{"id":7843,"date":"2013-07-04T10:56:48","date_gmt":"2013-07-04T14:56:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/?p=7843"},"modified":"2013-07-04T11:02:13","modified_gmt":"2013-07-04T15:02:13","slug":"middle-name-challenge-baby-girl-bennett-_____-d__son","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/2013\/07\/04\/middle-name-challenge-baby-girl-bennett-_____-d__son\/","title":{"rendered":"Middle Name Challenge: Baby Girl Bennett _____ D__son"},"content":{"rendered":"

Erin writes:<\/p>\n

After years of trying, my wife and are are thrilled to be expecting a baby girl in late October. My name is Erin and hers is Virginia. Our last name has two syllables and ends in -son. This will likely be our only child.<\/p>\n

Years before even trying to get pregnant, we decided that our future daughter would be named for my grandmother. Her name was long and Italian, and we will shorten it to Bennett. We absolutely love Bennett, and think it a strong ‘resume’ name as well.<\/p>\n

We are now on the search for a middle. We are looking for feminine, whimsical names with around 2-4 syllables. We would like to avoid names with an A. (Our last name starts with a D, and we do not want her initials to spell BAD.) My favorites are Simone, Magnolia, Olivia and Emmeline, though I do not completely love any of those – and my wife has vetoed all of them except Simone. Her top choice was Isabel, after her own grandmother, but it was recently used by her brother for her young niece, who is the only child in the family so far.<\/p>\n

Our first child, a son, was stillborn. His name was Orion. Though we don’t often mention his name in daily life, a middle name for our daughter with a strong O sound or slightly cosmic feel would be meaningful to us.<\/p>\n

Thank you for your help! We love your blog.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

First I looked in the Astronomy section of Baby Names Made Easy: The Complete Reverse-Dictionary of Baby Names<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Celeste – “heavenly, celestial”
\nCelestina – “heavenly, celestial”
\nDanica – “morning star”
\nEstelle (BED initials) – “star”
\nKalinda – “sun”
\nKamaria – “moonlight”
\nLuna – “moon”
\nSelena – “moon”<\/p>\n

Next, I looked up the names of other constellations<\/a>; it appeals to me to have a brother and sister both represented by constellations. It’s such a pity that Andromeda gives the initials BAD, because I think that’s a lovely choice—but there were some other options to consider. My favorite is Cassiopeia: it’s whimsical, pretty, and feminine. Bennett Cassiopeia D___son. More options, with the meanings Wikipedia includes:<\/p>\n

Carina (keel)
\nLacerta (lizard)
\nLyra (lyre, harp)
\nNorma (carpenter’s level)
\nVela (sails)<\/p>\n

Next I looked for names that shared sounds in common with the name Orion. I went to school with a girl named Orianna, and I think it’s a very pretty name—but if I picture myself in the situation, I think I would prefer a name that related to my brother’s name without feeling like it was a namesake name.<\/p>\n

I wonder if something like Nori would work? It uses all the letters of Orion, and it’s pretty. Bennett Nori D____son. Or maybe that again is too namesakey.<\/p>\n

Perhaps since Erin, Virginia, and Orion all share the letters R, I, and N, a middle name that also used those three letters would make a nice family tie-in with all of you.<\/p>\n

Lorelei would be pretty, and it has the -or- sound of Orion. Bennett Lorelei D__son.<\/p>\n

Oh, again I get a pang about the BAD initials, because wouldn’t Aurora be nice? And I’m not crazy about BOD, either, which makes me disinclined to suggest Ophelia or Olympia; or BED, which makes me disinclined to suggest Elodie. More possibilities:<\/p>\n

Calliope
\nCarolina
\nChloe
\nCleo
\nCordelia
\nFiona
\nGwendolyn
\nHarlow
\nHermione
\nImogen
\nIone
\nIsadora
\nJoelle
\nJosephine
\nJuno
\nNaomi
\nNoelle
\nPhilomena
\nRomilly
\nRosabel
\nRosemary
\nSophia\/Sofia
\nVictoria
\nZipporah<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Erin writes: After years of trying, my wife and are are thrilled to be expecting a baby girl in late October. My name is Erin and hers is Virginia. Our last name has two syllables and ends in -son. This will likely be our only child. Years before even trying to get pregnant, we decided […]<\/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-7843","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3iyiG-22v","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7843","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=7843"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7843\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7846,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7843\/revisions\/7846"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7843"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7843"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7843"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}