Baby name consultant: Lots of rules for Boy No. 3!

sanctanomina Baby name consultant, ,

Happy Feast of the Assumption of Our Lady!! What a wonderful feast day!! Mother Mary for the win!! 😀 ❤ 💐🎉

Today’s consultation is for Amy and her husband’s third born baby — a third boy! This little guy will join big sibs:

Gavin Theodore
Ethan Robert
Auden (with Jesus)

I love all of these names! They all have such a nice feel of really going together, and Amy and her hubs would really like to continue that theme for this little boy. She writes,

“Both first names were chosen simply because we loved them. My rule for first names is that they need to be unique in our family. I love to honor family with names, but I prefer for the first name to be uniquely theirs, at least within our family. Both middle names are for family (Theodore for DH’s grandfather, Robert for my Dad, grandfather, DH’s grandfather — a heavy hitter!) but also have a saint connection.

We have also named our baby in heaven Auden. It means “old friend” and I loved that. When we meet again, we will for sure be as old friends. Also, we felt it could be either gender although I typically like more feminine names for girls.

For this little boy — we are in trouble! I joke with family that he won’t have a name until the day he goes home, but I’m honestly not sure I am joking! We do know that the middle name will be Michael for DH’s father, and also because what a great patron. What little boy wouldn’t love to be named after St Michael!

DH loves Nicholas for this baby, but that is a great grandfather’s name, so a no-go for me. I also don’t love the way Nick sounds with our last name with begins with K. I really want to stick to a 2 syllable name that ends in N because that’s just the way my brain works! Strange, I know! Some that I have suggested that DH has vetoed: Colin, Rowan, Quinn. I also love Luke, but again, the K last name deters me.

So to recap:

2 syllable, 5 letter, ends in N. (Not a challenge at all, right!?!) Middle name to be Michael.”

I really enjoyed working on this for Amy — her taste in names is so cool! They’re all familiar but not terribly common, which is always so refreshing. I also really love that she and her hubs have “rules”—I find challenges like that so fun!

First, some thoughts about their current ideas—I was bummed to see Amy’s Mister vetoed Colin! That seems like the perfect name for them since he wants Nicholas and Colin is a variant of it, and 5 letters/2 syllables/ending in -n like Amy wants.

Re: Rowan, great name!, but it’s currently pretty unisex and the only Rowan I know is a little girl. This is what the stats currently look like:

rowan-boyrowan-girl

So if Amy and her hubs decide to go with Rowan, it is still ahead for boys, and maybe they’ll be part of the pendulum swinging back toward the boys?

Otherwise, I wondered what they’d think of Ronan? It’s a saint’s name and fits the rules, and is so similar to Rowan but is a boy’s name rather than a unisex name. There’s also the Irish surname Rohan, which can be said the same as Rowen and is exclusively male as far as I know (helped by the fact that it’s also an Indian male name, and there’s also the cool tidbit that it’s a Lord of the Rings name which, I mean, come on. So cool) (in the case of LOTR it’s pronounced RO-han, with the H voiced, like “hand” without the “d,” rather than RO-en/RO-wen, like Rowan).

The other ideas they had for boys were good for me to know too, as they provided good inspiration for coming up with new ideas.

So you all know that I almost always start a consultation by looking up in the Baby Name Wizard all the names the parents have used and those they like/are considering as it lists, for each entry, boy and girl names that are similar in terms of style/feel/popularity. I tried to find all the two-syllable five-letter ends-in-n names that I could find that I thought fit Amy and her husband’s Celtic-y style, but I also included a couple that broke one or another of the rules:

(1) Eamon
This is the Irish for Edmund, said AY-men. This was on my list for a long time, I love it! Danielle Bean has an Eamon.

