I was wondering if anyone had any interesting and different baby names. After 5 kids (10 names) and countless animals we're finding this very difficult! Thanks a bunch, Jean

-- Jean (ritz1@fgi.net), July 16, 2000

Answers

We have six children and have named them all out of the Bible. Lots of interesting and different ones there. It's a little short on girls names (not a problem for us since we have five boys) but the place names seem to make better names for girls than boys ie. Jordan, Bethany. God bless you on your choice.

-- Kathy (DavidWH6@juno.com), July 17, 2000.

Jean, try: babynames.com-They offer lots of different names and their meanings. If you have a nationality that you prefer just type it in with names.com! I have used both in searching for my animal names! Good-luck and keep us posted on what you decide!

-- Debbie T in N.C. (rdtyner@mindspring.com), July 17, 2000.

My granddaughters have interesting names: Journey Cheyenne, Latia Marie, Jay-lynn Alexandra and Tatyana Nicole. One of my daughter's name is Autumn No-el, I used to know a Stormy Sea. There's a couple older ladies whose names are Columbia and Hulda. My niece's name is Shallon Rachael. Flowers are nice names. I like Pearl, Lydia, Tori, and Trary and esp. Ivy. How about Sunshine? My grandson's name aren't too unusual except maybe Shaundel Xavier. I agree Biblical names are great names, esp. Elijah. Enjoy your search.

-- Cindy (atilrthehony_1@yahoo.com), July 17, 2000.

this may sound odd but go to an old graveyard we now have sadie clair, adeline tess, hazel jillian and maisie tavish {tavish is irish for i am a twin}. some we thought about emaline,pearl and mabel. let us know what you pick!

-- renee oneill (oneillsr@home.com), July 17, 2000.

The bible is a good source for names. If you don't want to use an overly popular name watch the paper for an idea of what they are, names seem to have "cycles" where you have a bunch of Caitlins, Madisons, etc. Last year in my son's class (I homeschool now) there were two Kelsey's, and three Brittany's with only 21 kids in all. Don't forget some of the old "forgotten" names. I was in the store one day and heard a mother call her little girl Vivian, hadn't heard that for a long time, had a nice ring to it. Of course getting your spouse to agree is another thing:)

-- Lenore (archambo@winco.net), July 17, 2000.

Are you looking for unusual names? I really like coming up with sort of unusual names. Boys: Holden, Amos, Hosea, Micah, Gwydion, Gavin, Guilliaume (pronounced: Gee ome) Girls: Madeleine, Mira, Albret, Phoebe, Edith, Ida, Gwyndelyn, Gwyneth, Gretchen.

-- Abigail F. (treeoflife@sws.nb.ca), July 17, 2000.

We have an Aldus, Mailee, Payson, and Narada either given to a child or on the waiting to be used list. They always seem right after afew months. Unique is good

-- sarah (slsimmons@tacomaclick.net), July 17, 2000.

We have Cedar Lilania (and her first daughter is Gladiana Lilyjean), Maranatha Amariah, and Juniper Leigh. I guess it is just as well we didn't have a boy, as we never did have a boy's name picked out that we really agreed on! If I could have had another girl, though, I would have named her Ella Rose, for my two grandmothers. A friend's two younger daughters are Bryn and Sayr. Favorites of mine are names like Abigail, Susanna, Joanna, Elisabeth, . . . a relative named one of her daughters Lei Lani. If you keep your eyes open and keep a notebook of names you like, as you come across them, it will help. Oh, as far as animals: I named my sorrel mustang mare Salsa. We had two Toggenburg goats named Lark and Linnet (I would use those for people, too!) Our cat that we have now is Tassie. A lot of our animals came with their names, often rather uninspired!! But too much work to try to change them. Anyway, it's a fun topic, and interesting to see the names that people like!

-- Kathleen Sanderson (stonycft@worldpath.net), July 17, 2000.

I once had a student named Misty Dawn. I loved the name and named one of our goat doelings after her.

-- Liz Rhein (merhein@shentel.net), July 17, 2000.

