People often ask me how our children got their names so I thought I’d write a little post explaining the meanings behind them. The kids love hearing their individual naming stories too so hopefully this will be a post they will enjoy looking back on.
When I was expecting our first baby, I had a copy of every baby name book available. I would spend hours reading through them, making notes of names I liked and creating shortlists of our favourites. Funnily enough, looking back, I could think of many rare girl names but not as many for boys. I believe it’s much easier to choose a name now with apps, such as Baby Name Genius.
I imagined that once our baby was born, we would spend lots of time getting to know him before giving him his name. Unfortunately, he was very poorly, so the Sister told us we had to give him a name quickly. Whenever I am put under pressure like that, my mind goes completely blank so it was really left to Dave to name our baby boy.
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| Danny McCormack in the black hat and “our Danny”is the one with no hair! |
Dave chose to name him after his favourite bass player at the time, Danny mcCormack, from The Wildhearts and The Yoyos. We named him Daniel, but always knew he would be called Danny. We have been known to call him Dan Dan too. Some people think Danny was an odd choice of namesake as he’s had many personal problems over the years. However, a few months later Wildheart’s Danny came down to Pembrokeshire to take part in a charity gig to raise money for Little Hearts Matters and there isn’t a day that we don’t listen to the Wildhearts music in this house, so for us it was a perfect choice.
As he was a boy, the middle name was already set in stone for me. I wanted to name him after my late dad, David, who would have been so proud of his little grandson. It also meant that our Danny was named after his father and great-grandfather as well- there are a lot of Davids on both sides of the family! St David is also the patron saint of Wales and St Davids is our closest (tiny) city so the name was well suited.
One day, we were at my mum’s house listening to old vinyl and we came across a really old song called, “That’s Danny!”, it really described our Danny- “two big shining eyes” and so on and even said that he was three years old, which Danny was at the time, it was such a coincidence!
Daniel: God is my Judge
David: Well-beloved
When our second child came along, I also had to find a name that went well with the older brother, Danny. Before the baby came along, this time I could think of lots of boys names and therefore, of course, along came a girl! I liked the sound of modern, unusual names, however, when she was born, she really didn’t suit any of them. I also felt that, as Danny had an old name, she should have an old name too, so eventually we decided on Rebecca.
For her middle name, I played around lots of family names to pass on but none of them fitted well. Then I decided that a play on one of her great-grandmother’s names could work nicely. So, as a variant of Lillian and also in homage to the majestic flower, we named her Rebecca Lily. It was quite funny when Granny told Great Granny that the baby had been given her name as a middle name she stubbornly replied “But my name is Lillian, not Lily!” in a manner that only the elderly can get away with.
I used a lily print on all the birth announcements and thank you cards and planted a lilies for her.
Rebecca gets called Becca but never Becky (apart from by her Grampy).
Rebecca: Captivating
Lily: innocence; purity and beauty
Our third child was a complete surprise jumble of joy so we had no time to think of names. She was a gorgeous baby girl and had lots of character. I wanted to name her Eloise but Dave didn’t agree. Then I thought of names which meant “surprise”. Eventually, I though of Caitlin after Dylan Thomas’ wife. But I changed the “i” for a “y” to make it the Welsh and Irish spelling.
Caitlyn’s slightly older cousin used to call her Dee-Dee and for a long time she was always called that by all of us but she’s back to Caitlyn now. It’s rarely shortened as Cait (sounding like Kate) as it sounds like a completely different name altogether rather than a shortened version.
Keeping to the flower middle name theme, we named her Caitlyn Rose. She had rose cheeks, rose bud lips and smelt gorgeous so Rose really suited her. Again I used the theme on her stationery and also loved to buy her rose print clothes and blankets.
Caitlyn: Pure
Rose: Fragrant flower
As you all know, our last baby was another little girl. She was so dainty and ladylike so I went with quite a girly, princess name (I blame my hormones too), Isabelle (Dave drew the line when I mentioned Isabella!).
Her middle name is also a flower, Isabelle Jasmine. A lot of the time she is called Izzy and that’s fine.
Isabelle: God of plenty
Jasmine: Flower
As the girls all have flowers in their names and associated with them, we have given Danny the honorary flower of daffodils, so he is unofficially Danny David Daffodil!
Writing this post has made me want to organise my old baby photos and their baby stationery again. All my photos of Danny were on a film and polaroid camera! If only, I’d started a blog when Danny was born- I would be far more organised!
What did you use to help choose your baby names?
Lovely names! I am biased though as I have a Daniel, an Isabelle and a Lily-Rose!I chose the names to make sure they all have a good meaning too.
Oh wow! That's a coincidence! Lovely names! 😉 xxx