K. writes:<\/p>\n
I really enjoy reading your blog and hope you can help make some good suggestions for us. This February we are expecting twin boys. Total shock for us but super excited about it. My husband and I have a fair amount of names that we like, but can’t seem to agree on a solid pair of names that we just love. I would describe our taste in names as traditional with a strong pull towards names that are Irish\/English sounding. We dislike strongly names that sound made up (like your Caydens and Neveahs), nature sounding names (no Willows or Ivys please) and anything super trendy. Our last name rhymes with Darling and we have an older son named Charles (we call him Charlie). Had Charlie been a girl, he would have been Nora, Claire or Mary Kate. Here is a list of what we’re working with so far:<\/p>\n
Brendan -like
Thomas -love nn Tommy
Eamon- my personal fav, husband not sold on yet.
Peter-husband hates, I like
Liam-husband likes, I don’t
Andrew-husband likes, too popular for me, but I think Andy is cute nn.
John-like
Quinn-like but worried might be more of a girls name\/ gender neutral name
Graham-almost used instead of Charlie, but now my MIL wishes to be called Gram so for me it’s out.<\/p>\nNames we can not use because friends and family have used them recently: Henry, Jack, Connor, Colin, William, Michael, Kevin.<\/p>\n
We are not so worried about middle names for now.<\/p>\n
We want the pair to sound nice together and flow well with Charlie. I am not sure if I love or hate the idea of twin names that are matchy-matchy. For example Timmy and Tommy are cute together for a minute, but I fear after awhile it would sound a little too sugary sweet. I feel like we are on the right track but just kind of stuck on ideas. Interested in your suggestions, Swistle. Thanks for your help!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
and<\/p>\n
My boys were born yesterday, very early, and are twin a and twin b for now.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Congratulations on your two new sons.<\/p>\n
I am in favor of slight extra-coordination for twin names. With my own twins, I was hoping for a small connection such as same first initial, or reverse first-middle initials (for example, one J.E. and the other E.J.), or same number of letters, or repeating sounds (Emily and Liane was one of my favorite girl-twin combinations, for the same number of letters and the repeating “lee” sound), or similar endings, or initials A and B for twins A and B, or anything like that. It happened that the two names we liked best had nothing in common at all, and I am still a little sorry about that.<\/p>\n
Working with your list, here are my favorite combinations:<\/p>\n
Peter and Thomas; Pete and Tom
Eamon and Liam
Thomas and Andrew; Tommy and Andy (same number letters\/syllables for 1st names)
Liam and John (same number of letters)
Andrew and Brendan (share the -an-, and also are A and B initials)<\/p>\nAlong with John, James is one of my favorite classic\/traditional names. James would go nicely with some of the other names on your list. Thomas and James would give you Tommy and Jimmy, which is significantly less matchy than Tommy and Timmy, while still giving a pleasing additional level of coordination.<\/p>\n
It seems to me that Daniel would fit in well with the rest of your list. I think the nickname Dan sounds like such a nice guy. <\/p>\n
Daniel and Thomas; Dan and Tom
Daniel and Andrew; Dan and Andy (repeating sounds\/letters)
Daniel and Brendan (both have “dan”)
Daniel and Benjamin; Dan and Ben<\/p>\nIf Andrew is too common, would you like Anderson? You’d still have the nickname Andy.<\/p>\n
To go completely off-list, I like the idea of combining two of the boy names in the longer-names-with-short-nicknames category (and I love it extra when the nicknames also have the same number of letters!) (I know, but I just DO love that kind of thing. I also love Christmassy names at Christmastime):<\/p>\n
Benjamin and Jonathan; Ben and Jon
Nathanial and Nicholas; Nate and Nick
Nicholas and Christopher; Nick and Chris (subtle Christmas theme)
Anderson and Harrison; Andy and Harry
Alexander and Nicholas; Alex and Nick
Theodore and Alexander; Theo and Alex
Alexander and Benjamin; Alex and Ben (twins A and B)
Anderson and Benjamin; Andy and Ben (twins A and B)<\/p>\nMalcolm and Callum are names that are similar to Liam, and may have too MANY sounds in common—but maybe not. Mal and Cal are probably too cute—but maybe not.<\/p>\n
Callum and Liam also share many sounds, without having possibly-overly-coordinated nicknames.<\/p>\n
Davis and Harris would make a nice set: matching endings, and yet the names are so different.<\/p>\n
Elliot and Miles go together nicely without matching.<\/p>\n
Miles and James share the same number of letters and the same ending. Is that too many -es boys for your family, or is it an additional plus?<\/p>\n
If your husband is not quite sold on Eamon, I wonder if he would prefer Ian or Owen or Evan or Ethan?<\/p>\n
I love Owen with Liam.<\/p>\n
Ian is one of my favorites, but I’m not sure what to pair it with. Ian and James? Ian and Eli? Ooo, that’s kind of fun, to be three letters together! Charles, Eli, and Ian?<\/p>\n
Ian and Leo might be better because they have the 3-letter thing but they don’t share as many sounds. Charles, Ian, and Leo. I love that.<\/p>\n
Ian and Isaac would give you matching initials but with non-matchy sounds.<\/p>\n
John and Isaac are nice together without being matchy.<\/p>\n
Simon and Isaac share the same number of letters, and also that nice strong I-sound.<\/p>\n
Simon and Oliver are nice together without being matchy.<\/p>\n
Elliot and Oliver share the same number of letters and syllables, as well as the L-sound, and I love how they also tie in to the L-sound of Charles.<\/p>\n
Oliver and Jasper share the same number of letters and also the -er ending.<\/p>\n
Asher and Felix don’t quite seem like they’d fit in with your style, but both of them mean lucky.<\/p>\n
Isaac mans “she laughed,” and I think the implication of surprised delight (the meaning comes from the Bible, where a woman barren and now also post-menopausal finds out she’s pregnant at last) makes it a particularly good name for an unexpected child: it would make a good name for the second twin, since he was the surprise.<\/p>\n
Felix and Isaac share the same number of letters and mean, respectively, luck and surprised delight. It’s a nice combination for twins.<\/p>\n
Asher and Bennett have good meanings (lucky and blessed), and also work nicely for twins A and B. (Plus, as with all the other A&B combinations, your children’s initials would be A, B, and C. But I don’t recommend this if it would make you feel pressured to continue it with the next child.)<\/p>\n
Two of my favorite Celtic names are Declan and Cormac. Dec and Mac are adorable nicknames.<\/p>\n
Some of these pairings might also make a nice first-middle combinations: Isaac Simon. Asher Bennett. Oliver Simon. Miles Elliot. Oliver Elliot. Ian James. Etc.<\/p>\n
Since you don’t have particular middle names in mind, I love the idea of using one twin’s first initial as the other twin’s middle initial. So for example, if you went with Andrew and Brendan, it would be fun to name them Andrew Bennett and Brendan Asher (if those initials don’t spell anything awkward with the surname). Or Nicholas and Christopher could be Nicholas Cormac and Christopher Nathan. Or Ian and Leo could be Ian Lachlan and Leo Isaac.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
K. writes: I really enjoy reading your blog and hope you can help make some good suggestions for us. This February we are expecting twin boys. Total shock for us but super excited about it. My husband and I have a fair amount of names that we like, but can’t seem to agree on a […]<\/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-5863","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3iyiG-1wz","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5863","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=5863"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5863\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5863"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5863"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5863"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}