Following on from the bad children's names thread...

[Caligula]

....What names were you tempted to choose for your own children which you reluctantly discarded because you knew it was wrong to name your children solely for your own entertainment, and also because you thought they might get the piss taken out of them or be considered pretentious?

Mine were

Fidel
Vladimir
Padraig
Jesus

Ours were
Scarlett
Harriet
Elise
Grace
Macy
Angelica (wtf was I thinking)
Angel (I blame pg hormones)

trefusis, I had to think and think about "Worse" ...

Willow is charming for a cat, can just imagine her, all slinky and pale. Elias would have to be something off-beat, like an otter.

Astrid
Gabriel
Noah (vetoed by dp)
Vita
Agnes
Dickon (loved the secret garden as a child)

DS was going to be stella if he was a girl, but we didn't use it for dd - we went for something else entirely, somehow it didn't seem 'her' name.

Also: there was a brief thought of Perdita, once, but that's such a sad name.

Just thought of two more sadly rejected
Emile - but we are not French
Hamish - not scottish either

Love them both though

My mum and dads cat is called Willow.

Shes a Devonshire Rex, she is very slink and a gorgeous smokey colour with beautiful eyes.

Love that name.

Bonym, a 'Persephone Gregg' was called while I was in the GP's waiting room yesterday.
The one that got away for me is: Amandine. Gorgeous. In my defence it would have been her middle name. But then we had a boy.
DH had a bit of a thing about 'Pablo'. Only partly a joke -- not least because his surname is comically English-sounding and ends with an 'o' sound. Let's say it's Marlow. Pablo Marlow! I think not.
And Bruno, Inigo, Mungo etc.

I thought Ivan or Ivor were cute for a boy Perhaps it was the hormones.

Briefly liked Phedra (Faydra) for a girl but knew no-one would spell or pronounce it correctly.

oooh Amandine is lovely. We have a french surname and that would go beautifully with it. My first dd has a french name too and it looks and sounds v. pretty.

Having a wicked sense of hunour, we told FIL we were going to call ours Chlamydia Lambrini if it's a girl and Oberon Ichabod if it's a boy. Cue long pause and then a "Oh, Oberon. That's nice. Is it Welsh?" So....no comments on the Chlamydia Lambrini then?

(FIL not the brightest star in the sky)

I am currently toying with Ethledreda...
I think it may be the hormones

I know a Rosie-May and considered it for DD. Think it's quite nice.

Also considered Ellie-Rose.

I have a cousin called Paddy-Ann (short for Patricia Anne) which is quite nice in a twee American way.

Actually thinking about it, maybe her name is Patti-Ann. But they're Yanks so you can't tell.

Are double barrelled girlie names like this associated with rednecks?

Had to pursuade dh from Travis and Lou!

I wanted Travis, Flynn, or Declan and Ella Rose was on my list too.
I have a Harriet as well.

I wanted Willow or Scarlett for a girl, or Sebastian, Luca and Oscar for a boy. I got talked out of them all by dp (and laughed at. Loudly.)
In the end tho he came round to Willow and we decided to give dd that as a middle name

DH, who normally likes David, Robert, etc etc sorts of names, wanted to call DS2: Orion. That's not even a name!

It really threw me off, having to go from "that is too boring a name, I am not having a son called that" to "wtf is that?".

I liked:

• Tristan
• Pascal (or Pascale for a girl, although that's pushing it)
• Grace (my RL name is Joy. Joy is the mother of Grace. Good, eh?)
• Lars
• Olaf
• Xerxes

Actually, I still like all of those, except Grace is getting popular.

My dad wanted to give my brother the middle name Plantagenet.

Mum said NOOOOOOOO!

as a laugh, we thought of Chuck for our future ds...

I wanted Basil as a middle name for ds (born the day of the wonderful Cardinal Hume's funeral) and was laughed at in the operating theatre by everyone when I mentioned it (to take my mind off the tugging etc). I also wanted Dominic, a lovely name, but which did not really sit with our surname
And for dd, Loveday, Susannah and Rosamund all got spiked by miserable old dh.
Our top no-no combo for a girl would have been Ellen Lucy, which would have really annoyed both grandmothers.

harpsichordcarrier, what about Frideswide, or Wilgefortis? Or my all-time mad English saint fave, Cuthbert, for a boy?
Suedonim, as soon as I saw Pheasant I knew you'd been at the Mazo de la Roche. The woman was completely unhinged They should be in the same category as brie and pate for pregnant women, those books!

frogs - 'fraid I won't tell. I'm hoping we move abroad before we have the next one so maybe our unusual name will be dismissed as 'foreign' .

psychobabble - DH really wanted Elmo. DS may have one in his class next year so I'm glad there's not 2 of them!

Mind you, DH really wanted Hercules after one of his ancestors. Would have suited DS actually but how do you live up to that?!

suedonim - Pheasant is still making me laugh the next day!

Gem... "Kirkules" made me laugh on Coro last week when he had to do all those Hercules tasks.