Does what your family/friends named their kids affect what you name yours?

[babystuffbuff]

This is an offshoot of the "what would your name have been" thread (kind of). The last time I was over at my SIL's, I was looking at all the pictures of her friends' babies that she has on her fridge. She was telling me all their names, and kept saying, "Well (DD's) name might have been XXX but then so-and-so named her baby that, so we couldn't use it."

I was just wondering if anyone else uses what their family or friends name their kids as a guide for naming their own babes. For example, my parents liked the name Nicholas Robert. I was a girl, and so was my sister, so they didn't get to use it. By the time my brother was born, my mom's cousin, who she sees reasonably often, had a little boy named Nicholas, so my brother was named something else.

I can't imagine not using my favorite names (Charlotte and Henry, if anyone is curious) for my kiddos just because, say, my friend from next door or my cousin from back home named their child the same thing already. The only time it would matter to me is if one of my sibling's kids already had that name. Just wondering how others feel.

Sarah

Auntie to my seven angels

We had kind of a similar situation when naming dd #2. We decided while pregnant with dd#1 that if we had another girl her name would be Linnea (dh and I can't agree on names at all so when we came up with two we liked we figured we better not use it as a middle name but save it for another daughter). Anyway, we mentioned in passing to a friend who was expecting a girl but not sharing the name they had already picked (decided on it before they even got married). Turns out it was the same name (what are the odds of both of us picking Linnea?). I didn't want to use it because these are good friends who were in our wedding and I thought it might be wierd. When they found out we were expecting another girl they told us to please feel free to use it as we had both decided on the name independently and we live very far from each other so we don't see each other often. We really liked the name and as I said, we can't ever agree on names so we decided to use. It will get really confusing when we get together with them but otherwise we are very happy with our decision. It did take me a while to make a final decision though because I didn't want our mutual friends to think that we had copied them because it is such an unusual name. FWIW, Linnea is a swedish name and all parties involved are swedish so that's how we came up with the same name.

[mommy_someday]

I love the name Aidan for a boy, but SIL named her DS (who is about 18 mos older than mine) Caden. We live across the street from each other and have the same kitchen table as they do, so I was afraid that they'd think we were trying to copy them ;) Seriously, though, I think it would be really confusing, considering how often we get together with DH's family.

DH and I have had many lengthy discussions about what our girl's name would be and it took us a long time to decide on Natalie. Right after we picked it (while pg), one of my high school friends had a DD and named her Natalie. I was disappointed, but we rarely see each other and live in separate states. So I think in that instance, we will still use it. At least the middle name is different. :)

[dhano923]

DH and I had picked out our kids names after we had gotten engaged! 5 years later, when I was 4 months pregnant, my now sister-in-law's sister had a baby boy, and named him Kabir, which was the name we had chosen if we were having a boy! Her FIL had cancer and was very ill, so they asked him to name the baby, and that's the name he chose. The funny thing is, it's not a very common name (we're Indian, so it's an indian name) so we were really surprised especially since we had never told anyone what names we had chosen.

When we found out a couple weeks later that we were having a boy, DH and I decided that we would still name him Kabir because that was the name we had chosen. Now both the Kabirs play together and the older Kabir and his 4 year old sister refer to my son as "baby Kabir". LOL

[trumansmom]

Sadly, yes. When I was pregnant with DS I was talking to a friend who asked me what I was going to name the baby. I told her we had names picked out, but we weren't going to tell anyone until after the baby was born. She said, "Well as long as it's not Alice Ann for a girl!" Um, yup. That was the girl's name we had picked out. DS was, of course, a boy so it was a moot point. A year later, she had a girl and named her Alice Anne. A year later DD was born. Alice was out. Although it was a family name on both sides of our families, we just didn't want to deal with it. Also, by that time we felt that since we had given DS a historical name, we needed to do the same for DD.

Long way of saying yes. :)

Jeanne
Mom to Truman 11/01 and Eleanor 4/04
Independent Consultant, Do-Re-Me & You!

A family that I was close to while in college had a child named "Sean Michael", and I totally fell in love with the name. We've since lost touch over the years after I moved. When DH and I married, I took his Irish surname, so using that name for a boy made perfect sense. (Somehow, despite DH coming from a large Irish Catholic family, none of his relatives have that first name.) Despite knowing the name has been used before, I have no qualms about choosing the name for DS.

On a side note, my cousin and her SIL had a spat over the naming of their kids. My cousin's SIL (a drama queen btw) has a daughter named "Nicole". She had a hissy fit and is now not on speaking terms with my cousin because my cousin named her daughter "Colette", a derivative of "Nicole". Apparently, cousin's SIL thought that my cousin was trying to steal Nicole's thunder or something. Personally, I think my cousin's SIL has way too much time on her hands to be stirring up controversy over something so silly!

[KrisM]

I definitely wouldn't use the names of my nephews as we see them often. I am undecided about DH's nephews though, as we only see them 1 or 2 times a year at most. And, they are much older.

In our childbirth class 2 years ago, a baby was born and was named DS . We ended up picking DSanyway, figuring we wouldn't see these people and the kids will be in diffent elementary schools. Well, DS and I hang out with Andy and his mom all the time! We moved, so now we are in the same elementary district, too. Fortunately, we do DS, and they do nickname, so there isn't much confusion, but it's funny how it worked out.

[daniele_ut]

I probably wouldn't use the names of my nieces and nephews, and perhaps not my best friends's children (though my son shares a middle name with several of his friends), but cousins and the like, are probably fair game for me.

Just a side note, but BOTH sets of my grandparents were named Mary and Leo and they each had a son named Leo, who also went on to have a son named Leo (yup, 6 Leos). How weird is THAT?! The confusion in our house was always rampant as to which Leo someone was discussing. My poor cousins (from opposite sides of the family) are both in their 40s and still referred to as "little Leo".

[aliceinwonderland]

Yes, unfortunately. My SIL (DH's sister) is now carrying a girl and they are choosing to name her after DH's Grandma, who is one of my favorite people on earth, for so many reasons. I am completely devastated and just *cannot* get over it, though i know I should move on already (we have known this for a couple of months now). I am basically kicing myself(and my DH) for not having shared our plans, because as it is, nobody knew of our intentions (they were also set on a different name for a long time so we thought it safe). Anyway, cautionary tale.

Edit: This is in regards to family. One of my best friends has a little boy by the name of "Adrian" (we are from the same area of the world ;)) and anyway, if I get DH to go along with it if we have another boy and get to name him, I am going to use that name.

[g-mama]

Eri - I LOVE the name Adrian for a boy. I wanted to use it any of the three times we had a boy, but each time I mentioned it to people, they all looked at me as if I was nuts and thought it was too girly. I hope you get to name a ds Adrian since I never did it!


~Kristen

Paolo 11-00
Benjamin 8-03
Marco 12-05