OT: Baby names you didn't name your child

[mnasf]

My first is a son Parker Edison with the runner up being Harrison - People always seem to like his name

My second is a girl named Shaeleigh (rhymes with Haylie) Marie no real back-up name

My third is a girl named Malesa (not pronounced Melissa) Louise with a back-up name of Callie

 

[Chereya]

If you are concerned about the popularity of a name, go to the social security administration's website and you can find lists of the most popular names in prior years. The site is immensely helpful if you want to avoid your child being one of five Jacobs in his pre-school class.

Thanks to every one who has posted! It has been a fun thread to read for sure. I just thought I'd jump in again with my thanks and some other blurbs of my own.

I've had the SSA baby name site bookmarked since the first baby. It has been Extremely informative! I also recommend anyone who's interested in US baby name statistics check it out.
http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/babynames/

I do TOTALLY agree about keeping the name to yourself until afterwards! For our first son, everyone was so curious and opinionated! They just HAD to know what we were considering and HAD to let us know exactly what they thought! We finally decided on Leon Keoki. Keoki was the easy part. It's the Hawaiian form of George who was DH's grandfather. I wanted a first name that had a personal meaning to us somehow. DH didn't see the need for this but I was pregnant and stubborn, hehe. Near to the end of the pregnancy, I suggested Leon after the main character in the movie "The Professional". It was a favorite movie of both of ours in the past and we had discussed it during our courtship phase. DH was so surprised that a female liked such a strange and violent movie.

We are not going to try for more kids after this 2nd one. We've always only wanted 2 and I am happy with 2 boys. Besides we couldn't afford to have any more, lol! I want to be able to do WDW on a regular basis in the future!

The ironic thing is, we have had a girl's name chosen since WAY before we ever got pregnant: Ariel Leilani. My husband is WAY less picky about girl's names so he just went along with what I suggested. I just like Ariel and think it's a pretty sounding name, plus it always brings to mind The Little Mermaid. Leilani I chose because I'm originally from Hawaii and I want all my kids to have a Hawaiian middle name to keep that cultural connection to my own upbringing. (I have no Hawaiian blood but I do miss Hawaii's unique culture.) Plus, I figured they could choose to use their middle names if we ever moved back or I sent them to live with family for summers.

Thanks again to everyone for posting their stories and names! I love reading about all them! Let's keep them coming! I've got a little list here of names to "discuss" with hopefully and open minded DH.

Chereya

 

[angel's momma]

Paige Noelle (she was born in December)

DD was also born in Dec. & her middle name is Noel.

 

[angel's momma]

We chose a different name for my older son now 9, Tristan. His dads idea, but now that he is older Im glad we chose it, it fits him.

We only have DD, & don't plan to have any more, but Tristan Micah is the boy's name we picked out years before we were even ready to have a child. We didn't have a girl's name picked out until about 2 weeks before DD was born. I was a little surprised when DD started school & there was a Tristan in her class.

 

[mom23boys]

First congratulations on having another boy. They are so much fun. I have three.

Our first is Robert Christian (First name after my Father)

Our second is Ryan Matthew

And our third is Anthony James.

I so wanted Nicholas for 2 and 3, but we have a very ethnic Italian last name and my DH said no.

So we ended up with ANTHONY.

BTW my Girl's name each time was Grace Elizabeth.

 

[FirstTimertoDiz]

Names we didn't use for ds- Noah, Nicholas, and Gabriel. We ended up going with Josiah, and we love it!!

Lisa

 

[KristiMc]

Our first is Matthew Steven (middle name after daddy)
Our second in Shawn Parker (Shawn is daddy's mn and Parker is my maiden name)

Our girl name both times was Katherine Grace. We also like Erin Elisabeth.

Kristi

 

[estherhead]

We name our kids after cities. I love to travel and thought it would be cool to visit the city they are named after when they get to be teens. Our first DD is Siena (Italy) and our second is Alexandria (Egypt.) The rejected names are Sofia (Romania) and Sydney (Australia.) I also like Brooklyn & London & Paris. But we couldn't use Paris as our last name is Thomas and that just sounds funny. DH still loves Boston if we ever have a boy. I think is sounds a bit like English Muffins or the name of a company: Boston Thomas.

My sister named her boys all Gaelic names. Gavin, Brody (which means second son), and Grant.

