How did you choose your child's name?

When choosing our son's name before he was born, I would go to baby name forums like babyzone.com for other people's point of view on the list of names I had. I would get their honest opinion and I like opinions. I also got inspired by a soap opera actor's name and another celebrities name and we decided to name our son that. The middle name that we came up with complemented the first name very well. When the birth registrar was signing our son's birth certificate, she said that our son's name sounded like a movie star :-) See I love those kinds of feedback!

My daughter was born in France so I wanted her to be called Janine which is a French name. While I was in the hospital my husband had to register her birth and he decided, without asking me, to call her Debbie (because he liked Debbie Reynolds) AND the middle name Klara (ugh)his mother's name. I was to say the least furious all I was able to do was have it changed later to Deborah Karla.

Hubby and I discussed alot of names, finally pulled out the Bible and went through the section that has names in it. We settled on a couple that had meanings we liked. My boy was named what I wanted my first boy to be named, happened to be in the Bible too. They sure have lived up to their names. It is just amazing.

Okay I don't have any children but I thought this was a neat topic and wanted to share what I would want to name my kids if I ever get 'em and why. First off my hubby and I would have a world of trouble trying to agree on names if we ever do get/ have kids, especially for a boy. He likes really common names and I like unusual (as my name is very unusual) and non-American names. I just like something a little different and something that there aren't 15 kids in the same grade or class named the same thing. The one common name that I do love is Sara. I've always loved that name ever since I was a baby and even named my first doll that. That's is the ONLY name we can agree on. Meanings and uniqueness are things I look for. If I like the way they sound but I don't like the meaning then they're out. I thought a good compromise would be to name one common name we can agree on and one uncommon name. We can even put the uncommon name in the middle (providing it sounds good) if he wants. He's main thing is to sound professional if need be. And I do pay attention to possible bad nicknames and also how it sounds with our last name. I think both of those things are important. Okay my favorites are: Girls names that I like for the meanings that my hubby hates: Sophia/ Sophie, Brooklyn, Celeste, Olivia, Gwendolyn, Audrina, Aisling, Gwylan, Ava, Aviva, Lakota, Winifred, Jocelyn, Bailey (my maiden name), Lorelai, Heaven Leigh, and my absoulte favorite of all time Morgaine (love The Mists of Avalon and Arthurian legends) . And ones I'm not really sure how he feels about but I think he might go for: Isabelle/ Isabella, Annabelle/ Annabella (special meanings for the belle parts: sisters nickname), Rosalie, and Jolie. For the boys names I like and he don't: Gawain, Desmond, Aiken, Godric, Trenton, Galahad, Tristan, Aiden, Cedric, Braden, Brogan, Finley, Theodore, Sebastain, and my all time favorite Gwydion (again from Mists of Avalon and Morgaine's brother). Names that he might go for are: Lucas, Dante (we had though serious about this one with his middle name - he wants to use his middle name and it would be named after the 2 main characters in clerks), Sydney, Arthur, Frederick, Jacob, Joseph, Gareth, Gavin, Wyatt, Quentin, Patrick, Hayden, and Dylan. His favorite boy names though are Jason and Michael. Those two names are entirely too common for my taste. Especially Michael as I've got 2 family members named that. So my two picks if I had complete control would be Sara Morgaine and Gwydion Randell (or vise versa). But I think the ones that would probably have a shot at being are: Sara Isabelle/a or Sara Annabelle/a and maybe Sara Morgandy for girls. Boys: Sydney Allen (dad's middle name), Dante Randell, Gaerth Randell, Quentin Randell, or Gavin Randell (although Gavin is getting really common). We almost got to adopt twin girls and we had thought we'd name them: Sara Isabelle/a and Cadence Annabelle/a. They're nicknames would have been Sara Belle and Cadie Belle. My sister, me and my hubby all like Cadence. So my sister and I decieded whom ever had a girl first would use the name. It turns out our cousin just had a baby and that's the name she choose unknowingly. So we dedieded one Cadence for the family was enough:)