Will you share the names with family before they are born?

My IL's are driving me NUTS. They are constantly asking me if we've come up with names yet (and we are not decided, btw). But I don't even want to share my possible names with them.

My own parents, know my choices, but they are far more involved in my life than my IL's (my parents live in town, ILs are eight hours away).

Am I cruel not to share my thoughts on names with the IL's? I'd rather just wait until they are born!

 

With dd we didn't share the name at all, even when we finally chose it. We told everyone that we wanted it to be a surprise. It drove my husband's grandmother nuts! But it was what we wanted to do. Just let your il's know that it will be a surprise for everyone, but right now you don't have any name chosen anyway. The more you tell them it will be a surprise the less they will bug you...theoretically.

(We've decided to keep the genders a surprise this time around...which is driving everyone nuts WAY more than not finding out names :lol: )

 

I'm having a lot of fun keeping the gender a secret -- here's a conversation.

"Do you know what it is?"
"No, it's a surprise"
"So you're not telling?"
"No, I don't know either!"

So far I've got about 4 votes for a boy and 1 for a girl.

And as for the naming, I've had a lot of people tell me stories about changing the names they picked when the baby introduced his/herself....so that's my story as well. "We've got some ideas, but we'll make the final decision once we see the baby"

 

If I was having another I wouldn't tell anyone but maybe my mom. We had a lot of negative comments about the girls names which are still the names we named them

 

We didn't announce the names until after they were born. Didn't want any negative comments

 

No, and we have told everyone so. We don't care to hear a million different opinions and I suppose there is always that chance we'll change our minds. We tell people we already told them the gender and we're keeping names our only secret. My Mom bugs me a little, but I just keep telling her it's futile.

 

We kept the names of all three of our kids a secret until after they were born. Didn't want the comments or have to argue about suggestions. Everyone knew the genders so it was nice to keep something to ourselves.

 

We made the mistake of telling some people that we were naming our baby A Addison Emily. We did get some negative comments and some seemingly hurt feelings that we were not giving her a family name. We did not agree on baby B's name until they were born. I still think that some people are disappointed that we did not use family names but there are just too many people in the family that felt like they or a passed loved one should have a namesake-- we were doomed to have hurt feelings so we gave the girls their own names!

when that darn stork finally comes back to my house, we will not tell anyone IRL our ideas!

 

We didn't reveal our names either....didn't want any negative comments! My mom was a real pain! She wanted to KNOW so badly - she kept telling me not to pick weird names! We decided that since everyone knew the genders, the names could be a surprise ! Plus, noone can give you any negative comments once they are born and named - because then it cannot be changed!!

 

If you aren't going to tell your in-laws, I wouldn't tell anyone in your family. Just do what other posters have suggested...say "we're going to keep it a surprise." You just wouldn't want it to come out that everyone EXCEPT your in-laws knew before hand.

 

We have been sharing first names--Abigail and Elizabeth [if they get shortened, Abby and Beth].....but middle names are still undecided and that will just be announced after birth. :hush: We go with biblical first names and family middle names......WELL, I had 2 nieces die in a car wreck 5 yrs ago and they each had family middle names that we'll be using--Grace and Marie [not sure which is which]--which i already okayed with my sister....but she said I get to tell our parents :drown: [who will get all sobby and go all emotional, etc. :blink: which is why they get told AFTER the fact and when i don't care or have the time to be consumed with THEM and THEIR issues :BDH: ]

 

Well if your parents know, then it may not seem fair. Living farther away makes it harder to stay involved...
But it is completely up to you, and if they keep bugging you, then tell them off, nicely.
My hubby started calling them by their names as soon as we found out both genders, so its not really a big secret, though everyone is still wondering what Charlie's middle name is going to be, I am too! lol... waiting for my husband to settle on his middle name

 

We waited with our son so we are waiting with the twins as well. Some people have been persistent in trying to find out the names but I just tell them that when they are carrying the kids then they get to decide to tell names before the birth or not, and we are choosing not to- or I blame it on the hubby and say he doesn't want to tell until they are born and we get a look at them first to make sure the names fit. People have too many opinions about what pregnant women should do and not do already and I don't want anybody else's input about my kids' names in their attempt to sway me about what they would prefer, so I have found it easier not to tell. I am a school teacher and there are so many names I would never name my own kids just b/c I would think of a previous student. Our son's name is Tristan and after he was born my father had a hard time at first with the name, and didn't even know how to pronounce or spell it, but there was nothing he could say at that point anymore b/c it was already his name. He grew to love the name but had just never heard it before and had to get used to it. I know with the twins he will probably have the same reaction.