I think it is a lot easier when there is a theme, like a nationality or how many syllables each has, something to help out a bit. Picking a name from thin air is very difficult. Once we narrowed it down to naming them after cities we started looking at maps instead of baby books and had lists of names we agreed on!

 

[Jomrog]

My DD9's name is Hayley Beth but she was almost named Marissa. If she were a boy, we chose the name Tyler which was waaaaay popular at the time.

My DS3 is Garrett Parker. Garrett is his dad's name but we didn't use dad's middle name because we don't like it (Leroy). If he were a girl, my DH was dead set on naming her Bronwyn Marie. Just say it a few times, it migh grow on you. Needless to say, the family was glad the Garrett was a boy.

Other boy names we liked were:
Liam
Holden
Dalton
Landon
Jake
Joshua
Justin ( I really liked this name, too or Justine for a girl)

Can't wait to hear what you choose!

 

[HopperFan]

I haven't read the entire thread so I apologize if I repeat something. I too think it is very important how the name sounds, how it looks written out, how it sounded with the other kids names, how it looked with the other kids names (especially on the holiday cards), how it may or may not be turned into a nickname, how it would fit a child and an adult........I guess because I don't care for my name, I really wanted my kids to be happy with their names for their entire lives.

First I would look at some family (especially last) names. Many make great first names and have true meaning to them. Anytime I meet a young man with a family name it just sounds so distinquished. My kids all have my maiden name for their middle names.

My DS now 16 had a long list of possibilities that came down to two (DH's and mine) and we let the doctor pick I won.

Anyway, one name on my list that I have yet to meet a boy named in the 16 years since that I think is very strong sounding is Gavin.

 

[tatooed goofy]

I have two girls but, I liked for boys:
Sawyer
Ethan
Ian
Abram
Aaron
Chase
Spencer
Martin
Alexander
Dalton
Grant
We usually do family names in the middle--for grandparents.
My girls are Kaitlyn Elizabeth and Allyson Paige
I liked Melissa and Lauren, too.
Good luck!

8/2003-POLY
8/2005-POFQ

 

[justhat]

If Madison had been a boy, she was going to be Henry Joseph. And if we have a boy in the future that will be his name. Henry was my dad's name (he died when I was 17) and Joseph is my husband's name (he's a III, so it's also FIL and GFIL's name too).

Naming Madison was much harder though. We both always liked Madison, years before it was popular, but since it is like the #3 name (or around there) we weren't totally sold on it. We didn't mind it being popular, but didn't really want her to be like 1 of 6 Madisons in her class. In the end, we decided we liked it so we kept it.

Her middle name though, we didn't decide on till about a month before she was born. Like another poster said, we got a baby name book and each went through it and wrote down the names we liked separately. Then we compared the lists and there were 2 names that we each listed, Julia and Alyssa. We still debated over it for a long time, about a month, and then finally decided that Madison Alyssa sounded better than Madison Julia. I really love the name Julia though (and it's my aunt's name) so we'll hopefully get a chance to use it in the future. I wanted it as a first name, but I don't want her to be called Julie (one of my college roommate's names, so I don't want that!) so I think it will have to be a middle name. Right now, I really like Tierney, Taylor, and Olivia if #2 is a girl. My husband hates Tierney though, so we'll see.

 

[Gillian]

Does this thread make anyone else have more kids??

 

[JVL1018]

I really love the name Julia though (and it's my aunt's name) so we'll hopefully get a chance to use it in the future. I wanted it as a first name, but I don't want her to be called Julie (one of my college roommate's names, so I don't want that!) so I think it will have to be a middle name. .

Just an FYI..my daughter's name is Julia, she is almost 6 and no one, with the exception of my FIL a couple of times(he was corrected immediatly ), has ever called her Julie. I wouldn't stand for it. LOL

We call her Jule, and Jules, and "J", along with Julia, and other family/friends call her Jules from time to time, but never hear Julie, thankfully!

 

[crazymomof4]

Our last child DD4 (Catherine) was going to be "Connor"
Strange thing, in public, everytime I hear someone call their son Connor, I feel compelled to tell them that it had been our name choice too. Odd.

 

[cinjam]

When I was pregnant with DS #1, we had the name Ian Scott on the top of the list and there is tayed for many, many months. Then one day DH (who is a cop), pulls over & eventually arrests a man named Ian, who turned out to be a real jerk. Dh comes home to tell me that the name Ian is out **sigh**. We came up with Aidan a few days later & that what we settled on: Aidan James

When pregnant with DS #2 we had no boy names in the hopper - only girls:

Brenna
Grace
Kylie
Ella
Carly

We kind of liked the name Liam for a boy, but were not totally in love with it.

