A friend told me about your blog, and I have really enjoyed reading through the posts. I am having an extremely difficult time deciding on a name for our baby girl, due in a month! I am Terra, husband is Josh, surname is Patterson. Siblings name is Grady Owen (call him Gray). He is named after my husband's grandfather (and my husband and his father also have middle name Owen). We both tend to like older, more traditional names. We don't want anything too common, but also don't like very odd names. I would like to use something from my side of the family this time since we don't plan on having anymore children. Basically the only family names I have to work with are Hazel (great-grandmother), Jacqueline (grandmother), or Harper (mother's maiden name). My favorite name of these options is Hazel, simply because I like the name.
Our finalist list:
Catherine Hazel (call her Cate) - This is probably my number one pick. Have always loved the name Cate (with a C), but my concerns are that it is too plain and common (especially with Gray). Also not sure if the "ate" sound and fact that it is one syllable bothers me after saying it over and over.
Lucy Sutton (call her Lucy) - Sutton is a family name of my husband's that we love, but then I won't be using anything from my family. My other concern is I'm not sure I see Lucy growing with her. Is it too little girl sounding?
Charlotte (not sure about middle name) - We both like Charlotte well enough. Worry about it becoming too popular, and it is also fairly new on our list so not sure if I'm in love with it yet.
Others that we both like: Eliza, Annabel, Carly.
Names that got ruled out either because a friend has used it or because it is a color (don't want them both to have color names since we call our son Gray): Olive, Violet, Ruby, Pearl, Caroline. Love several of these but can't get past the color thing...Didn't realize when we named him that we would have this issue!
So, I need your help and feedback on our final list and other potentials. I keep coming back to Cate, but then I start to wonder if it just isn't right since I can't commit.
HELP! :)
Since you have always loved Catherine/Cate, I think this indecision is likely to be normal baby-naming jitters. Baby-naming is a big deal, and we only get so many babies to name---it's normal to feel uncertain. I do wonder if you might call her Catie, and might call your son Grady? Then you'd have a rhyme, which would be fine if it didn't bother you, and maybe even fun since it would be an optional, avoidable rhyme.
Lucy Sutton is super cute, but it does seem unfair to have tons of family names from your husband's side (not to mention the surname) and none from yours. I like Lucy Harper. I think all the other Lucys will help to make Lucy seem like a grown-up name when they all ARE grown-ups (just as the name Jennifer now seems like a woman in her late 30s), but there's also Lucille or Lucia or Luciana or Lucienne or Lucinda.
I like Charlotte with Harper (I like the repeating "ar" sound).
