I was talking to a pregnant friend this morning about baby names and it got me thinking about my kids' names.
My son, the oldest, was probably the hardest to name. His dad shot down most of the names I liked! Somehow, we finally found a name we both liked - Timothy. He shares his middle name, Allen, with his Dad. I still wish I could've named him Cody, my first choice! But really, Tim fits him.
Naming Shelbie was easy. When I was very young, I saw the name Shelby in a book I was reading. I thought it was the most beautiful name I'd ever heard, and informed my mother that I wanted to change my name to Shelby immediately. She was not on board with that idea. Whatev! So I settled on giving that name to my first daughter, with a little twist on the spelling. My mom wanted me to give Shelbie my middle name, but it is SO common - Lynn. So, her middle name is Caitlynn. My mom is still holding a grudge over that, and often calls her Shelbie Lynn.
Next came Elayna. She was a hard one to name. I knew she'd be my last baby. When Tim was just a baby, my (now) ex-husband's mother passed away. While I was pregnant with Elayna, I decided we should honor her with this baby's name. So, if she'd have been a boy, she'd have been Colby Walker, Walker being the ex's late mother's maiden name. Then I started playing around with her first & middle names, Mary Ellen. I eventually came up with Elayna Marie. Not only does it honor the kids' late grandmother, but my sister and niece have the middle name of Elaine, and my best friend's middle name is Marie. So, Elayna is named after four people!
I love names and now use my favorite names on our pets. All of our animals except one have human names, including the fish! And I have a running list of names for future pets.
For a laugh, check out Bad Baby Names. It's mind-boggling what some people name their children!
Now....tell me all about your kids' names! Even if you don't use their real name, tell me about how you came up with it, or who they're named after, or whatever you'd like to share.
22 comments:
Neat. For the most part, our names were chosen because they had family ties.
I love to hear this! I love the name Shelbie!
My kids middle names are after family - but first names are just what we liked.
Great stories about how you chose the names you did for your kids! My oldest daughter's name is Brittany Marie. Brittany means "from Britain" and that's where many of my ancestors were from. Marie was the middle name of both of my husband's grandmothers. Our youngest daughter's name is Abigail Grace. I've just always loved the names Abigail or Abby (what we call her). We gave her the middle name of Grace because I had suffered two miscarriages and two years of unexplained infertility before she came along. We felt that if it weren't for the "grace" of God, we wouldn't have had her.
The first husband and I could only agree on one name for my first born, daughter.
The second child, was named after his father's middle name.
And my third, with new husband, was named after his father's middle name.
Starting to see a pattern.
But I'm done having kids. So the pattern will not be repeated anymore.
Bug was named after my dad since he was the first boy in the family. My poor dad has 3 daughters and had 2 granddaughters before he finally got a boy!
I love how you named your kiddos! My oldest was pretty easy...I went thru a baby book until I found one I liked - Madison, her middle name however was much harder. My sister wanted her to share my middle name..um no..thats mine, I don't want to share-not to mention she HATED what I had chosen for her middle name...Rhea. What sealed the deal for me was the meaning of the two names, mothering and calming brook...my daughter is VERY mothering, but not so calm. In the end - it all boiled down to having a good strong meaning in their names!
~K
What a great back story for your names.. My oldest was named after my husbands dad.. and my little guy was picked and named by his dads name chose after I finally conceded to the fact that my names I chose were never going to stick.. haha
My first and third son's names start with J and end with O-N. My second on forth son's names start with E and end with A-N. The funny thing is that we really didn't plan it that way it just happened. The last three also all have the same middle name. Every male in my husbands family has the same middle name. Also we all share the same birthdays the 13th, 20th, and 22nd!!!!
I love reading how people name their children. I am pregnant with my third and cannot name this baby. I have about 100 days to go so I better get busy.
Ryan is our first. Always loved the name. Super easy for us. Kyle is our second. We made a list and crossed off names we both didn't agree on. Kyle was my husband's choice and I went with it. Now, no idea. We don't know if it is a boy or girl. Great post.
I can at least tell you how my nephew and nieces got THEIR names! Monkeyboy is named after the actor Brandon Lee from The Crow. And I think Diana just liked his middle name, Alexander, for a long time. Little Bear's real name is Abigail, and I'm not sure how they came up with it, except that Diana liked the short name Abby, and thought it went well with her bir brother's name. And her middle name, Marie, is for her grandmother, her auntie, and, I guess, me! As for Pufferfish, her first name is after Hayden Panettiere, the actress in Heroes. Her dad just liked the name and thought it was unusual and catchy. Her two middle names are after her cousin, and her paternal grandmother. Name stories are interesting, aren't they!
