Ella, Evelyn, Elizabeth, Ava or Anna!

[Sandydunes]

Please help me decide as I am about to give birth any day now and am getting sick of thinking about these names...they are all starting to blur!

I have a gut feeling of my two favourites and OH likes another two better so would love some outside opinions.

The middle name would be either Margaret or Claire.

Thanks in advance for all your honest opinions!

I love Ella, I know it's popular, DD2 is Eleanor but Ella at home. She had a choice which name to use when she started school and chose Ella. Sometimes she uses her long name (mostly when she wants to look grown up!)
Anna is timeless
I agree (sadly) with others that Evie is v.v.poplular - but hey, so's Ella!

Anna - it is beautiful, timeless and I don't know any little Annas.

Don't see the attraction of Evelyn personally though it seems quite popular currently and agree there will be pronounciation confusion and it will inevitably be shortened to Evie.

I like Ella, but it is v popular, although I think it may be falling outof fashion now, don't really encounter many babies named this, mainly slightly older girls.

Don't like the name Elizabeth it feels too unwieldy, although agree some shortenings are nice but am not a fan of shortened names. I do love both Eliza and Beth though.

Ava -pretty but very popular

In summary, I would go for Anna

Elizabeth and Ava are my favourites from your list. Ava is very popular now though so I would probably go for Elizabeth. I love the nn Eliza too.

I might be rather biased though - DH has just agreed Elizabeth as a middle name for DC2 if it's a DD and I am over the moon!

Anna or Elizabeth for me, preferably the former. I love Anna, it's elegant and timeless. I do know one little one, and always think that it is a great name to serve a girl and then a woman her whole life through.

Anna - timeless, elegant, wonderful.

Anna Margaret is fab.

we were going to have evelyn. I think it's a lovely name

Evelyn is lovely

Anna

I think Anna and Elizabeth are in another league to Ava and Ella. The sound of all four names is quite nice but Anna and Elizabeth are timeless names whereas Ava and Ella are the Claire and Louise of the new generation. They are everywhere and of course they will date.

Ava is also massively popular in the US at the moment so it will date globally.

I cannot decide what I think of Evelyn. I keep thinking of Waugh and can't seem to get beyond that.

I considered all of those names for my DD (went with something else though).

Evelyn was my favourite, but I decided against because I didn't want the confusion over how to pronounce it. A minor detail though.

I had a shortlist of 3/4 by the time she was born, and didn't know the sex of the baby beforehand. We decided quickly which name she 'was' once I could see her little face, and her middle name just came to me there and then and wasn't one we'd previously thought of. Maybe just wait until you have a face to put to the name and go with your gut?

Love all the names on your list, although Anna and Evelyn are my favourites. Could you use Linny as a nn for Evelyn?

I have an Ella; there really aren't many round here, there is only one other in her whole school (put in the same class!)
Ella Margaret/Evelyn Margaret are both lovely.

Oh darnit, maybe I shouldn't have hoped for a unanimous verdict on this one. Now I'm even more confused :o

But am really enjoying reading everyone's opinions....

Peeriebear, to be honest those two were my gut feeling names!

I don't mind not using a NN for them, would be happy to have the full name

Similar to names I am considering for DC2 should it be a girl.

Maggie, Eliza, Ellie, Eva.

Quite liking Eliza at the moment.

But that's probably not much help

Oh Anna definitely - lovely name. Margaret over Claire as a middle name - unless you have a particularly sweet tooth - an eclair!

E-clair, didn't even think of that Doretaball!

Evelyn or Anna. Like both equally. Ella is lovely but too common for me. I know a couple of evelyn's both over 50 who don't shorten to anything and if I had that name i wouln't shorten it to anything either.
For middle names, love Claire, dislike Margaret (have an irrational dislike of Margaret and Martha, not sure why, think of boring librarians)

Mine is an Anna Claire, think her middle name has been used once - when she was baptised My older childrens middle names are never used either, in fact if I hadn't been using family names I don't think I'd bother with middle names.

I have a little girl called Evelyn (pronounced eve-lyn not ev-lyn) so that's obviously my favourite. I agree Evie is really common at the moment, but she's not ever called that. She's also the only one at her nursery/toddler groups etc - in fact I've only ever met old ladies called the same and people always comment on what a lovely name it is.
Elisabeth's nice enough but a bit bland, same as Anna really. Ella and Ava are both nice too, I'd go for either of those three!

I have an Evalyn. When my dd was born we went for Evelyn but wanted it pronounced ev-Lin. We ended up changing the spelling to try and get people to pronounce it properly. I know some people don't agree with chaging the spelling but we love it! I don't know any other little ones with the name Evelyn. Good luck

My dd Anna is nearly 5 and we love her name. Have only met one other and had so many compliments........

Anna. No question.

I love Evelyn, then Anna. The others on your list are a bit ugly IMO. If you and DH like Ella but worry about it being too common, how about Etta? puts to top of list for possible DC2 Or based on your choices, Eleanor, Eleanora, Evangeline, Annabel, Elana, Elaine?