Anya or Maya - cast your votes please ladies :)

[scoobysu]

So I think we are down to two names for our DD due in May. Would love to know which you prefer - Anya (nn Annie) or Maya?

Anya, definitely. Also like Anja spelling but that would probably confuse people as it's a forrin spelling and people seem unable cope with that. (

Anya - the world doesn't need any more Mayas, even though it's a lovely name.

Anya - although I prefer the spelling Anja

I've only ever heard Maya pronounced My-a. Lots of different spellings.

Maya. Pronounced May-ya.

Maia nicer spelling I think

Maya but said like Migh-ya.

Marjolaine just curious... What does 'legitimately never heard anyone' mean?

smug at the fist of sounding like Katie Hopkins, as soon as you start messing around with spelling you start to sound common, IMHO.

I prefer Maya to Anya.

I find Anya ugly (sorry to owners of same). Maya is okay.

i think both are lovely.
maya should be pronounced my-ah, and is very cross-cultural (the sounds work in almost every language), if that matters to you.

FinallyMrsFC I just mean, I've never heard anyone say May-a and I didn't think this was a "real" pronunciation!

Double post to say that Maia is a legitimate spelling; it's a Greek goddess (plus a star, a few places in the world, there's a dinosaur called maiasaura...)

Annie.
I wouldn't choose either of the other two.

I've heard Mi-ya more than May-ya. But I think either are just as real. Like Ant-ony and Anth-only.

Whatever the parents decide. I stand by the misspelling though.

FWIW, I prefer Maya to Anya, but personally I prefer a name with more pronounced consonants.

I'd pronounce it My-a. May-a makes me think of May I jokes.

So my vote goes for Anya.

Like Anya lots x

Thanks everyone, really appreciate all of your comments. I think we're heading towards Anya as our name but will wait to meet her now to make sure it suits. We will call her Annie as a nn which I love but like Anya as a name she can grow into :) x

Anya definitely, it's gorgeous!

Maya is nice too but more popular and I think as people have already said, it could be pronounced in different ways.
I would say Maya as May-a, Mya or Maia as My-a, and Mia as Me-a.

Anya and Annie are both lovely.

We are definitely settled on Anya now...phew! Just hope DD suits the name when she arrives :)

Do you think we could use May/Mae as a middle name, so Anya Mae? Would that work?

Names we would have liked to used for possible middle names would be Ruby, Lilian/Lily or Daisy to honour family members, but I don't think any of these would work.

Unfortunately I know of loads of Mayas and Anyas, beautiful names but are becoming very frequently used.

I'd avoid Mae....practically every child has Mae as a middle name. If you do use it, I much prefer May as more classic.

Anya

Actually I think you need a longer middle name as I'm not sure two short names match as well, e.g. Anya Elizabeth.