Cousins with similar names

[Barkermum2024]

Hi all!

i am expecting a baby boy and me and my partner have fallen in love with the name Evan, we’ve been using it to address bump and everything.
however, it randomly popped up in my head that my husband has a nephew called Ethan (they will be first cousins) and now I can’t get it out of my head how similar they sound.
I raised it with hubby but he doesn’t think it’s a problem at all.
I’ve tried to stay open to finding a new name but nothing sounds as good as Evan does to me now.
what do you think? Is it too similar?

for context, we only see Ethan about once or twice a year and his mum and dad are pretty laid back. I’m more worried about what the rest of the family will think. EG, grandad who would have two grandsons called Ethan and Evan.

Non issue

I think it’s fine.

My niece is Eva and her cousin on the other side is Ava and they are only 2 weeks apart and will be in the same class in the same school.

It's fine. Friends of ours had four grandchildren called James amongst their various children.

I have cousins with the same names! A few actually now that I think about it. I don't think Evan and Ethan sound that similar anyway x

You're overthinking this. It's fine.

I think it’s fine too. Those names are different enough so if you love Evan, go for it!

We have cousins in my family that are born the same year, with the names Chris and Christopher. Not a problem at all!

Totally fine. Stick with Evan

It's a completely different name.

I know cousins (the mums are sisters) who have a Leon and a Leo between them

It's never been an issue at all-nobody gets them confused

They are (or where) in the same class at school and it never caused an issue

I also know of siblings who are called Harper and Parker-and another set who are called Noah and Nora-again no issues at all (might be because they are different sexes) but nobody has ever commented or batted an eyelid

It’s fine, don’t overthink it.

To give a slightly different answer, I think that if someone would be annoyed by this it is more of a them problem than a you problem.

I crossed a number of names off my list because they sounded too similar to my niece's name (think Alice/Alex/Elise). We ended up choosing a name which happens to be one of my niece's middle names. Didn't think this would be a problem because nobody cares about middle names and my nephew (niece's brother) has the same first name as another family member.

Well. SIL hasn't spoken to us since our DD was born. Which now makes me feel like it was a complete waste of time and energy crossing any names off our list for her benefit because if someone is reasonable they really won't care about this and if they are not, they would have declared WWIII over some other triviality eventually anyway.

My daughter has two cousins whose names are identical except for one letter (and they rhyme)

They are both lovely names; the only time they would be used together (they are not siblings) would be if my in laws were listing their grandchildren, so not an issue

Totally fine, you're over thinking. Also I absolutely love Evan. It was on my list if I'd have had a boy. Xx

How petty of your SIL!

Had she always been so "difficult"?

We don't really know each other that well, to be honest. She'd been with my BIL for about five years, we live in the same town, but we only saw each other at family events and she didn't really seem particularly interested in socialising with us. So I can't really say much about her character. We never imagined she'd go no contact with us over a middle name though.

I have two cousins called Daniel. No one has ever batted an eyelid really, they get called Danny Man and Danny Boy

I have grandchildren called Olivia and Oliver, it's never been a problem

She sounds ridiculous.

You're totally overthinking. Evan has a very different feel to Ethan. Evan is solid and reliable and Ethan likes interrailing through Europe.

Totally fine! Both lovely names and they have a different sounding E at the start, so even if it did matter, they don’t sound the same.

How old is Ethan?

Children, particularly cousins close in age, can bring families together. I think it could be a pain to have two kids with such similar sounding names somewhere busy or noisy.

Have you seen Ethan...yeah he's over there. But when you get there it's Evan. The person miss heard you.

If there is 8 plus years between them I wouldn't bother too much but much less then yes it could be a royal pitb.

Are you mispronouncing Ethan?

Absolutely fine!

We have a Jack and Zac cousins and also Neve and Eva and Emma and Emily!

Evan and Ethan are completely different, and Evan is lovely!

My cousin and I have names one letter different and it causes no bother at all.