Choosing your child’s name is a huge responsibility. Get it wrong and they will be saddled with a name that they hate for the rest of their life. No pressure there then. According to leading psychologists naming your child really can have a massive impact on the rest of their life. For example if you are thinking about giving your a child a name that is “different” then perhaps have a rethink as apparently this could lead them to being bullied at school.

Baby naming is a serious business and at Island Living 365 there are some things that we wished we had taken into consideration whilst naming our two girls;

1. Check that it is not about to become a popular name, if this is something that bothers you. Read the predicted trends for the year. I love the name for our youngest and I didn’t know anyone with that name before she was born. Then she was born and everyone had a newborn girl with the same name. The reason was a very popular T.V programme.
2. Don’t feel pressured by your family to name your child after a distant relative. You name your child, not them. Your family will learn to live with whatever name you choose and they will learn to love the name as they love your child.
3. Consider that the name might be shortened and if so are you happy with the “nicknames”. If not then don’t use it as someone you know will use that nickname for your child.
4. Check the initials of your chosen name. You don’t want any embarrassing combinations….

If you are in the process of thinking up names for an expected bundle of joy then you might want to check out what nameberry.com is predicting as the popular names for 2016. For example they are predicting Benedict after leading man Benedict Cumberbatch. And Blaise is another predicted top name.

When tackling the tricky task of naming our child perhaps we should all relax a bit and remember the line from Romeo and Juliet.

“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose would still smell as sweet”

It is just a name after all, isn’t it?