 

I shared my sons name when I was pregnant with him. I feeli if people are going to say things about it - it doesnt matter when you tell them, and I also felt if everyone knew my choice from the get go there would be less of "you stole my choice of name" if anyone chose the name while I was pregnant. Im adoptingthe same approach with my twins. I've put my names out there, I know they are not everyones favourite but at least I know now - and personally I dont care. We got some positive feed back too, and idea's on different spellings too which worked very nicely for us.

 

We didn't tell ANYONE -- not a soul besides DH and me. This was partly because we felt like our pregnancy was public enough already (what with everyone knowing we did IVF, and me being so enormously huge, and on bedrest for weeks) -- we needed to keep something private. But we also did not want to invite comments -- we wanted it to be a fait accompli so that people would have no choice but to say "What lovely names!" :ibiggrin:

 

It depends on you- are you willing to hear comments/defend the names? I was- I figured that everybody else got to name their kids, I should have that right, too. We went with rather unconventional names- Sebastian Quinn & Orion Michael (not Ore-eon, people!) and I was very surprised to hear crap from my mom- one of the least judgmental people I know. I ended the discussion with her by saying, "Mom, these are the names. I assume you'll love Sebastian despite your dislike of his name, eventually". It seemed to shut her up.

Now, my MIL came out recently and commented that she liked Quinn as a first name- SO? She had a child and had the opportunity to name him. She chose Ben. If she wants to name a child, at this point- adopt.

From everyone else, Orion was the kicker. My DH hates all conventional names and Orion was a compromise from me when he suggested Icarrus. I told him No Icky Babies! So, if Orion one day hates his name, I definitely can tell him it coulda been worse.

I found that if I looked people directly in the eyes and told them the names when they asked, they usually didn't have the guts to say anything other than "Oh" if they didn't like them.

Good luck!

Michelle

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What you name your children is a really important and special thing. I would definitely not share my thoughts on names with anyone, let alone your IL's. When you share your ideas on names, I believe people should only respond one way, "Oh, what a nice name!" but most people don't at all. My kids names are fairly common names and when I shared them with people while I was pregnant, often they just said "Ohhh." How tacky! Anyway, this is not the thing you want others' opinions to influence, so I wouldn't share with others. Also, just my opinion, but please do not name them coordinating names, for example, starting with the same letter, sounding similar, like your kids are two cute little half's forming a whole. I know SO many people do this, but your kids will thank you later if you don't do this.

 

We did not find out the genders of the twins so we had to have 2 each ready to go. We acted like we were him-hawing around but really J.T.'s name has been picked out since we were in high school My Dad's name is Jeff and my FIL is Tom....we wanted to introduce our son to them with their names. We didn't get grief about any of the names we picked out but no one knew JT's name

 

I wish we didn't tell anyone the names because we have got a lot of comments, some good but some bad too, it would have been nice though to have it as our little secret. :FIFblush:

 

We've picked out names for whatever genders we get, but we are also keeping them secret from everyone.

But to make it easier on immediate family, we've given Baby A and Baby B fake "in utero" names that are really quite silly (they rhyme with our last name), so that people can call them something other than "the twins."
We want people to get used to calling them by actual names, not "the twins," so this really helps.
The only thing now is to hope our families won't keep calling them the silly names once they're born. LOL!
(And no, the actual names don't rhyme or start with the same letter at all. They're each individuals so they get individual names, IMO.)

 

I have never shared names before birth ( 2 singles already) and won't this time either!

As other pp have said, I don't want to invite comments. People already know that we are having girls so we want their names to be a surprise. Also 1 of the names we have chosen isn't very common-not unusual just uncommon- so want that to be a nice surprise.