I'll get my coat.

Eric?

Freya and Theo and they seem to scan okay with Merrick.

If you like Freya for a girl, how about Fran for a boy? (going with my ear here)

Merrow (also for a girl - means mermaid - altho too many Rs? Merrow Merrick?)

Continuing the north of the border theme, I quite like Nechtan (for a boy, Pictish king from back in the day)

Or given where we are, Mark David Merrick? (Or Hepworth Ellen Merrick?)

:-)

James Anthony Merrick (Jam), He'll go to Eton
Rosie Elizabeth Merrick (REM) - She'll be shiny and happy

Worked for us! Best of luck.

Humphrey Lionel?

bro'-in-law's Christian name is Merrick. Merrick Merrick might be a bit Catch 22 though.

Not John if it's a boy. Obviously. Unless he's good with building churches out of matchsticks.

I think when the surname has a strong sound at the end (i.e. "ick") you should opt for a softer ending to the Christian name. As Merrick is derived from Welsh, for boys you could have Brynn, Ioan or Taryn etc. and for a girl Aerona, Elin or Iola etc.

after Bristol City's captain in the legendary first division days?

What do you mean, no? At least give it some thought!

if it's a boy. Jack was my late dad's name and is also my nephew's son's name.
Jack Merrick has a good blokey ring to it and is unlikely to cause him trouble in later life.
Suitable girl's names are proving much trickier. I think I'll leave it to someone else.

There is a tradition in some parts of naming a male child after the father's father and a female child after the mother's mother. How does that work out for you? Also another (from the US?) of using the mother's maiden name as a christian name for boys. Sources of middle names, if nothing else.

Levon for a boy
Giverny for a girl

I'm a fan of names that are old fashioned but not self consciously so. The Brontë thing was one of those things that wasn't exactly on purpose or an accident: we were aware, obviously, but we didn't care! It just turned out that way.

For boys I think you have to go a long way to beat William, but maybe I'm biased: my dad, his dad and every one of our male antecedents going back to the 18th century have had a William in their names. My dad looked it up.

Just don't do what a twattish ex colleague did: the Geldof route. His kids are called Heathen and Cinnamon. I shit you not.

My daughter is Charlotte and has become a real Charlie. We wanted to call her Lottie as the short version, and it stuck until we got a grip of her personality and Charlie it is.

A name that can be varied is useful - you can shorten it or change it to match their personality as it develops.

Boy: Gabriel (although there is the issue of toughing out the obvious nick name/taunts) or Niall

Girl: I like Mercedes, but Madonna nicked it. Grace is nice too. Or if you wanna go all Celtic, Anwen (which usefully shortens to Annie)

which to me always seems to add, umm, a certain 'je ne sais quois' to the sound of the whole name. Hence our girls are Madeleine and Lucie - Mad & Loopy as I sometimes address them, in my lovable doting Dad way. 'Lucie' lends itself to pet names (Lulu, Lou)that aren't too cutesy or annoying to the owner.

When I was a kid all the grandads were called Alf, Ted, Wilf, and Harry, while old grannies were called names like Cecily, Lily, Ruby or Jessica. So the names were all seen as old fashioned. Now that generation are dead, suddenly their names are peculating up the popularity lists as they are seen as Proper Traditional Like and have no real associations with old blokes in sheds or biddies with hairnets and aprons.

In 50 years time I wouldn't be surprised if names like Wayne, Kevin, Dean, Lisa, Deborah, and Dawn will resurface for the same reasons.

wanted to go for names that didn't reflect the times we are living in, so they wouldn't sound stupid in 10 or 20 years. So our youngest is called Kate and yes I admit, the lovely Ms Bush was a major influence. Our 16 year old is called James, after Paul McCartney. James Merrick sounds pretty good to me.

Me too, my wife is also due in April. We had picked Helena if were to be a girl, ( tis a boy )so you can have it if you want.

and decided that whatever we chose would have to be adaptable in future so that our first born would be able to shorten or customise their own name according to their personality, so things like Charlotte and Elizabeth and Catherine were all discussed at length. Then when the midwife asked what we were going to call him we mentioned a few names we'd been through and at the mention of 'Archie' he opened his eyes for the first time and looked at the pair of us in turn. So he's stuck with it now.

Vyvyan Neil Merrick

Grace gets called, naturally, Gracie.
Emilia gets called Mili, Mils, The Milster, and most frequently, OI EMILIA GET DOWN FROM THERE RIGHT NOW.

I also absolutely love Poppy for a girl... would have used it for one of our girls, but we have a flowery surname so that would have sounded ridiculous.

For a boy, I particularly like Joshua, Nathan, Noah.

Congratulations!

When we had our first, we discussed baby names with my wife's sister because we were struggling. As we shared our shortlist with her, she strongly vetoed most of them based on awful school friends etc. We weren't actually giving her voting rights but we felt that we had to scrap our shortlist after that. Luckily, little Limahl is thriving.

...has always sworn blind that he plans to have six kids, every one of whom, regardless of gender, he plans to name Clive.

than Mr and Mrs Hunt, the parents of the Huddersfield midfielder in today's Arsenal match, who seem to have been sucking nitrous oxide on the afternoon they decided to name their beatiful new arrival... Jack.

a boy and a girl, which made the naming thing pretty simple - we used both the ones we came up (we didn't know we were getting one of each, we were just crap at coming up with more than 2 names fo reach sex).

So they became Anya Grace and Ellis Alexander. I reckon Anya works well with Merrick. Not sure about Ellis but Alexander is pretty good.

