{"id":14794,"date":"2020-06-08T10:52:32","date_gmt":"2020-06-08T14:52:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/?p=14794"},"modified":"2020-11-21T17:11:38","modified_gmt":"2020-11-21T21:11:38","slug":"baby-girl-or-boy-lyberg-but-starts-with-an-n-sibling-to-grant-william-will-and-mae","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/2020\/06\/08\/baby-girl-or-boy-lyberg-but-starts-with-an-n-sibling-to-grant-william-will-and-mae\/","title":{"rendered":"Baby Girl or Boy Lyberg-but-Starts-with-an-N, Sibling to Grant, William\/Will, and Mae"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hi Swistle,<\/p>\n

We\u2019re expecting baby #4 in November and I\u2019m having a hard time feeling settled on our girl name option. Hubby is pretty open. Our last name sounds like Lyberg but starts with an N. This will be our last baby.<\/p>\n

We have used honor names (that we also just like which feels worth mentioning) for both first and middles of our 3 kids so far: Grant Leonard, William \u201cWill\u201d Daniel, and Mae Pamela. I\u2019d love to continue this tradition not because I feel pressure to but because it just helps a name feel really meaningful to me. I love one syllable, spunky names (or a regularly used nickname like Will) and would prefer not to repeat first initials.<\/p>\n

I have two wonderful women I\u2019d love to honor Susan Leigh and Marlene Joanne. So far, so good, right? Wrong.<\/p>\n

Susan Marlene called Sue fits my criteria but Sue feels outdated still. Should I love Leigh? It feels a little generic to me. Plus Leigh and Marlene rhyme so that combo would be out and I\u2019m not sure of a good alternative. Leigh Anne? I have a grandma named Louise (also my middle) who goes by Lou so I\u2019d be excited by a first name that easily lended itself to the nickname Lou but I don\u2019t feel as strongly about honoring her as the other two ladies so that\u2019s not a top priority. But doesn\u2019t Lou sound great with my kids\u2019 names? But is it significant enough on its own and what do I do for the middle? I thought I\u2019d hit the idea jackpot with Lucy Susanne (smoosh of Susan and Joanne plus hubby approved) but I feel a little sad that the nod to these two ladies isn\u2019t as obvious as my other honor names are. Also, I wonder if I\u2019d need to spell the nickname Lu to make more sense which then takes away a little significance for me. I grew up with a Louisa so that doesn\u2019t feel right to me. Eloise is cute but is Lou too much of a stretch? I considered Louanne as a smoosh but I\u2019m not sure that\u2019s right for us and Louanne Susan sort of rhymes. Hubby didn\u2019t love Louanne mostly because he works closely with one. My brother\u2019s name is Joe so using Joanne\/Joanna called Jo could be confusing. Anne sounds so much like Grant to me. Susan means Lily so I\u2019ve considered Lily Marlene but I\u2019m slightly sad about losing the one syllable first name\/nickname pattern I\u2019ve started. I\u2019m nervous to use two middles for the first time after reading from some that it makes paperwork somewhat complicated.<\/p>\n

That was a lot, sorry. It feels like a riddle with no good solution in my mind. I\u2019m hoping you and your readers might have some suggestions or encouragement for me that would help me honor the people I love but also give me a first name that fits my established style. I\u2019m tired from overthinking and still have 6 months to go! I\u2019d love some outside input that\u2019s objective and isn\u2019t influenced by hormones.<\/p>\n

Boy names we\u2019re considering are Luke, Andrew called Drew, Allen called Len, or Clark.<\/p>\n

Thank you in advance!<\/p>\n

Marissa<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

I do love Leigh. It’s the kind of name my eye might skip right past in the baby name book, until I encounter a Leigh in real life or in a book, and then suddenly I am thinking “Leigh!! What a lovely, lovely name, so simple and so elegant, and look how nice the letters look, why are we not using it??” I think in part it feels generic because of its familiar use as a middle name—which reminds me of the current situation with the name Rose: extremely common as a middle name, but still fresh and surprising as a first name. Leigh as a middle name feels at this point like a filler; Leigh as a first name is a fresh surprise.<\/p>\n

But I also love love love Lou. So perfect! And I LOVE Louise, and I love that it’s your middle name and your grandmother’s name. I would be ready to go straight to this option. I even love the way you’d have two kids with a one-syllable given name and two kids with a one-syllable nickname, and those names alternate, and it would be one boy of each and one girl of each. Totally unnecessary, but satisfying all the same. Grant, William, Mae, Louise; Grant, Will, Mae, Lou. I see what you mean about feeling less strongly about honoring your grandmother—but it’s also one of YOUR names! And I don’t think we use mothers’ names often enough in our culture. It is so, so, so common to use fathers’ names, and still a little remarkable to use mothers’. You don’t say who Susan and Marlene are to you, but my hope is that one of them would be in some way honored by the Louise (e.g., if one of the women is a daughter of your Grandma Lou), to make it obvious that you should use one of the other woman’s names as the middle.<\/p>\n

I also love Jo, and I care not two beans that it could be a little confusing that her uncle is also named Joe. If anything, that seems fun and charming and like something that could be a cute bond between them, and it would not be hard to differentiate: he could be referred to as Uncle Joe, and another cute option would be used for her. Maybe Jo paired with her middle name; maybe Jo-bug or Jojo; maybe the full version of her name if you go with Joanne and use Jo as the nickname—there are tons of rich options here.<\/p>\n

The name Susan feels not quite ready for a comeback but I think it certainly WILL come back. I might use Sukie as a nickname for it. Or does lengthening it into Susanna dilute the honor too much? But that doesn’t solve the preference for a one-syllable name\/nickname.<\/p>\n

I think Marlene would work beautifully for a modern child, with the nicknames Marlie or Lena to choose from. But again, that doesn’t give us one syllable.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

So here are some of the options I like best:<\/p>\n

Joanne Leigh, called Jo. To differentiate her from her Uncle Joe, she could be called Jo-Leigh, which sounds like Jolie, which is French for pretty.<\/p>\n

Louise, called Lou, with the hope that it is clear which of the two women should now be honored with the middle. I like Louise Susan, I like Louise Marlene, I like Louise Joanne.<\/p>\n

Leigh Marlene, or Leigh Joanne. Marlene shares the L-plus-long-E sound of Leigh, but doesn’t rhyme, and I am finding the sound compelling and fun to say. I want to use the whole name when I am sweet-talking her. Leigh Marlene! And I like the way one woman’s MIDDLE name would be used as the FIRST name, and the other woman’s FIRST name would be used as the MIDDLE name; this feels balanced. But Leigh Joanne is a great name and I love it too, and it can also be appealing to think of using both women’s middle names.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Name update:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hi Swistle!<\/p>\n

Name update here! Baby #4 arrived on November 10th and surprised us by being 3 weeks early AND by being a boy! We chose the name Luke Davis (my maiden name) Nyberg and couldn\u2019t be happier with how he finishes out our family: Grant, Will, Mae and Luke (plus our puppy Beau!). Thank you and your readers for all of your great suggestions that helped give me peace of mind about girl names (even though we didn\u2019t ultimately get to use them). <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Gratefully,
\nMarissa<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hi Swistle, We\u2019re expecting baby #4 in November and I\u2019m having a hard time feeling settled on our girl name option. Hubby is pretty open. Our last name sounds like Lyberg but starts with an N. This will be our last baby. We have used honor names (that we also just like which feels worth […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14794","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-name-update"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3iyiG-3QC","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14794","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14794"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14794\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15029,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14794\/revisions\/15029"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14794"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14794"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14794"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}