Category: Naming Siblings and Multiples
Gender Shock! What to do when nature foils your naming plans?
Remember Kristen, the mom who was suffering from Baby Name Desensitization Disorder and just couldn’t settle on a name for the little brother she was expecting for Colette and Weston? Well, her problem turned out not to be BNDD or even Boy Name Ambivalence but something much more dramatic. We’ll let her tell the story:
With four weeks left till my due date, my midwife sent me for a series of ultrasounds. The baby is very healthy, but there is one detail that now has my head spinning, eyes crossing, and hair standing on end. During the ultrasound they informed us we were having a GIRL! Yes, a girl! A GIRL!
We are thrilled and excited and can’t wait to meet this little girl who has played an awesome practical joke on us! Man, she will fit into this family just great! But after years of ignoring all things having to do with girls’ names, Jeff and I have no clue where to start.
What is popular? What is trendy? What is classy? What is just weird? What is wayyy overused? Right now we are calling her lil Shocka Khan, Shocka for short, but hopefully we can replace that soon!
A Baby Name “Quad-ary”: Can This Berry Find a Name That Fits?
Washington State berry Katy is a mother to three girls with meaningful names and spirited nicknames, a tradition she’d like to continue with her fourth child. Can this berry find a name that fits her criteria and her sibset? Here is what she says:
“My husband Colin and I are expecting baby #4! We have 3 daughters, 6 year-old twins Isobel Rose & Liv Michaela, and a 3 year-old Zoie Grace. Isobel‘s name means pledged to God, Zoie and Liv‘s names mean life.
We don’t know the gender of the baby yet, but we’ve been searching for a name that has a meaning similar to Isobel‘s. We want to stay consistent. So far we’ve come up with Jack, Matthias, & Theodore (our favorite) for a little boy and for a little girl we found Elliot (our favorite), Libby, & Thea.
Challenge of the Week: Name your perfect family
Calling all name nerds! This question/challenge of the week is aimed at you:
If there weren’t any restrictions—no real life spouse to compromise with, no in-laws to contend with, no last name to match, no concerns about overpopulation or putting six fantasy children through college–
WHAT WOULD YOUR IDEAL, PERFECTLY NAMED FAMILY BE?
The family can be any size you like.
Sibsets: Is their importance overblown?
It’s long been a precept of Nameberry, and of our books—dating back to Beyond Jennifer & Jason and more recently in Beyond Ava & Aiden– that names of siblings should ideally share a similar style and feel, not matchy-matchy, certainly, but complementary yet distinct. And thus the concept of sibsets was born.
We still feel that way, but we’ve been seeing something of a backlash emerging lately. For instance, for the past couple of months, there has been an interesting thread on our forums, posted by a berry expressing concern about ‘breaking the mold’ set by her first daughter’s very feminine name, wondering if she was locked into choosing an equally feminine name for her second or could use a completely different kind of name that she has fallen in love with. A number of interesting points were raised, some people feeling that the whole sibset obsession has gotten out of hand and is unnecessarily restrictive. Where do you stand?
Twin Names: One Berry’s Top Picks
Twin names pose special challenges and special pleasures, for the namer and name enthusiast alike. Here, Nameberry intern and guest blogger Hannah Tenison chooses her favorite twin pairs and tells us why they work so well.
Since the days of Ancient Rome and Greece, when the stories of Remus and Romulus and Castor and Pollux circulated among the public, twins have been a source of intrigue; but when Mary-Kate and Ashley burst onto the screen in the 80s sitcom “Full House” as the lovable Michelle, they became positively marketable.
The Olsen twins gave way to “The Parent Trap,” starring Lindsay Lohan as twins Hallie and Annie; Tia and Tamera Mowry, who starred in the 90’s Disney show “Sister, Sister,” and later, Dylan and Cole Sprouse in “The Suite Life of Zack and Cody.” There’s “Harry Potter”’s Fred and George Weasley as well as Padma and Parvati Patil, along with “A Series of Unfortunate Events’” Duncan and Isadora Quagmire, and in music, there’s the duo Benji and Joel Madden of Good Charlotte, and indie pair Tegan and Sara.
But of course, the most interesting thing about twins is their names – at least from a name nerd’s perspective. Here, a list of my personal favorite twin name pairs, from starbabies to royalty, and why I think they work well together.
Thornton and Theophilus Wilder (Thornton wrote the play “Our Town”): Unusual, distinguished, and somewhat stodgy, these names sound old-world cool, and the shared “th” sound makes them similar without taking it over the top. I like that Thornton, whose unfussy surname vibe couldn’t be more different from the antiquated sound of Theophilus, still manages to sound like the latter’s twin.
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