Help - how did you choose baby's name?

iVillage Member
Registered: 02-01-2006
Help - how did you choose baby's name?
6
Thu, 02-02-2006 - 9:17am

Hello,

I was wondering how people went about choosing a name for their babies. My husband and I are expecting our first, and it's a boy. We are trying to decide if we will use my husband's name, his father's name, or my father's name either as a middle name or first name. Is there a tradition with the first child? Should the name come from the husband's side of the family or the wife's or neither? Should you use the name for the first name or middle name or neither? I don't really want to use my father's name or my father-in-law's name for our child's first name. I think it should either be something original that we both like or my husband's name. My only issue is that my husband's brother already used their dad's name as a middle name. I do not want to do the same thing as them so I would prefer not using his father's name or using the first letter of his name and choosing something that starts with that letter. I also suggested just using my husband's name since he is the father or my father's name because my father's name has not been used on my side of the family. My family only has 2 kids in it, and my husband's family has 9. Is there a tradition that you followed when picking a name? I'm curious to hear input from other people. I also want to make sure the name flows regardless of what name we pick. I don't want to pick something just because it's somebody's name if it doesn't go. Any thoughts?

iVillage Member
Registered: 10-24-2003
Thu, 02-02-2006 - 1:39pm

I don't think there is any tradition - you just need to agree on what you want to do.

Pat

Happiness is a conscious choice, not an automatic response. --

iVillage Member
Registered: 10-01-2004
Thu, 02-02-2006 - 2:33pm

hey

There really is no tradition as a whole in picking a name and if there is I missed out on it...My husband and I's families are both Irish, so we wanted to stick with Irish names, But we also decided we were not going to just name our children Irish name b/c they were Irish...If we found a name we loved more then we would use it regardless of its origin. With our Twins Braidyn Gunnar and Brennan Hunter...We choose Brennan b/c we loved the name and we loved Braidyn too, even though it isn't REALLY Irish, but we call him Braidy (Brady) which is.. there middle names came b/c I loved the name Hunter and I wanted to use it for Braidy's middle name and I told Sean, my husband he could choose brennan's middle name.He chose Gunnar b/c It went well with Hunter...get it, a hunter usually has a Gun...yea he was really creative. My third son's name is Riorden Shaynne (Shane)...Both are Irish names that we loved and we call him Rory, which was one of the other names I wanted to use and Since Riorden can be nn: Rory It worked out that I technically got to use both names. One thing we did know is that we don't really like very popular names...we may like some of them but we don't want to use them .. so we try to stay under the top 50 names if we can...unless we really love the name...

hth
Casey McCoy
Wife to Sean McCoy
Mommy to Brennan McCoy, Braidy McCoy, and Riorden McCoy
TTC # 4 and last

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-28-2005
Thu, 02-02-2006 - 3:14pm
For us, we have used names we both like as first names. As far as middle names, we would like to use family names (which means from his family or mine, it doesn't matter). We used DH's grandfather's first name, Ray, for DS's middle name, which was a nice flow for that name. If we have a girl, her middle name will be my sister's first name. I think that also last names (like a family last name, i.e. Sanderson is my husband's grandmother's maiden name: We think it's great for a middle name). We also thought Elizabeth is great for a girl's middle name, but I didn't think we had an Elizabeth in the family. At first, I cared, then I decided that it was more important to me to like my child's name regardless of family name or not, then I found out my great grandmother's name was Elizabeth! How perfect! Find your family tree and look way way back. I guess it's just up to you what matters. My side of the family has horrible names, and I'd cringe if I named my child after someone who has a bad name just for the sake of naming after the family. That's just my opinion.
iVillage Member
Registered: 01-20-2006
Thu, 02-02-2006 - 9:01pm
Hello!! We each made lists of names and traded them and eliminated, then made a master list of the names we both liked, and narrowed down from there. We thought it more important to agree on the first name, and neither of us were in favor of having a JR, or using a family name as our child's first name. Our first son has husband's middle name as his middle name, and our second son (due April 16) is going to have My father's and brother's middle name as his middle name. Since we had already passed on a middle name from husband's side, this middle came from my side. Don't know where we will go next, but we can decide that when the time comes. Really, its whatever you both agree to do with naming your child!!
Good luck,
Wendy
iVillage Member
Registered: 04-28-2003
Thu, 02-02-2006 - 11:37pm

I know there are traditions that some families have with naming, but there are certainly no rules. For my children DH and I picked names we loved for their fns, but I wanted them to have mns that were family names. When my first child was born we decided since he would be having my DHs last name, that his mn could come from my side of the family. When my second child was born we switched off and chose a mn for my DD from his side. We just had our third and her mn is after my grandmother.

They are are lovely names, we weren't going to use something just out of familial obligations. However I think with a mn it is a great opportunity to use a name from your family tree, honor someone you love. Good luck finding the perfect name for your little one!

Avatar for haarlasr
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
Fri, 02-03-2006 - 10:43am

What we did was focus on a name that we loved (or at least our best compromise) for the first name and a family name for the middle name.

My older DD is Megan Joy. We both just liked Megan. It was common enough and easy to spell (important with our difficult last name), but not so common among new babies. And DH loved the nn Meg. We chose Joy b/c it's DH's favorite aunt's name, and she has no children of her own.

My younger DD is Julianna May (Annie) -- Julianna was a big compromise (although I love it more all the time) b/c DH and I didn't like any of each other's favorite first name choices. Juliana also happened to be the mn of my great-grandmother, but we chose it b/c we liked it, not b/c it was a family name. May was my grandmother's middle name, and I knew I wanted to use that before we chose a first name.

Like others have said, there are no set rules for choosing a name (unless your family/culture has certain traditions), and lots of people do very different things.

Good luck deciding!
Stephanie