DearJean. We named our first daughter,K'lyn,pronounced KayLyn but it was forever misunderstood. But at the age of l9 I thought if I gave her a beautiful name, she would be beautiful and she is with auburn hair and brown eyes. Over the years, she simply called herself, Kay, Probably if I had been more mature, I would have named her Kathleen which I used later. However, she's now in her forties and proudly calls herself: K'lyn and she's still beautiful, very self assured. I think names must come from the heart and selected personally for a reason for each child as you already know. Only you can decide. God Bless.

-- Norma Lucas (TROOPER806@WEBTV.NET), July 18, 2000.

Look to the family tree .Our 3rd daughter is Casandra Elizabeth and the 4th is Mikaylee Rebecca .

-- Patty Gamble (fodfarms@slic.com), July 18, 2000.

In retrospect, I think we would have checked the family tree for a sense of connected-ness and history, rather than trying to be unique. You can always use nicknames while they are growing up. Now that I'm older I like being named after my ancestors! Although I wish my name was spelled Jeanne! Good luck! Jean Louise

-- Jean (schiszik@tbcnet.com), July 18, 2000.

I was named Ellen, from my father's side of the family; and Renee, from my mother's side. I answer to Polly - a nickname given me by a dear family friend when I was three weeks old. Good thing - with Pop's huge family calling me Elly and Mom's calling me Renee, I'd have probably grown up with some kind of a multiple personality disorder! Kids that I had gone to school with since age five didn't know who they were talking about when my "real" name was used at high school graduation.

My daughter is Jessie, after a grand-dad, uncle, great-great grandmother, g-g grandfather and g-g uncle.Her middle name, Leah, is from the bible and she was given a middle name with an L to honor two very dear family friends - Lillie and Louis. Had she been a boy, she would have been John Jesse - the five Jesse's and thirteen John's - well, within the past five generations that we know of! There are a lot of Jessica's in her age range - I constantly have to correct official type people who "insist" upon using her REAL name - What? I don't know my kid's real name!?

I always enjoyed names that reflected my heritage - Nora, Eileen, Brenna, Mick and Pat. Jes's dad liked ones that reflected his: Gretel, Gretchen, etc... Unusual names make it hard to buy anything personalized for the child off the shelf - I can find lots of things that say Jessica or Paula - but very few Jessie or Polly.

As for critters - mine have always seemed to suggest their own names. Pepper for the bouncy puppy, Hazard for the big, goofy, ham-footed pup, Sherman for the pup that went over the others like a tank at feeding time, Whip-poor-will for the shy pup that you rarely saw, but heard all night long! Taffy was the sweet, tan cat; Miss Jane was the prim calico. The red sow was Ruby, the white one Pearl (not that Aunt Pearl appreciated that one!) The escape artist rooster was Wiley, and that one mottled hereford cow was called something I won't mention on a family forum!

-- Polly (tigger@moultrie.com), July 18, 2000.

I have an unusual name, Alana (rhymes with Donna, accent on second syllable). My dad gave it to me, it is Gaelic and means "my dearest" or "my darling."

I like and appreciate my name now but I did NOT like it as a kid. I didn't feel like I fit in with all the Diane's and Debbie's at school.

My dislike of having such a unique name did carry over a bit into adulthood--I named my first several children names that were pretty common--Angela, Michael, Daniel, JOel. Decided to stick with Bible names, but got a little bolder with baby #5 and chose Arielle. We stuck with the "el" ending for the rest of them and Samuel came next, but it's getting difficult to find female Bible names now that our last three babies were girls--Rachel, Laurel, and Jewel. Laurel isn't in the Bible, but I like it anyway.

-- Alana Potter (lester@erols.com), July 18, 2000.

Jean, I understand how hard it is coming up with interesting names. We chose old family names when naming our brood, though it was hard not to leave someone out even with our tribe . Our children like knowing they have roots they can trace directly through their names.

Margaret Molly, Barry Michael, Francis (Frank) Leslie, Jessica Marie- Deane, Cynthia Rose, Brandon Matthew, Erin Gale, Cassandra Noel, and Amanda Anne (aka, Maynard...thanks to her Uncle).