(2) Dylan
Dylan’s such a fun name — it entered the top 1000 in 1966 (thank you Bob Dylan, who took his inspiration for this stage name from poet Dylan Thomas) and went from #115 in 1989 to #28 in 1992 (pretty sure it was the airing of Beverly Hills 90210 in 1990 that caused that jump) — but this classic Welsh name has stayed in the 20s and 30s ever since and is popular all over the world. It’s a great option for this family!

(3) Tobin
Tobin’s from an English surname, which came from the biblical name Tobias, so it’s kind of like a combo of Gavin’s and Ethan’s styles — I love that kind of thing!

(4) Rylan
There’s not much to know about Rylan as far as I can tell from my research, but it has an Irishy sound and I have a cousin named Rylan (twin of Sean) who’s really cool and smart, so it has good associations for me.

(5) Owen
Owen is my first rule breaker—it’s four letters instead of five. But if they’re going to break a rule, Owen’s a great one to do it with, because it fits so well their style otherwise: it’s listed as a style match for Gavin and Ethan both! It was actually the first name I thought of as I was reading Amy’s email, and when I saw that Michael would be the middle name I had to laugh because my newest nephew is Owen Michael! Awesome name.

(6) Conor or Colum
Some more rule-breakers here! I always think of Conor as similar to Colin, so maybe Amy’s hubs won’t like it, but it’s such a handsome name. And Colum’s even closer to Colin sound-wise, but is a variant of Columba — as in the awesome Irish saint — and it means “dove” so I think it could also be considered a Holy Spirit name!

(7) Lucas
Finally, Lucas, only because Amy said she really likes Luke but d0esn’t like how it runs into her K- last name. Lucas avoids that, and also gives them a five-letter two-syllable name.

And those are all my ideas for this family! What do you all think? What five-letter two-syllable ends-in-n name(s) would you suggest for the little brother of Gavin and Ethan?

55 thoughts on “Baby name consultant: Lots of rules for Boy No. 3!”

  1. If she’s determined to keep her theme, I would add the suggestion of Roman.

    However I want to put out there that the 3rd boy is a good time to break one, two, or all three of their rules as I can only imagine how hard completing this pattern will be if they keep having boys. Two is coincidence; three is a pattern. I mention this because my fun boys’ theme got a whole lot trickier with the arrival of boy #5 and I can only imagine the corner I might be in if we are blessed with boys 6, 7 or even 8.

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    • I was going to say Roman, too! And yes, with so many rules having 3 will certainly set a pattern. I have friends with 3 boys all ending in “n”: E@ston, Corb!n & Br@nson. Totally breaks the 5 letters rule, and Easton & Ethan are pretty close…what a challenge! Lots of my “n” names have 6+ letters: Nathan, Braden, Benjamin…oh!! I have heard the boy name Galen! (No idea meaning, etc.) Galen Michael sounds nice. Too close to Gavin, though? I’m thinking of, “and these are our boys, Gavin, Ethan and Galen” –too close? It’s almost like “our boys, Gavin, Ethan and Easton”

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      • Choosing a name that ends in -n but has more/less than two syllables as well as two syllable names that don’t end in -n are both great ways to break out of theme if they’d like to while still sticking pretty close to what they’ve already done, nice ideas!

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  3. Urban!!!!

    I so love Eamon, though! My brother’s friend’s dad is Eamon Boyle and we have a friend at our parish who has revitalized our 6-12th grades youth programs named Eamon Essex — GREAT associations!

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  4. Other ideas: Becan, Bjorn, Bohan, Byron, Cleon, Conan, Coton, Devin/Devon, Donan, Haven, Hogan, Irvin, Jeton, Kevin?, Orion, Piran, Simon, Tegan, Titan

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  5. Personally, I would consider breaking the rules. I wouldn’t have noticed the things that they see in common so it wouldn’t be a big deal. And if they’re feeling boxed in now with just number 3, what happens if they have more?

    Your suggestion of Owen would be the perfect way to break it. 2 syllables, ends in N but only 4 letters!

