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You are pretty dialed in to the sort of boy names I am drawn to. It is a very narrow band, hard to characterize and much more difficult for me than girl names. Some old longtime favorites among your girl suggestions. Thanks!

Thanks for some suggestions a bit off the beaten path! Quite a few family names among them. Always nice to have some backup/know I’m not too out of bounds in my naming tendencies.

Thanks. Susanna is a beautiful name that I always linger over, but the sounds unfortunately don’t work with our surname. I think Alasdair (preferred spelling) is very handsome, but fear it’s too specifically “ethnic” paired with our already “ethnic” (of another sort) surname.

Thank you. Have a huge soft spot for both Enid (Arthurian!) and Edith, but unfortunately they don’t work super well in our situation.

Thanks for the vote of confidence. I agree it’s a lot of syllables. It gets trickier the deeper one has to dig among names for a given s*x!

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You list many names that I admire and have rolled around in my head for consideration. I prefer female names with some substance that also are not derivations of male names, so that tends to exclude a lot of lovely names.

Fair enough and thanks! It seems to me many people dislike the “ag” sound, although overall I find the name to be quite soft and gentle. The saint is of particular significance to me and my daughters for heritage and health reasons.

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I have thought about Sibyl/Sybil as well as Sylvia/Silvia/Sylvie, but tend to feel like those names echo another daughter’s name too similarly.

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As for the characters, I am trying to preserve some shred of privacy from searches.

I like that the “o” makes the pronunciation very definitive, but five syllables is something else. (I don’t like how unclear the pronunciation of Eleanor is, for example.) Florence (Flossie!) has been in the running since my very first child, but obviously has never made the cut. Adore Nina!

You seem to have my number. I remember seriously considering Adelaide at one point. When I’m getting carried away I get way too medieval (Hildegard, Walpurga, Eulalia), but I try to rein in my worst impulses. :) I have been saving this boy name for a long time. Almost gave it as a middle to my son (it is a family name), but realized I love it so much that I needed to save it in case there ever were another boy. I have spent a long time pondering, and there is nothing that has ever come close. It could be the number one baby boy name in the country, and I’d still use it! Which makes me wonder what I’d name a third? Andrew? Nicholas? Gregory? Geoffrey? I love somewhat unusual names like Benedict and Constantine and Conrad but they feel a bit much even for me. Once upon a time had considered Magnus nn Gus.

Interestingly I have gotten quite a bit of pushback and skepticism on all of my kids’ names. Particularly (believe it or not) over the presence of “fred” in a female name. So it’s nice for a change to see the girls’ names described as “fashionable”! Your point on not wishing that name for yourself is well taken.

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In our family we tend to go by our full names, so five syllables is a lot. My own namesake had that name as a middle, and I’m fairly certain its position as such was influenced by the multiple Swedish royals who also had it as a second name.

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Valentina is an intriguing option on several levels. Haven’t given that one a lot of thought in recent years. Have a soft spot for Frances because I adore Fanny (staying in keeping I guess with my ill-advised instincts). Thanks!