I saw that! and I am still trying to wrap my head around two sets of identical twins without fertility drugs- I had no idea that was even possible. 

I do think Blaine is a bit of an outlier as well- the others are all so clearly Country/Western.

I think something like Bo would fit more, but we all have exceptions to our style don't we?

yay! that will make life easier for her. 

on another note, I'm so interested to learn more about Icelandic surnames. 

Another blog I read just had a long discusssion/debate about the child's surname and how to decide which name to give and the decisions people make about whether or not to take their partner's surname or keep their own or hyphenate....

I always love hearing about other cultures that have different answers to these questions.

Hmm, I wonder if the adult entertainment industry and the names of those who participate have a similar impression.

Are young women named Jenna going to face increased discrimination based on all the scantly clad results that name insprires?

I'm sure you will get a wide range of responses here and I'm sure there are plenty of people with popular names who are very happy with them.

But I think it may be an instance of the grass is always greener...The first name I was given at birth is a very popular classic first name. It's always been in the top hundred and until very recently it was always in the fifty (according the Social Security name rankings.)

I hated that. I hated being one of at least three girls in my classroom with the same name, and having to write my first name and my last initial on all my work. I hated hearing my name called in a hallway and not knowing if someone was calling me or one of the many kids who shared my name. My birth name has a lot of nicknames, but they were all being used by someone else. I tried all of them and just gave up.

I started thinking about changing my first name as early as age six, and tried on lots of names over the years until I found one that stuck. I legally changed it when I was in my early twenties and I've never looked back.

My current first name hasn't been ranked in the top 1,000 baby names for many years and it gives off a pleasantly old-fashioned feeling. In my opinion of course, but others have said something similar.

I continue to meet tons and tons of women with my old first name and I like them just fine, but  I am glad not to have been the third person with that name in the workplace.

I don't know what problems you are experiencing relating to your unique name but I just thought I would share my troubles with having a common name.

Some ideas for you.

Boys- Oliver, Owen, Liam, Tierney, Callum, Ewan

Girls- Siobhan, Darby, Kiara, Deirdre, Oona, Shea

Does any of that fit your style?

Hmm, what about...

Andrew

Daniel

Dante

Hunter

Jonah

Noah

Spencer

Tanner

Xander

Personally I think with two boy names ending in -er, you should move away from a third name with that ending. Otherwise your kids start to sound like a nursery rhyme along the lines of the butcher, the baker and the candlestick maker. 

Of your current list I like Maddox the best. I think Carter is too close in sound to Connor. Corbin is a bit more distinctive but I think Maddox has the most individual sound.

Other ideas: Maxwell, Liam, Finn, Ross, Jack. 

Wow, some of these are really great! I could see some of them taking off in the U.S. too, although our brand of cutsey-cute is different. 

Does the U.K. actually record hyphened first names? I know that the issue of punctuation in first names comes up with the SSA. 

There's a girl at my daughter's school with a double barrelled first name R*by-Hudson. So I guess it's getting some use for girls, though it does seem odd. 

You could try doing the baby name playoffs with your husband. A poster on this site invented this game a while ago and it's been a favorite, Laura mentions it in the second edition of BNW. 

You make a list of eight names you love for each gender and he does the same. Then you put them in a hat and draw them out in random order to make brackets. ( I guess you can "seed" them but I am not a sports person and I don't know what that means so I didn't.) 

Then you sit down with your husband on a nice long evening (we did ours on a road trip which I highly recommend if you can) and you talk through the brackets, where only one name advances from each pair. By the end you have one (or two or maybe four) names that you both feel good about. 

I did this with my husband when we were naming our second and we managed to find a name that we both loved that totally surprised us as the "winner." At the very least, it's fun and you get some good conversations out of it. 

I think it might be difficult for an adopted Korean girl to have the name Siobhan. I know that so called "ethnic" names are not as closely tied to a certain race or nationality anymore, but especially if your surname is not Korean I think the disconnect would be hard to live with.

I like a lot of your other choices- Pearl, Iris and Eliza are my personal favorites. 

I love the name Juniper. It would have been my son's name if he'd been a girl. I like one-syllable middles with it like Pearl and Blythe. I also love the flexibility of June or Junie. 

I also don't think it would limit her from being a judge or a lawyer ( or an artist if that's the path she takes. Maybe all of the above?) It's a nature name but it's not nearly as flamboyant as some others. 

I didn't know that, what is the long version?

I should clarify that I'm not currently pregnant, just daydreaming right now. My two kids in real life have names inspired by punk rock songs and I like to think about what a third kid would be called. 

I like Iggy as a nod to Iggy Pop but I do think a kid should have more than just Iggy to put on a resume  or a diploma. I understand the point about nicknames don't have to be connected to the given first name but for me personally I think that kind of nickname comes from experience or the kid's physical appearance- things like Sprout or Rusty. Iggy feels like a shorter version of a longer name to me, which is why I think it would feel odd to say this is my son Iggy and then have all his official documents say Robert. 

 I like the idea of first name I. middle name G. though. That connects the nickname but still gives some flexibility. I'm also liking Gideon and Viggo. and I do like Ignatius but it does seem so very very Catholic, which we are not. 

I think Godfrey is still a tough sell. There's the "God" part and also the W.C. Fields thing where Godfrey Daniel was used as a euphemism for a rather common oath. That might be an old association but having my child's name used as a swear word would give me pause. 

Hmm, classic but unusual...

Quentin

Anton

Frederick

Roman

Marius

Asa

It's so funny because I just had a name dream a few days after Christmas. I dreamed that I had a baby girl named Twelvina, born on 12/12/12 of course.

Bertha.

I know a baby Baird and it's so cute on him. Just thought you'd like to know that someone used one of your exotic names IRL.

Holly did reach an all time high in the 1970s, ranking 58. It was ranked 180 in 1999 and is down to 426 in 2011. I think that can be a good thing. It's familiar and people will know how to spell it and pronounce it but there probably won't be a ton of other kids her age with the name. And it doesn't seem as tied to the 1970s as some other names of that era.

I think Anna has more of a "timeless" feel to it, but it has also been in or near the top twenty for the last decade so there are bound to be a few of them running around. I can see the apeal of it, it's simple and clean and classic. It's not my personal favorite but it is pretty and stylish.

I agree with others that Ella and Elijah is too much of a mouthful.

Maria I think will depend a lot on where you live and your family's culture and heritage. In some states it will be more expected and traditional and in others it's more of an antique classic. It's hard for me to give an opinion without knowing some of the context because I think that can really change how this name is perceived.

Other ideas: Tabitha, Eva, Susannah, Nina, Ruby, Evelyn