{"id":15942,"date":"2022-07-20T09:25:33","date_gmt":"2022-07-20T13:25:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/?p=15942"},"modified":"2022-08-19T07:45:09","modified_gmt":"2022-08-19T11:45:09","slug":"twin-baby-boys-doyle-with-a-b-brothers-to-kerry-and-neil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/2022\/07\/20\/twin-baby-boys-doyle-with-a-b-brothers-to-kerry-and-neil\/","title":{"rendered":"Twin Baby Boys Doyle-with-a-B, Brothers to Kerry and Neil"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dear Swistle,<\/p>\n

My husband and I are excited to welcome identical twin boys in mid-August. Our last name is Doyle with a B, and our older sons are Kerry (spelled like the actor last name Grant) and Neil (spelled with an A rather than an I).<\/p>\n

We like names that are unpopular but not so rare they aren’t easily identified as names. We also like names that are used in full rather than nicknames. Our preference is names that will sound and feel like they fit with the other boys’ but aren’t very matchy \/ twinny, so not rhyming or close enough to be confused. I like Jamie, Conall, Theo, Kieran – my husband does not. He likes Felix, Warren, and Alexander – I don’t. We’re stuck – please help!<\/p>\n

Thank you!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

[I kept putting off answering this because of the different spellings for the first two kids. The spellings feel so important, especially for Kerry, that I wasn’t sure we could even answer the question with the wrong spellings repeatedly in front of our eyes. And with alternate spellings, we don’t notice that both names have four letters, and for some people that will be important! But I think we should try to power through. Just, maybe we should do this one on paper, with the real spellings? And then translate our answers?]<\/p>\n

Your firstborn’s name is unisex, but with the spelling used almost exclusively for boys. Your secondborn’s name is used exclusively for boys in the U.S., and is the currently less common spelling of the name. Both names have four letters, which leaves me torn between the fun of finding two more four-letter names, and the idea that that’s way too much pressure and a totally unnecessary goal (but fun, so let’s see how things unfold). If you think you may have more children, I would probably steer away from four-letter names at this point.<\/p>\n

Theo seems like a great choice to me, except I think you might be unhappy with how common it is right now: according to the Social Security Administration, the name Theodore was the 10th most popular boy name in the United States in 2021. Alexander likewise seems much too common: it’s been in the Top 20 consistently for over two decades.<\/p>\n

I think what we may be looking for here are “Baby Boomer names that are about to start sounding good again.” Theo is too current. Jamie is dated, but too RECENTLY dated: it peaked in the 1970s and 1980s. Warren is uncertain: it hit its peak in the 1920s, so if we’re assuming approximately a hundred-year naming cycle, it might be about to join Theo as Too Current\/Common. Some names that might be from the right era (though may overshoot in either direction–it’s a little difficult to pin down Boomer Names because they were all named Dave and Sue and Kathy and Jim, plus names that rhyme with Kerry):<\/p>\n

Alan
\nClark
\nCraig
\nDarrell
\nDarren
\nDean
\nDouglas
\nFrank
\nFred
\nGene
\nGlen
\nGordon
\nJesse
\nJody
\nKarl
\nKeith
\nKent
\nLaurence
\nLee
\nLeon
\nLouis
\nRay
\nReeve
\nRobin
\nRoger
\nRoss
\nRussell
\nScott
\nSeth
\nShay
\nStanley
\nTracy
\nWade
\nWard<\/p>\n

I’m not sure about the names that end in L: with your surname, it’s either catchy or it’s too much—and there’s already a name in the sibling group that ends in L.<\/p>\n

Other issues I wasn’t sure about: Are Darren and Darrell and Karl too close in sound to Kerry? Is Karl too close visually to Kerry, especially since it can also be spelled Carl (remember the actual spelling of Kerry)? what about Ray (again, remember actual spelling of Kerry)? Is Lee too much like half of Neil? Is Leon just Neil backward, and is Dean almost just Neil backward? (Remember the actual spelling of Neil, which I think makes the Dean issue more of an issue.)<\/p>\n

I included Jesse, Tracy, Robin, and Jody, but the way those jumped the gender line for Generation X (Jesse as Jessie\/Jess, from Jessica) may mean that they’re too much in use as Mom Names right now to be used again for boys. On the other hand, it seems to me that Kerry is working great for boys despite all the mom\/grandma Carries.<\/p>\n

We considered Alan when we were naming Henry, and I still love it. I wondered if it might be the perfect combination of Alexander + Warren + familiar-but-uncommon.<\/p>\n

I don’t know if I would have considered Roger, except that some time back I heard that that nickname for it used to be Hodge. HODGE!! I know you’d rather not use nicknames, but it still made me love the name Roger more, just knowing Hodge was there.<\/p>\n

Let’s play with pairing up some options:<\/p>\n

Alan and Dean; Kerry, Neil, Alan, and Dean. Everyone has four letters.<\/p>\n

Frank and Louis; Kerry, Neil, Frank, and Louis. We switch to five letters, but for both twins. Two are one-syllable names; two are two-syllable names.<\/p>\n

Gordon and Russell; Kerry, Neil, Gordon, and Russell. Both surname names as well as familiar first names.<\/p>\n

Douglas and Roger; Kerry, Neil, Douglas, and Roger. Subtle little matching G’s, but with different sounds so it isn’t too matchy.<\/p>\n

Actually, I find I’m almost immediately overwhelmed. It’s HARD to name twins, isn’t it! It SEEMS like it’s going to be FUN, but then it’s HARD! What Paul and I finally had to do with our twins was to pretend they were singletons. First Baby A is arriving: what shall we name her? Now it is two or three years later and the Baby B is arriving: what shall we name him?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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

Dear Swistle, <\/p>\n

Our babies have arrived! The0 W@rren and Curt!s Patr!ck won the day. <\/p>\n

We read through every suggestion and comment many times, and they really helped us to add to, remove from, and re-rank our list. Thank you, everyone!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dear Swistle, My husband and I are excited to welcome identical twin boys in mid-August. Our last name is Doyle with a B, and our older sons are Kerry (spelled like the actor last name Grant) and Neil (spelled with an A rather than an I). We like names that are unpopular but not so […]<\/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-15942","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-name-update"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3iyiG-498","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15942","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=15942"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15942\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15975,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15942\/revisions\/15975"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15942"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15942"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15942"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}