Within a few days of finding out we were having another baby, we started talking about baby names. All of our children have had their names sorted by the time their 20-week scans came around – boys and girls options – and we wanted to be the same this time around. I know some people prefer to wait until their baby is born before settling on a name, but for us, it’s part of that bonding process.

I absolutely love the boys’ names and don’t have any regrets at all about any of their names. I also still (mostly) like the names that they would have had if they had been girls:

Harrison James (would have been Darcy Rose)

Alexander Thomas (would have been Jessica Rose)

Benjamin Rhys (would have been Charlotte Rose)

Choosing their names was pretty straightforward. We settled on them pretty early on, and I think they all suit their names. This time around, it felt a lot harder.

For starters, had baby girl been a boy, we would have been really stuck as we’ve all but run out of boys names that we love. I think we probably would have gone for Joshua Philip, which I do love, but not as much as the other names. Having a girl – well, we were spoiled for choice, obviously!

We’ve always gone for longer names that could be shortened into ‘proper’ names if that’s what the kids wanted. Harrison only usually gets called Harry by a few of my family members, Alexander pretty much only ever gets called Alex and we switch between Ben and Benjamin. We wanted baby girl to have the same option. We also tend to go for names erring on the more traditional side – neither of us are fans of modern names. The most important thing to us was that they have names that carry them through the rest of their lives, from childhood to adulthood.

We ummed and ahhed over a few girls names, finally settling on Eliza, Evelyn and Elizabeth as our shortlist, each with Rose as a middle name. After hours and hours of discussion, we settled on Elizabeth, which I actually really love because it’s also my middle name.

After a few weeks though, we found ourselves falling out of love with Rose. It’s a beautiful name, but neither of us seemed to love it. We discussed a few alternatives, Jade being one of them. We talked to my parents about it as well, and they suggested looking at Welsh middle names. We had already toyed with this idea, so we went online, and found not one, but two Welsh names we loved. I think we will probably keep those ones to ourselves until she is born – there needs to be some mystery! The second name we have gone for has two potential pronunciations. We are going for the Welsh pronunciation, but the English one is also very pretty, so that can be left for her to choose as she gets older.

It’s also been fun coming up with little nicknames for her. Elizabeth is a name that lends itself to so many derivatives. I love Betty, but Graham isn’t so keen on that! I think I love her full name so much I’ll use that mostly, but there’s no doubt that throughout her life she will end up as a Lizzy, which I also love.

How did you choose your baby’s names?