Jacob's was really a default name...I liked it and was the best and only name that went with my Dad's name which is his middle name.
I just loved Olivia...and I was set on it. There was no discussion and luckily Dave didn't put up a fight. She shares her middle name with my sister's middle name.
I love the names and stories behind them for your kids Cyndy. They fit them so well.
When I was pregnant with Nicky I had no boy names picked out whatsoever. Chris and my sister Kelly came up with Nicholas and I added Jay and Harold to it for his middle names. Jay is Chris's and his Dad's middle names and Harold is after Chris's grandfather Harry but I didn't want the short version.
Jessie was always going to be Jessica Ivy. I named her after both of my grandfathers. One was Jess and the other Ivy. I threw Jo in there after my MIL and so she would have two middle names like Nicky does too. When Jessie was about 2 Chris's grandfather mentioned that he had a brother named Jessica. LOL. That brother was born back in about 1902. Times sure do change.
Oh and Jessie is only 10 but she's picked out her little girls first name already. Chancie. She just loves this name. Hopefully she won't use it for about 15 years if we're lucky. Oh and our pets all have human names too. We have Perdy, short for Perdita. She's half black lab and half blue heeler. Then there's Ginny who's half chihuahua and half Carolina dingo and our cat is Skylar. Anyway, there's my book for you to read. LOL.
So funny -- my husband's name is Allen and I am Caitlin! :)
Those are all great stories of how you came up with such beautiful names!!
We had the hardest time coming up with Cole and Bella's names. They were our first-born twins and we wanted them to both have strong names. We went with Cole Nicholas (we both loved the name Nicholas but we weren't sure if we'd be blessed with more kids so we decided to use it as Cole's middle name). We thought Isabella would be a unique name because it's so old-fashioned but turns out it was the most popular girl name for 2004...who knew!! So now when we're at the park, I can call out "Bella", at least 4 little girls turn their heads towards me. Her middle name is Danielle after my maternal grandmother.
Garrett and Landon were much harder for us to name for some reason. Again, they were twins but we wanted them to have strong names (no rhyming names, like Ron and Don). Landon was originally going to be Evan but then we were at the park one day and a lady was there with her son and she called out to him "Landon" and both Tim and I looked at each other and said, "that's IT"! So he became Landon Evan. Garrett's name came out of a baby name book and his middle name is Ian after my maternal grandfather.
That's really cool!! I love both those names!
I am named after my mom's sister who passed away right before I was born.
My daughter's name is Jessica, her maternal great-grandmother was Jessie. Their birthdays are only one day apart. It wasn't intentional (either the name or due date), but it made her GGma happy and that was okay.
My son goes by his middle name, like his dad does. Different mid-name, but they share a first name which is a family name that goes back many generations.
(Lynn is my middle name, I share it with my mom. I've always thought is was a little common too.)
This was fun. I love hearing how people decide on their children's names too.
I love names that have meaning. And I love hearing the stories behind peoples' names.
My first son was named after his father, and grandfather and great-grandfather. yes, he is the fourth...
So our second son, we just chose a name we liked. Remington. Remy for short.
Shannon Rae ... loved the name "Shannon" and Rae after my dad, Ray. Of course, she doesn't even go by that name now!
Scott David ... when I was a kid, there was a song, "Watching Scotty Grow ..." and I loved it. David, after my grandfather.
Sean Jeffrey ... Sean after Sean Connery; Jeffrey, after the maiden name of Hubby Man's mama.
I like names and name stories too. My oldest son has the name of the bar where my sister worked when I was pregnant. We loved the name and decided to use it. My husband and I have never agreed on a girl's name. If this new baby is a girl. We're in trouble!
I take kids names very seriously and I had some great choices for our boys, but my husband hated all of them. We finally managed to agree on names that worked, but were more popular than I would have wanted - Ryan, Matt & Blake. Blake is at least a little more off the beaten path. But the nice thing is that each of the boys has a middle name that ties them to either their father or grandfather and now they've done the same thing with my grandson. And my daughter-in-law and two granddaughters have the middle names of Faith, Hope, and Love, which I thought was sweet.
I have two girls and their names are Fiona Dawn and Caitlyn Marie. I wanted first names for my girls that sounded slightly different but not too out there. I just wanted to be sure that people didn't look at me like "where the heck did that come from?" but I also wanted to make sure I couldn't find their names on pencils! Middle names came from family
I love baby naming! All of my kids' names have some kind of family connection in their first of middle--or both--names. It was kind of tricky w/ 4 boys though to keep coming up w/ good ones! It was easy to name my daughter--I had so many girl names in reserve!
Post a Comment