Family surname as baby's first name. Your thoughts please...

[Helzapoppin]

Hi,

We have some lovely girl's names for DC2 due in August, thanks in part to Mumsnet advice. However, boy's names are proving tricky. We like few boy's names in the first place and the ones we do like have no real 'meaning' for us (I have a penchant for Scandanavian names, DH says I should have married a Dane!). Anyway, DH has suggested using a surname from his side of the family as a boy's first name (it has been done before in his family, there is a bit of a tradition of it).

The name is Sandcroft, and I guess we could shorten it to Sandy.

Any thoughts about this name/using family surnames as first names in general (I like the sound of the name, but it feels a little Victorian and aristocratic, which the name and the ancestors are, but we are very much not!)?

Thanks :)

Nooooo

hth :o

You will be sending him to a top prep school, won't you?

Not keen on Sandy.

Terrible imho - sorrry.

Because if you send him to any old school the other mums on the playground may will snigger when you introduce him.

"It sounds like the name of a bungalow in Mablethorpe" Very true.

Was going to say I love this idea - then saw the name and not sure it really works as s first nsme

Oh well, back to the drawing board I suppose! TBH I wasn't at all sure when he said it, but I thought that I should give it a chance!
Thanks :)

I think you've had lots of thoughts already but to me Sandcroft sounds like a rich character out of American teen novels think Sweet Valley High.

Sorry it sounds like a B&B in Blackpool tbh.

In general I love the idea. But only the idea. Not if it's to be carried out with that name!

(Trying to convince DH that Ramsay is nice enough to use for a first or middle...)

In principle I like the idea - family surnames are often used as middle names in certain cultures.

My DS has the middle name Reeve, which was his great nan's surname.

Sandcroft though? No, sorry :( you could just have Sandy?

My pet hate is surnames as first names.

Fine as a middle name; terrible as a first name

I think some surnames work - Hunter, Wilson, Harrison, Bailey, Morgan

However some don't - Guest, Banks, Wood, Sandcroft

Tbh I don't even like it as a middle name. Would possibly be ok for. a boy, but it's too harsh for a girl IMHO

You just can't call a child 'Sandcroft'. It sounds like the name of a bungalow in Mablethorpe.

That is one of the funniest things I have ever read on MN.

Actually OP, what about Mablethorpe? Sounds like the baddie in a Wilkie Collins novel, but in a good way.

Giving family surnames as first names was the traditional way of naming in the past. We almost did it for DS2, but he got my maiden name as his middle name instead.

Sandy is not nice imo, sorry.

It's like Gladstone imo. You read it in a Jane Austen novel and it seems like a really good idea, but then people think you or your kid are up yourselves in the Victorian way and he gets bullied.

It could be okay in a posher area, but chavs certainly aren't going to like it.
I like the name, but for these reasons I think it should be resigned to middle name status if you actually want to use it.

Sandy is cute, but Sandcroft? Hell NO.

I would use my maiden name as it sounds very similar to an established first name, so I'm not opposed to the principle, but the 'croft' at the end puts me right off Sandcroft.

Any other potentially suitable surnames?