Good luck with everything by the way. And cherish that sleep your currently having.

and my daughter is called Josie.
We ruled out Sir Francis, Charlie and Vera early on because of our surname.

are Emma (7) and Holly (3).

At the moment Emma is Em and Holly, by virtue of being a bit of a bruiser, is known as The Hol(l)ster. The other day Holly asked us what a "human" was so we told her that she, Emma, her mum and I were "humans". She thought about this for a moment and then said "I'm not a human, I'm a Holly" and that pretty much sums up how she is right now. Emma is just a wonderful enigma, like an elusive butterfly: as her father I kid myself that I've caught on to her flightpath but then as soon as I've cupped my palms she flutters away leaving me empty-handed once again. Lucky for me she lets me catch her once in a while but she's old beyond her years and I'm dreading the day when she'll fly away and not look back.

liked girls with boy's names. It must be something of a weakness as I have had flings long and short term with a Stevie, a Bobbie (American, naturally), a Nicky, and an Alex.

For children's names I think you can be quite experimental with girls names but do think that boys names need to be solid and blokey.

Lee - Lee Merrick - has a poetical ring to it.

Sounds like a guitarist in a Smiths/Velvets band
or a journalist (and/or superhero)

Sebastian and Lillian.

So it's Bathsheba if it's a girl and Nebuchadnezzar if it's a boy. I bet they'd be the only one in their class.

a few suggestions....

of the Oscar for best actress in a leading role is....

Jessica Merrick (much cheering from the Massive)

Much better than my initial thought of offering Rowen, Damia, Laria, Holly, Kura or Maiha. They have all been the names of my last 6 dogs.

Or Lilith

when expecting twins 21 years ago my husband was adamant that their names were to be Bryan (Robson) and Norman (Whiteside), well i put my foot down (Sean and Lara) but he stills calls our daughter Norman!

Obviously. I have spent the last twenty year trying to get one of my friends to call their child Jo/e. Not one of them has.

Siobhan, Niamh, Sinead etc. Trouble is, no-one can speak or spell them properly.
We have no regrets with our two girls, Ailsa and Esme. Esme Merrick scans nicely.

...or too obvious either.

We thought of some great names for our first born. But having gone to the christening of some friends children - Yasonte(!?) and Cinnamon - we rethought.

- don't pick a name that stands out too much unless you think your child will benefit from heavy duty teasing at school
- don't pick a name that will make them grimace when they hand in their passport
- give them a name that they can shorten and lengthen at their will. It works for us. When their full name is used they know they're in trouble.
- avoid alliteration at all costs
- do NOT call your son Merrick. That sort of thing only works if your sons turn out to be England international footballers. (I'm thinking Neville of course)

Came across a West London mum with kids called Tarragon and Thyme recently. Seriously. Don't even think about it.

I was all for Saiorse for our wee one - I've always thought it a lovely name with a great meaning (freedom), plus a nod to my Irish heritage. However it has political overtones (it became a popular name after the Easter uprising) and, possibly more problematic, people over here might struggle to pronounce it...

Is Ben with second name John for my late Dad. Suits him fine. Benjamin at disciplinary moments. Never Benny. Good solid name for a lad.

As I have said elsewhere he was going to be Lowell for about 5 nanoseconds before the word No reached me from Mrs T.

.....after my two favourite muses.

favourite films is "Love & Death", I've always had a liking for the name Nehamkin, though I realise it's probably not a good one to saddle a child with.

Perhaps you could get a cat instead?

Make sure you give them two middle names, this lifts them above the hoy poloy. Mine are Evelyn Martha Mae amd Theo Edward James.

The parents are very earnest, sincere and somewhat churchy. Their surname is Dix. Or Cox. I can't remember. I'll check tomorrow. Anyway.

Their son is called Isaac.

The teachers have to suppress a fit of the giggles every time they read the register. The sad thing is that you can't blame the parents who are just too innocent to comprehend what they have done.

Lots of suggestions there (and lots of jokes): we are truly thankful.

I'll be sure to let you all know in April what we decide on!

After today's news, I'm thinking either Jack or Meg, in tribute...

(Oh no you don't - FPO)

are a great source of inspiration....we love Leonard Cohen....so after finding only half a dozen or so womens names mentioned by old "Laughin Len" rather surprisingly-given his reputation, we went with Alexandra....which is great we think...and suits her perfectly. Len himself has Adam and Lorca,.....Lorca after the Spanish poet.

Just a quick note to say thanks to everyone for all the suggestions when I started this thread earlier this year.

The long wait was finally over at 7:24am this morning when my wife gave birth to a massive (10lb 8) baby boy: Harris Jack Merrick. (Notice we just ignored all the suggestions above)

Anyway, I'll make sure I get him a Word subscription in about 16 years time!

... to the Merricks!

Blimey.

He'd have made Mrs Merrick's eyes water just a tad.

And you'll be off games for more than a couple of weeks, Mr Merrick.

Hope the wee lad gives you both much joy. He'll need lots of feeding so don't be afraid of turning to the bottle. And Harris might want some as well.

That's a unibody twin surely? All the very best wishes to all of you.

in more ways than one!

Congratulations!

...this thread.

If you have a last minute change of heart you could always call him Richard Ap Merrick - after the little-known Welsh merchant who funded John Cabot's 1497 voyage west... and whose name, in some circles, is the origin of 'America'.

If nothing else it'd be a good dinner party anecdote in 30 years time.