We are due Jan 1st with a baby girl and have basically exhausted ourselves looking for a name. Our names are David and Emily and our last name is (phonetically) Tom. This baby will be our 3rd child – we have an 8 year old daughter Rowan Terese and a 6 year old son Griffin David. Both of those 2 were SO easy to name, both were named within days of their 20 week ultrasounds, and I’m baffled why we are having such a hard time this go round. Nothing seems “right” for this one. A quick note – my husband is one of 14 kids, so we have a large grouping of nieces and nephews on his side. This will be grandchild #30 for his parents and we’d like to steer clear of cousin names.
Here are some of our (ok, mostly my) parameters:
No T name. I hate matching first with last initials – especially because matching T’s sound like Tater Tot to me.
At least 2 syllables – since our last name is so short.
No overly girly/flowery name – Rowan’s name (to us) is feminine but strong. We’d like to be somewhat consistent. We don’t really think of Rowan as unisex, since I’d always heard it as a girl name, but totally get that it is not “girly” by any means.
Nothing overly traditional – this just would not “go well” with the other 2. Does that matter? Maybe not when they are 30, but I’d hate to have a Rowan, Griffin and then a Gertrude, or even a Jenny. It feels like the “one of these things is doing their own thing” skit from Sesame Street. While we love some other types/categories of names, we don’t want the age gap between our older 2 and this one to be marked or highlighted by an obvious name shift.
Nothing too trendy – we like names that are easy to spell and read… but I am hoping our baby won’t need to add her last initial to her name when in school. I grew up an Emily WAY before it was popular, so I enjoyed being the only one. As a side note, my husband doesn’t really care about this at all – guessing he was one of many David’s in his classes and it never bothered him.
Names we’ve considered but ruled out (for now?):
Delia- husband likes a lot, but I’m not loving it – it isn’t quite right.
Delaney – we both liked, but then found out someone we know has a daughter named it and it was kind of wrecked for us.
Piper – both liked a lot, but same scenario as above.
Harper – we loved but don’t like how trendy it is getting. We’d like her name to be somewhat unique…though not out there.
Hadley – I love, husband hates.
Nora- Husband loves, I don’t.
Fiona – worried about the ogre connection a bit
Finley – love this, but don’t like that it “matches” the end of Griffin’s name.
Neelie – I loved this and keep trying to push my husband to it – it is my Grandma’s name backwards. He is not even slightly convinced. We also dabbled with Eiley for awhile after the same Grandma, but hubby is not a fan.
Nola- we both liked this for awhile, but after getting bombarded with negative comments from family and friends it has lost its appeal. Guess that is a good reason to keep names to ourselves J
Phoebe- one of the 29 grandchildren, so this is out. We both love, though.
Quinn – we both love, but “belongs” to a good friend, and is only 1 syllable.
Ruby – we like this one, but it seems to be trendy… and is a bit matchy matchy with Rowan.
Any help or guidance would be greatly appreciated. I’m doing my best to ensure this baby comes BEFORE we ring in the new year, more because of my quickly growing size than for any tax purposes, though that would be nice too.
Rowan and Griffin are both names that could be described as "contemporary, fashionable choices": they're not common enough to be called trendy, but they're fully in style. This is, I think, why you're getting stuck: your tastes are leading you to fashionable, cutting-edge names---but those are the very ones that could suddenly spring into trendiness/overuse.
I advise not trying to fight it too hard: future popularity of a name can't be known, so you could drive yourself crazy trying to avoid it; the current popular names are not as common as the popular names of our decade were; going by a surname initial from time to time is not so terrible; you could name her something highly unusual and still find another in her class just by the luck of the draw; and it would be a shame to give up a name you love just because another child has it, or might in the future have it.
Harper would be, I think, a perfect name: to me it's non-girly-but-still-feminine in the same way as the name Rowan. And, unfortunately, that kind of name is a hot property and, as you've noticed, the name is going up in popularity very quickly, which kicks it off the consideration list.
More possibilities:
Arden Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Arden
Averil Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Averil
Bianca Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Bianca
Bronwyn Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Bronwyn
Carys Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Carys
Cleo Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Cleo
Darcy Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Darcy
Daria Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Daria
Fallon Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Fallon
Haven Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Haven
Hollis Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Hollis
Imogen Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Imogen
Kiefer Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Kiefer
Larkin Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Larkin
Quinlay Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Quinlay
Yeardley Tom; Rowan, Griffin, and Yeardley
I wasn't sure if I should avoid names that have the same ending as Rowan and Griffin: on one hand it's nice to change, but on the other hand it makes the third name more obviously separated from the first two. I went for some of each.
Name update! Emily writes:
We hemmed and hawed –and then because she was late, we hemmed and hawed some more. She arrived January 7 – weighing a whopping 9 lbs 10oz. One look at her and both my husband and I knew she was supposed to be named Harper Adelia. Thanks to all the feedback - so many great names – and many of the comments (including yours Swistle) helped convince me that the “trendy” issue was not that important when we really loved a name. Thanks!!
