Did you get compliments on your name choice?

Yes I did. I got that’s unusual too.

it was way out of the top 100.

it’s not top ten.

My older 3 children have traditional classic names, but for my 4th I wanted something different.
I loved the name while pregnant, and when he was born it suited him perfectly.
I had heard it from a childhood storybook.

Turned out it's that name that gets reels of hate on mumsnet. I was bombarded with the chv word (that word still makes me cringe).
I was post natal at the time and my baby was in PICU fighting for his life.
Thankfully he recovered, but my mental health was ruined. It got to the point where I almost changed his name.
I'm glad I didn't.

He's a teenager now and loves his name as much as I do.

Thank you I feel like popularity does take away from it abit

Exactly.

Also, some people have very different tastes than us, so we wouldn’t actually want them to genuinely love our name choices!

Or that we have different perspectives on the bar?

Nobody liked the name we picked. But we love it. It’s not out there, it’s fairly traditional but not in the top 100

We got quite a few for DD2's name - quite classic, top 100 - along the lines of "how lovely, I considered that for my DD..." etc.

Dd1's name is classic too but sometimes referred to as "dated" on here. Comments were more like "Aww, lovely, haven't heard that one for a while!" 😁

No matter, we (and DDs, so far!) love their names.

Yes but I’ve also told many people “awww what a lovely name” while secretly hating it, so I didn’t read too much in to people complimenting my choice!

The only one of my children's names that was complimented was also the one that some didn't like.

It would not be liked on MN as seen as a surname/American. But it was well received by people in Scotland where we live. Much less so by my English family.

We gave DS2 such a common name that we got loads of compliments from about 6 different adults we know with the same name confirming that it is, indeed, the best name.

That’s a pretty low bar… just goes to show how we all define differently what constitutes a great/beautiful name!!

Yes, her name isn't even in the top 4000 and everyone has always reacted positively.

Define ‘compliments’?

Also, some people’s tastes are so different (bad!) that I’d rather they don’t like my name choices. I wouldn’t like theirs either 😊

I don’t think popularity takes away from beauty- Olivia is so popular because it is beautiful and timeless.

My Mother said on hearing DD’s name “ I suppose I’ll get used to it “ it’s an uncommon name but I think lovely, she came to like it as it suited DD as her personalty emerged.

My dd is Olivia we got a lot of compliments about how beautiful it was . (Three years later it was the number 1 name)
mmy ds has a very cute surname so with his first we got a lot of awww how sweet.

Yes, with DS (now 16) lots of people made comments- it was a biblical name that at the time was not in fashion at all… So it seemed to get positive comments for being unusual but not made up or completely out there…

Unfortunately it then became SUPER popular (he jokes he was a trend setter), and became the number 1 name for many years…

Yes it’s Noah. He’s the only one in his year at school. There are millions of them in his siblings primary school…

My boys have very 'usual', top 100 names My girls have more unusual, and very much not in the top 100 names. Two of them (still, and they are in their 30's) get compliments on their names, the third constantly has her name misunderstood as a Welsh word, but goes by a diminutive of her name anyway - also unusual.

They have their father's very very boring surname, and they've all loved having names that have meant they've not been 'one of ten' in their school, unlike their brothers!

Should point out that none of them have 'made up' names/names that are hard to spell/hyphenated or otherwise filled with punctuation names.

I’ve had a few over the years that have seemed really genuine- like mentioning her name in passing and being asked to repeat it and then getting a compliment.
But, when it appears on MN it is never in a positive light! But I adore it and I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

Gary, Sharon and Tracey will be back, and will seem fresh and charming to a new generation of parents, once the current crop of Garys, Sharons and Traceys have died off. The reason so many older people hated the trend for Edith, Violet, Stanley, Ivy, Mabel, Arthur, Reggie, Bertie etc is that for their generation, those names were Gary and Tracey.

No, all four grandparents hated it, but given the generic names they called their children, I would have expected no different. My parents think all children should just be called John, Tom, Mary and Ann or such.

And honestly, even in somewhat less 'magnolia paint' circles, naming tastes differ hugely. My NCT group/people I used to meet at NCT coffee mornings in London included babies called Thiago, Ferdinand, Elsie, Lasairfhíonn, Rhadisat, Phineas, Nelly and Ace.

Both are complemented a lot, often by strangers who happen to hear us say them.

Neither are off the wall, but also not particularly common. They’re rare enough that we comment when we come across another child with those names.

But in the end, we like them. And I think as long as you don’t go for something ridiculous (creates something unfortunate with the initials or surname, or spells David Dhayfhfhfhuud or similar), it doesn’t really matter.

at some point, loads of people must have thought Gary / Sharon / Tracey / Wayne were lovely names. I don’t recall coming across a baby named one of those since the 80s

I don’t remember getting compliments and I don’t comment or compliment names either.

Congrats on the baby, what’s their name, oh wonderful, hope you’re doing ok……

Define “compliments” - somebody saying “oh what a lovely name” is just politeness.

“Oh what an unusual name!” means “omg what made you call him that!” 🤣

Classics

loads of compliments for not going for silly made up or Americanised names