We are due at the end of October and are finding ourselves further and further away from a name that we like, boy or girl. Our last name is Nadeau (rhymes with play-doh) and we have a 2-year-old daughter named Finley Frances. We love her name and can not come up with a name, either gender that we love equally. We recently created lists with the thought that we need to have some names in mind when we get to the hospital, none that we are truly married to.
For boys we have:
Andrew (after my father and would be called Drew)
Trevor
Callahan
Owen
For girls we have:
Louisa (have not gotten a great response when floated this name with friends and fam but can't help but be drawn to Lou-lou for n.n.)
Brenna
Annika
Olive
There have been other names we like but for certain reasons can't use them. We love Francesca, but 1. Fin's middle name is Frances and 2. I do not want to use the same letter to start Fin's sibling's name. Also, any name that ends with an o sounds funny with Nadeau. I also like a lot of names with a similar ending to Finley, but it sounds funny to me when I say the names together. It is important to us that the name have a good n.n. and that it is somewhat different without being outlandish. (although our boys list does not necessary reflect that)
We would love to hear some suggestions, as we have searched every list around and have yet to be inspired by anything!
Thank you!!
Because Finley is an androgynous name, I'd use this rule of thumb (which I'm pretty sure I got from Beyond Jennifer and Jason): similarly androgynous for a sister (or at least not distinctly frilly), clearly masculine for a brother. And with your surname, I find I don't like the sound of first names ending in N, which cuts out a ton of options.
Darby Alice
Ellery Estelle
Ellis Ruby
Emory Eleanor
Hollis Harriet
Quincy Margaret (Fin and Quinn too much?)
(I included a number of names that don't have nicknames, because I would have thought of Finley as nicknameless, too.)
I LOVE Louisa. I think it's non-frilly enough to go okay with Finley, though it's quite a different style. Louisa is the sort of name people might be "meh" about when you tell them about it, but then later it will grow on them so much they won't be able to believe they ever felt that way. And the right middle name will make it fit better with Finley: Louisa Ruby is better with Finley Frances than, say, Louisa Elizabeth. Maybe: Louisa Hazel, Louisa Matilda, Louisa Harper, Louisa Ivy, Louisa Violet.
For boys, I find Owen too much O with Nadeau--and because it ends in N, it runs together. Owenado.
My favorite from your boy name list is Andrew, and I like that it's a family name.
Name update 11-05-2010! Taryn writes:
We had a baby boy on October 29th! After he was born we took out our list and reviewed our names, and like many before us have stated, one name just seemed to stick out... We named him Kelton Terry (after my older brother) Nadeau. Although Kelton was a name not suggested for us, I did find it on your blog suggested as a boy's name on a different post! Thank you for your ideas and inspirations :)
