It’s not entirely fair that it works that way, but it’s something to take into consideration when choosing a name/nickname combination.

Here are the only girl names in the Social Security Administrations database for 2011 that have the letter combination “bo” in them:

Arbor
Bobbie
Bodhi
Bonita
Bonnie
Bora
Bostyn/Boston
Bowen
Bowie
Deborah
Ebony
Harbor
Rainbow

I can see getting Bo from Bodhi, Bonita, Bowen, Bowie, Ebony, and Rainbow. It also might make an excellent fresh nickname for Deborah, if you wanted to honor a Deborah in the family without the confusion of two Debbies; people are more flexible/accepting about unusual nicknames when honor names are involved. 

In 2011, there were 18 new baby girls named Bo, and another 27 named Beau. I see another 13 named Isabeau.

Isabeau is an interesting possibility. I’d need to think about that for awhile. It seems like it would cause some confusion—but on the other hand, many names come into style as variations on names that feel too popular to use: Madison leads to Addison which leads to Adelyn; Ava and Evelyn lead to Avalyn, etc. When a sound sounds good, we look for other ways to use it. Beau is masculine in French—but we’re not speaking French, and in any case Bo/Beau is your goal so I already know that’s not an issue.

[Edited to add: According to the book The Best Baby Names in the World From Around the World, the name Isabeau is used in France for girl babies. The Baby Name Bible and 100,000+ Baby Names also list it as a French girl name. None of them list it as a boy name. I’d say this crosses out what I said about beau being masculine in French, if even the French themselves don’t consider -beau- too masculine for a girl’s name. This may be one of those “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing” things, where we’ve all learned that it’s “beau for boys and belle for girls”—but without knowing the actual language well enough to draw any conclusions from that, or to understand fully how it applies. This is one reason I don’t try to do baby name consultations for other languages/countries.]

My favorite route would be to consistently refer to the fetus as Bo during the pregnancy. Then name her anything you want and call her Bo, saying, “Oh, we started calling her that when she was still a fetus, and it just stuck!” Plenty of kids still get called Bean or Peanut or Bear for that very reason, and it’s a simple story that lets people quickly unfurrow their brows about it. I think even Little Miss Overly Picky About Nicknames (that’s me) would accept that easily.

A. writes:

We are due in a couple of days and have been agonizing over first names for our little girl. She’s our first child. I want to use Elizabeth as her middle name after my Granny. My husband wants to use Lynn as her middle name after me. We both are open to picking either one based on first name choice, but we don’t want to use either name as a first name. Also, our last name is Ford and really no girl’s name sounds good to me with Ford.

We have two names we like:

Avery Lynn – we both love this name. I’m having a hard time with it because of popularity. We don’t know of any Avery’s but from researching it, it appears trendy and popular, which I don’t want. I really don’t want her to be Avery F. in school.

Emery Elizabeth – I love this name and it’s my husband’s second favorite, but he really doesn’t want to give-up Lynn and I don’t like Emery Lynn.

I’m also not a big fan of nicknames. I will always use her full name.

Help, please!

Avery is indeed popular: #18 in 2011, and likely to be even higher when the 2012 Social Security Administration statistics come out in May.

Emery is currently much less common, but climbing even faster than Avery did: Avery went from “not even in the Top 1000” in 1988 to #465 in 1995; Emery has gone from “not even in the Top 1000” in 2004 to #272 in 2011. To boil down those numbers: in their first seven years in the Top 1000, Emery made far more progress than Avery did, and so may possibly continue to move even more rapidly to where Avery is now.

However, even if that DOES happen, an Emery born in 2013 will not have anywhere near as many Emerys among her peers as a 2013 Avery will have Averys. For comparison, in 2011 the Social Security Administration records 7303 new baby girls named Avery and 1162 new baby girls named Emery.

Both Avery and Emery are likely connected to the popularity of their Top 10 more traditional versions: Avery is the modern surname equivalent of Ava; Emery is the modern surname equivalent of Emma. If you like Avery and Emery, I wonder if you’d like Ellery (the modern surname equivalent of Ella). It’s not yet in the Top 1000, but has a very similar sound to the other two names. Ellery Elizabeth Ford.

Or Ellison. Ellison Elizabeth Ford.

Or Brinley? Brinley Elizabeth Ford.

Or Waverly: it’s Avery with a W and an L, and it’s not even in the Top 1000. Waverly Lynn Ford or Waverly Elizabeth Ford.

Or Everly, not in the Top 1000 yet either. Everly Elizabeth Ford.

Delaney is ranked in the 200s and seems to be hovering right there—no lunging for the Top 10 or even for the Top 100. Delaney Elizabeth Ford.

Emery Elizabeth, Ellery Elizabeth, and Everly Elizabeth all bring Emily Elizabeth (from the Clifford stories) immediately to my mind. But the Clifford TV show was popular at my house when my eldest child was a toddler, so I’m not sure everyone’s mind would leap to this, nor is it a negative association.