As to naming our animals, all cats are named after characters from Agatha Christie novels, all dogs have "Blue" or "Skye" somewhere in them (youngest daughter's idea). The breeding pair of geese named themselves: "Wrong Way" is our mama goose who is forever going the wrong way when the rest of the flock heads out to forage. Her mate is Duncan as he likes to dunk-in the wading pool. OK, so they're not real original, but they work. Our best rooster is called "Spot", for no other reason than I like to call him that. Our best mating pair of ducks are Fred (Astair) and Ginger (Rogers) because they sound like they're tap dancing when they walk across the driveway when it's raining. The rest of the animals don't have names as they will be filling jars soon enough.

-- Kathleen (kalfy53@hotmail.com), July 18, 2000.

I tried to post here in the beginning but troubles...

Anyway, Old is new. Try not to use anything so unusual that the poor kid has to constantly spell it or correct the pronunciation all through school. Don't worry to hard about the teasing part as you already know they can always find aw ay to tease. and think about what kind of nickname they might get stuck with inn adulthood (no guy wants to still be "TommY" when he's 30!)

This from a girl named Novina!

-- Novina in ND (lamb@stellarnet.com), July 19, 2000.

I agree with Novina, names that are so unusual that they are hard to spell are a curse! Cassandra is nice, and Savana. For boys I am stuck with the old David, as my favorite, then Michael and Steve. The boys names are from my family, the girls are just names I like. Please let us know the name/names you chose.

-- Tina (clia88@newmexico.com), July 22, 2000.

I always thought that I was the only Gladiana in this world, but I was wrong. My friend was on the internet and wanted to see if anyone else had my name...and as it turns out someone else does. To tell you the truth I never liked my name because it was different, and now I really want to be the only Gladiana...its a unique name. Now to tell u how my mom came up with the name Gladiana....My grandmother from my dads side is named Gladys and my granmother from my moms side is named Ana...so my momz just put em together and came up with Gladi+ana=Gladiana. Ive grown to like my name....although people have a hard time remembering it.

-- ~Gladiana~ (DominicanSweEets@aol.com), June 04, 2001.

Sure thing, hon: If it's a girl, name it either Demasiada or Ultima. If it's a boy, name it Demasiado, or Ultimo.

Or to simplify, you could name either a boy or a girl, "Nomas' "

JOJ (I love the Latin based names; they are so heartfelt....

-- jumpoff joe (jumpoff@ecoweb.net), June 04, 2001.

hi, i like these names:

Girl: Alexandra Nadine Rochelle Hermione Violet Monique Maria Melanie Marilyn Aurora Lilly Edith Layla Yvonne Meredith Jasmine Nichole

Boy: Matthew Gareth Steven Ross Demitri Ewan Tom Martin Alex

Also you can base the names on characters or stories or starsigns etc. Maybe someone from your fave music group, or someone famous throughout history.

Eg: Jasmine (Disney's Alladin) Libra (Starsign) Emily (Author Emily Bronte) Josie (Josie and the Pussy Cats)

hope this helped, luv rach

-- rachael (gothictulane@aol.com), April 12, 2002.

My grandmother passed away this past week. Her first and middle names were Hassie Jewel. She went by Jewel. She had a sister named Lela. If you give your children the same middle names for girls and same for boys, it cuts down on the decisions. Our girls are Johannah Rachel and Susannah Rachel. My son is Benjamin David, the same middle name as my dh. The girls names give a nod to my middle name of Anne (with and "e"!).

And you all probably thought my middle name was Blue! hee hee

-- Lavender Blue Dilly, Central Maryland (lavenderbluedilly@hotmail.com), April 14, 2002.

My real name is Colie Leigh. I know alot of people with the names: GIRLS.Kari Michelle; Kylie Christine; Amaya Nichelle; Baliey Christa. And some boys names: James Blair; Devon Christopher; Michael Allen. Those are a few that i like. colie

-- Colie (not like the dog:collie) (chrisette_18@yahoo.com), April 15, 2002.