    I don’t have a ton of suggestions for them. I like Elijah for them but that could be breaking the patter WAY too much for them to consider (and by WAY too much I mean completely ignoring the rules, lol)

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  6. Declan came to mind, also, but it’s 6 letters.

    I’m with those above who encouraged breaking the pattern, though, so they won’t feel boxed in if they have more boys after these three.

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  8. I’m too stubborn to have broken our rules here, BUT if they do by adding a letter/letters there are a TON of great names with 2+ syllables ending in -n!

    Pontain, Jothan, Julian, Martin, Fabian, Severin/Sevrin, Johann, Lucian, Cyprian, Baithin, Baldwin, Bassian,
    Brychan, Caspian, Cassian, Canaan, Dorian, Duncan, Dunstan, Finnian, Fintan, Florian, Jameson, Joaquin, Joplin, Lachlan, Langston, Lennon, Maximilian, Milan, Morrison, Nolan, Orson, Reason, Reuben, Samson, Savion, Simeon, Solomon, Tarquin, Tennyson, Thurman, Truman, Twain, Valentin, Walden, Zebulon

    Just noticed the 83rd Pope was named Conon!

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  9. As others have said, the third baby (on earth) is a good one in which to break the pattern, or at least modify it a little! That would be a hard pattern to stick to, I think.

    Ian is two syllables and ends in ‘n’, but it doesn’t fit the five-letter rule. Still, I really like Ian Michael. Ivan is another that might work.

    A friend of mine has a son named Ivan (he’s Ivan Paul, in honor of JPII (her son was born in Ukraine so she wanted to give a nod to his heritage).

    I think Liam would go very well with the sibset, too.

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  10. I’d add Seton and Ruben to the list.
    I think that you and your husband are so close with the Nicholas/Colin combo. I would reconsider names with strong L/C sounds that may not meet your rules, like the suggested Lucas. Other contenders may be Cole, Colby, Colton, Lincoln, Declan, Lachlan, etc.

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  12. My favorite for them would be Declan, but it’s six letters… I like your suggestion of Owen!
    What about Aiden? Too close to their angel baby, Auden? Love this challenge! !

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  13. My first thought to go with her current boy names was Sean. They could spell it Shawn then it would only be breaking the two syllables rule. And it means “gift from God” 🙂

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  15. I love the suggestions of Roman, Urban, and Conan! Although it’s 6 letters, if she likes Luke I would suggest Lucian. It ends in N and has a two syllable pronunciation (LOO-shun).

    As for names that fit THE RULES, I like Kevin, Brian, Logan, Edwin, Kiran, Nolan, and Orson. They all have Celtic-y sounds and would go great with Michael in the middle spot.

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  16. i think their rules are strict but not impossible to keep using since there are SO MANY names ending in -n, and lots of them have 2 syllables. Maybe the 5 letters rule is one I would break now.

    One thing to consider is the ending of their names: -in, -an, -en. I think it would be pretty cool if they could find a name ending in -on, like eamon, aaron, anton, alton, ashton, byron, damon, gideon, orion, simon, samson. Then they could start again If they ever have a 5th child?

    Or maybe they could find a name ending in -en to honour the child they lost? rowen, ruben, soren, holden. Galen means calm, healer, which would be such a good meaning for a rainbow baby.

    Basically I would avoid names ending in -in and -an. I love Anton, Ashton, Byron, Simon, Rowen, but Galen is probably my favourite for them.

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  17. Amy, the reasoning behind Alden’s name is so moving! Just beautiful!
    About the rules: make sure you choose a name because you love it, not just because it follows the rules. And that can be hard after 4 ou 5 boys. I think if you choose a 6 letter name but that follows all the other rules it won’t have a diferente feel from the others. I love Martin next to the other boys’ names.
    But there are a lot of great 5 letter options: Simon, Brian, Rowen (Owen with an R to make it a 5 letter name!), Logan, Jason, Ruben…

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