Kayleigh writes:

This isn’t a question about what I should name my baby, or if a name I’ve chosen is okay, or anything strictly like that. It is, however, a question about names. You recently had a question sent by someone named Kayleigh, which happens to be my name, and all of the names she said she liked are on my list, as well… and it’s something I’ve noticed among other people in different name forums who have similar names. So my question is this:

How much influence does a parent’s name have on their naming decision for their children?  Obviously, things like a father named Samuel Jones VII is going to bear rather heavily on the naming of a son, but what about other things- are women with common names more likely to choose unusual names, or will they be more comfortable with a trendy name because they turned out fine? Will someone with a name that lent itself well to nicknames be less likely to name their child something that will also allow that? Have you noticed any trends like that in your questions and in your readership?

Thanks so much!

One thing I can imagine playing a role here is the way certain names go with certain ages. For example, a mother named Kristen or Jennifer is likely to be in a different age range than a mother named Brittany or Courtney—and so two mothers named Kristen are more likely to have favorite baby names in common than a mother named Kristen and a mother named Courtney: in the years between them, naming trends will have changed.

Another issue is that we tend to notice people more if we share a name with them. If I’d posted a question by someone named Brittany who shared your naming tastes, it would have caught your attention too—but it likely wouldn’t have caught it as firmly, or stayed with you as long. Same thing if I’d posted a question by a Kayleigh with different naming tastes than yours: you’d notice it, but that information would be more loosely filed than a double hit like same name AND same tastes. Over time, this can give an exaggerated feeling of correlation.

What I’ve noticed about the connection between naming tastes and the namer’s own name is that every combination can be used for a cause/effect explanation—even if those explanations come out completely opposite. So for example, one person will say, “I had a really unusual name, so I want something unusual for my child too,” and the next person will say, “I had a really unusual name, so I really want something traditional and familiar for my child.” (I notice similar things with parenting experiences: one person will say, “We had sweets around all the time when I was a child, so I got in the unbreakable habit of eating them” and the next person will say, “We had sweets around all the time when I was a child, so they were never a big deal and never became important to me.”)

I have wondered if naming tastes are set up largely by a person’s own family/community. This would be one possible explanation for how people with similar names tend to like similar names: if a person grows up surrounded by people named Margaret and Elizabeth, they’re likely to have a different idea of what a “normal name” is than someone who grows up surrounded by people named Oso and Grove—and a different feeling about what the reactions of their family/friends would be to a name they’re considering. But that’s when the previous paragraph kicks in, because some people grow up wanting what they think of as a normal name and/or wanting to fit/please their circle, and some people grow up wanting the opposite.

Definitely I think some of our naming tastes come from our own names—but I think our experiences with our names are so varied (“I hated it!”/”I loved it!” for two people with the same name) as to cancel out the effects. If I were to ask people to say in the comments section how their names affected their tastes, I think that’s what we’d see: a nice even split between, “Well, my name definitely affected my tastes: I always wanted a nickname, so I gave my children names with nicknames” and “Well, my name definitely affected my tastes: I hated my nickname, so I gave my children names without nicknames.” How we feel about our names affects our decisions—but how we feel about our names is more connected to us than to our actual names.

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What do you think? Have you noticed any connection between parents’ names and the names of their children? And if so, what issues do you think enter into that connection?

Jessica writes:

You might remember helping me & my husband name our daughter, Amelia Eve, a year and a half ago after an epic battle of naming styles. Well, we are at it again – due in May with our second (and probably last) baby. Eve was my favourite name from day one but husband was lukewarm, Amelia was his top choice and I really liked it (and the nickname potential; Murray calls her Amelia, but I call her Mia most of the time). We had to compromise on popularity but overall we both love her name.

Sibsets are very important to us (okay, to me) and I would like another classic first name that can be shortened, coupled with an already-short-but-completely-gorgeous middle. Preferences for the first name are more than two syllables, not starting or ending in A, not top twenty. This child will also have either my or my husband’s middle name as a second middle which has to be taken into consideration for overall length. Easy, right? Hah.

Knowing in advance that it would be a struggle, we started straight away this time and after hearing FOR THE LAST TIME that I will never be naming a son of his Sebastian, Murray has agreed that if this baby is a boy-child, he will be Oliver Fox. THE PERFECT brother name. My guess is that means we’re having another girl.

So after starting from scratch (again), we have narrowed it down to  names  – none of which quite work. But here they are:

Eloise. The last remaining girl name on our list of three from Mia, we were both agreed that we would use it if we had another girl. Unfortunately we’ve both gone rather lukewarm on this name. It does seem to go SO WELL with Amelia, though, and gives me Lo & Lola – so cute.