It wasn't until my 9th month that we heard the name Kade, for a boy, and fell in love with it. So Kade William is DS #2

Congrats on your pregnancy!

 

[Hunnybee]

We lucked out and had wonderful parent names to work with. Before we were even talking about getting pregnant, we had 2 boys names and 2 girls names picked out. (We were hoping to have two children, so would have been set either way -- boy/girl, girl/girl, boy/boy.) We had no problem agreeing on any of the names, which is very surprising because we don't agree on a lot of things!

First child (we didn't find out ahead of time) is a boy: Clayton David (DH's father's name is Clayton, my father's name is David). BTW, I cannot tell you how many people have commented on his name -- Clayton. And everytime they say something about it, they say what a "strong" name it is! Maybe your husband would like that one. I also liked it because it wasn't a commonly used name -- although since we had him, we've found many young boys named Clayton. In fact, in his Sunday School class the only name used twice is Clayton (the other Clayton started going to our church this year). Our other boy name was Zachary Todd (Todd is my DH's name). When pregnant with our 2nd child, if she had been a boy we had decided to go with Jacob Todd, after my grandpa who had passed away, Jake.

Second child (we did find out ahead of time) is a girl: Rachel Elaine (My mom's name is Rachel (and she gave me a middle name "after" hers of Rachelle), my DH's mom's middle name is Elaine). Our last name starts with an R and ends with an L so the name is rather alliterative, but I just love that she's named after grandma, so I don't care! Our other name if we had had two girls was Taylor Christine (DH's initials are TC).

I love reading the births in the paper, college newsletter, etc. because I love to see what people name their children. Names can say so much! I always love to find out the stories behind the names too.

 

[Hunnybee]

I just finished reading this entire thread and had to laugh! Justhat, I must admit to looking to see where you were from -- my name is Julie.

I didn't think any of my college roommates really disliked me, but I did have to check! Anyway, judging from where you're from, I don't think it was me!

 

[Tasha+Scott]

DD's name is Kylie Noel. We also considered the name Skylar Cheyenne. Other names we briefly considered were Bailey, Riley, Kristian, and Kelsey. I am glad we decided on Kylie though. It seems to fit her and I am over our other choices. If we ever have another dd we are probably going to name her Teagan Rose.

If she had been a boy we were either going to name her Hunter Blake or Dakota Blake. Glad she wasn't a boy b/c I don't like either of those names anymore!

 

[minmate]

Wow, you sure have received many replies with lots of names to ponder! Here's my two cents:

We have a
Calista Caitlin
Meghan Jo
Brayden Michael
Jayleigh Elizabeth


BOY'S UNUSED NAMES:
Chance (kind of a joke b/c last dd was conceived by chance! lol)
Carter
Andrew Joseph (AJ)
Joseph (Jr.)
Eric
Spencer

GIRL'S UNUSED NAMES:
Tariana (nickname Tara)
Paige
Sheyene
Kirsten

When picking names, I too, wanted strong names and tried to imagine a CEO or the President being the name we chose. In the end, my preference for a bit unusual names won out. I like names that people may have heard before and can remember but are unusual enough that they won't forget them. Plus, in the end I figured the "trendy" names of today will become the names of all our future leaders anyway. So, we pretty much gave trendy/unusual first names with a traditional middle name. All except Meghan, who I wanted to by Jayleigh back then but dh didn't like it then. So three days after she was born we finally agreed on Meghan. And it's obvious that was dh's choice when looking at the list of names!

One of our dd's names has the same first initial as our last name but I wasn't overly worried b/c despite it being old fashioned, chances are she'll remarrry and have a totally different last name anyway. Who knows if you'll remarry into a name that does that with your name too! For boys though, their name is more permanent and I was more concerned about it's sound too. I wasn't sure if you meant that the last letter of first name and first letter of last name were same though... regardless, if you don't like the sound of it, don't do it. But keep in mind, if you use a name that has a common nickname, does the same thing happen? For example, my dh's name is Joseph, but he goes by Joe -- different last letter and diff. number of syllables in the name.

Whatever you do, Good Luck and remember, you'll grow to love the name and only think of it as your son's -- not anyone else's!