{"id":16385,"date":"2023-08-31T12:51:38","date_gmt":"2023-08-31T16:51:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/?p=16385"},"modified":"2023-08-31T12:51:38","modified_gmt":"2023-08-31T16:51:38","slug":"baby-boy-fulford-brother-to-mae","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/2023\/08\/31\/baby-boy-fulford-brother-to-mae\/","title":{"rendered":"Baby Boy Fulford, Brother to Mae"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hello!<\/p>\n

I read your blog post about numbered family name traditions<\/a> and wanted to write in. Our current finalist name is George Taylor, which is also the name of my husband’s grandfather and great-grandfather. In our case, we would be restarting the tradition vs. naming directly for the father\/grandfather of the baby. George is also a family name on my side, and I like the rhyme of Taylor in the middle. However, now that we’re in the third trimester (baby is due in a little over a month!), we’re waffling about this choice and really not completely certain that it’s the right direction for us.<\/p>\n

Our girl name for this baby was going to be Audrey Joyce. Audrey because we like the sound of it and the meaning of “noble strength”, and Joyce for my godmother. We had a couple other contenders: Florence or Flora, Diana, Aurelia; but once we put Audrey Joyce together it simply felt “Just Right” in the same way that Mae Beatrix felt right for our first child. (Mae is my mother’s middle name and my husband’s grandmother’s name; Beatrix we like the sound and meaning, although we definitely waffled over Beatrix\/Beatrice and only decided as we were filling in the paperwork).<\/p>\n

The other boy’s name that is currently a top contender: Oscar Reid. Oscar we just like, Reid honours a paternal relative. I also love Samuel, Lawrence, or Paul, and my husband likes Hawk, Peter or Wyatt. When we go through lists of names, it feels like we both have strong feelings in opposite directions and can’t easily find a middle ground.<\/p>\n

I worry that I’m getting sucked into George Taylor Fulford (the fifth, because there is also a great uncle and a distant cousin sharing the name!) because I’m tired of trying to find a name that we both like, that also works in French (we are currently living in a majority French-speaking area, and I don’t want to complicate things for our little boy), that also suits our tastes. Clearly this name works, it’s worked four times before.<\/p>\n

Is that reason enough to pick a name? I’m a little sad it doesn’t feel as ~magical~ as our girl name picks, are we just defaulting to what is easiest?<\/p>\n

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

 <\/p>\n

You’ve read the other post, so we don’t need to start with WHY WOULD YOU WANT TO DO THIS, WHY WOULD ANYONE WANT TO DO THIS, WHY IS THIS A THING THAT KEEPS HAPPENING. We can skip ahead.<\/p>\n

Here is what I suggest: name him George, because it is a family name on both sides, and because it works in your area, and because it’s great with Mae and with a possible future sister Audrey, and because it is on Swistle’s own list of boy names that got away. But give him a different middle name and don’t make him a V.<\/p>\n

See if you can find a middle name that gives you that click you got with Mae Beatrix and Audrey Joyce. George Reid Fulford? George Oscar Fulford? I’d prefer a middle name from your side of the family, though, or from your own favorites list, since the child will already have a surname from his father’s side, as well as a first name in heavy use on his father’s side. George Samuel Fulford, George Lawrence Fulford, George family-name-from-your-side Fulford, George your-family-surname Fulford.<\/p>\n

I also think Oscar Reid is a great choice—though, again, I’d prefer the balance of including a name from your side of the family, rather than two from the father’s side and none from yours.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hello! I read your blog post about numbered family name traditions and wanted to write in. Our current finalist name is George Taylor, which is also the name of my husband’s grandfather and great-grandfather. In our case, we would be restarting the tradition vs. naming directly for the father\/grandfather of the baby. George is also […]<\/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":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16385","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3iyiG-4gh","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16385","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=16385"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16385\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16386,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16385\/revisions\/16386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16385"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16385"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16385"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}