Evelyn. This was a suggestion of yours from the first round which was – surprise, surprise – vetoed by my husband. Today he looked over at me and said, apropos of nothing, “I don’t mind the name Evelyn.” I wanted to kill him. Instead, I edited this draft. Nickname: Evi (eh-vee), possible middle name Mae. BUT, is it too close now that we’ve used Eve as Mia’s middle name?

Anastasia. Yes! It’s back! Vetoed immediately last time, hubby has finally seen the light and agreed (albeit reluctantly) to put it on the list. Nicknames Ana or Ani, check. Hopefully Fifty Shades of Grey has not ruined this name for us (don’t get me wrong, I loved the book despite it being perhaps THE worst edited best seller of all time, but not an association I really want for my baby girl). Problems here are the repetition of both the first and last letter of her sister’s name, which I really wanted to avoid, plus it’s a bit of a mouthful unless we can come up with a tiny little middle name for it.

Quilla. This is Murray’s top choice and was his great-aunt’s name. At first I said NO WAY. Maybe if we had gone with one of our outliers like Piper or Winter or Sunday the first time around, I said. It doesn’t go with Amelia AT ALL, I said. Then I thought… Is it really that far off? I’ve never heard it before, but if you introduced yourself as Quilla, I’d spell it just like that without hesitation. There are three things that put me off it: it’s two syllables with our two-syllable last name, it has zero nickname options (Q? Illy?) – and it is MY TURN to choose the first name! (Included for the sake of honesty although it makes me sound selfish. It just seems so unfair given that I have been compiling name lists since primary school.) Middle name would likely be Isobel, a name we both love but can’t use as a first. If we had just named our first Eve Anastasia like I WANTED to, I would use Quilla Isobel without hesitation – but does it fit now?

Names that have been vetoed by my husband: My first choice, Imogen (unfortunately, Murray feels the way about Imogen that I did about the phrase “and then he found his own release” by the middle of book two of the Fifty Shades trilogy – I really did love the books, though, I swear. Well, the first one, anyway), Eliza, Eleanor, Coraline, Madeleine, Electra, Adelaide, Louisa, Miranda, Clara, Elodie, Corisande, Clementine, Vivienne, Rosalind, Adeline, Juliet. We both seem to prefer vowel names. Are there any left?

Names that we have rejected for other reasons are Sophia, Charlotte, Violet, Scarlett, Georgia and variations.

Middle names are another problem as it turns out Eve and Ivy were the only already-short-but-completely-gorgeous names on our list, and Murray has gone from ‘meh’ to utter loathing upon careful consideration of Ivy. He has already rejected Wren, Snow, Swan, Jane, June, Io, Aria, Lyra, Lyric, True, Alice, Elise, Claire and Rue as well. I would prefer a bite-sized word name that’s not too ‘out there’, but does it exist?

So what we are looking for here is a name like Amelia Eve, or Imogen Ivy, but NOT those names… Help!

Oh, I do love Eloise so, so much. I wonder if the name would freshen right up again when it was on the baby herself? I might try doing a Google image search for newborns, and then looking at their little faces and thinking “Eloise.”

I don’t think the first name Evelyn is too close to her sister’s middle name Eve. I don’t think I would even have noticed if you hadn’t mentioned it—and if I DID notice, I’d think of how I’m the same way: certain sounds and letters appeal to me again and again. Perhaps we will find a middle name that has some small thing in common with the name Amelia, and that will make an even cuter sibling set! Amelia Eve and Evelyn Anne, for example, to have swapped initials; or Amelia Eve and Evelyn Leigh to have swapped sounds.

I think Kate would make a nice short middle name for Anastasia. Amelia Eve and Anastasia Kate.

It’s hard to picture a sister pairing of Amelia and Quilla. I don’t see any problem with a 2-2 syllable set-up, but I do see an issue with popularity: Amelia was the 30th most popular name for girls in the U.S. in 2011 (and Mia hit the top ten), while Quilla was completely unused. On the other hand, Quilla sounds similar to Ella and Isabella and other names currently in style. I’m not sure. Combined with the lack of nicknames and the your-turn issue, I think I’d use it as a middle name—especially since Q is one of the coolest middle initials ever.

Quilla and Imogen brought the name Gillian/Jillian to mind. Jillian S!mon; Amelia and Jillian. Maybe Jillian Kate or Jillian May or Jillian Jade.

Or maybe Eliana. Eliana S!mon; Amelia and Eliana.

Has he made ANY suggestions other than Quilla? I feel like I can’t get a grip on his naming tastes, since all his contributions are almost exclusively vetoes.

I think the best choice overall is Evelyn. It’s compatible with Amelia in style, popularity, and length; it sounds similar to Imogen; it starts with a vowel; it has cute nicknames; and your husband has not vetoed it. SOLD. Evelyn Quilla would be nice. Or I think Evelyn Mae accomplishes the possible goal of making her middle name similar to her sister’s first name in the same way her first name is similar to her sister’s middle name. Eve/Evelyn/Evi and Mae/Amelia/Mia.