I'm so jealous of people who can use surnames as given names - it just doesn't work with Italian surnames. Even so, I can't get rid of the deep seated Italian (or Catholic?) belief that you must sohelpyouGod name your child after a saint. My mom is serious about that.

As for keeping names in the family, many Italians will name their first son after his paternal grandfather, their first daughter after her paternal grandmother, their second son after his maternal grandfather, and their second daughter after her maternal grandmother. My mom is one of four - two boys, two girls - who follow this tradition. It's also the reason my father has a brother and four fist cousins who all have the same first and last name.

One of my many nerdy hobbies is name meanings and origins, so I love this thread!

For a girl, I've been thinking Cassandra Morrighan Lastname. The Cassandra, because I like Cassie as a nickname for a girl. Morrighan, because it's an old Irish name and reminds me of my great-grandmother.

For a boy, Robert Preston Lastname. It just sounds very grownup and executive.

Interesting, we broke that rule entirely. Our first names are all unique to the family and our middle names are all 'for' people. Mine for my maternal grandfather, my sister's for our paternal grandmother, my brother for our paternal grandfather and my other brother for my dad.

Actually that probably says a lot about my mom's relationship with my Nonna more than anything ;)

My parents also broke that tradition - it's very old school. If they had my first name would be Joseph, which I'm not particularly fond of, especially compared to my first name - which I prefer in it's full form and not it's nickname, thank you very much. My first name is after my godfather and my middle name is my father's. My sister's first name is completely random, but her middle name is for our paternal grandmother.

My husband and I are set on Lucas for our future son (after my father who passed away when I was younger). Not sure on the middle name yet but we should have a few more years before we have to think of one.

The girl names are up for debate. I really like Kassidy or Kassandra. Other favorites are: Kaylynn, Kandace, and Kristen.

After teaching for many years my list of names I'd never name my children is far longer than names I like.

Top Names of 2010 from Yahoo
http://shine.yahoo.com/channel/paren...-2010-2418678/

Top 10 Girls’ Names of 2010
Sophia
Isabella
Olivia
Emma
Chloe
Ava
Lily
Madison
Addison
Abigail

Top 10 Boys’ Names of 2010
Aiden
Jacob
Jackson
Ethan
Jayden
Noah
Logan
Caden
Lucas
Liam

The article has links for the top 100 of each gender also.

I'm all over the place.
 

Marselina would be my first choice for a name. My grandmother's name was named Marcellina, thats who I'd name my child after. But if we ever tried to giver her a nickname, I like the spelling of Selina rather than Cellina.

If i went with a theme...

Kaydence Alyssa
Kennedy Alison
Kamryn Alicia (not "eleesha" but A-lee-see-uh)

I might throw Emersyn Grace in there to mix stuff up.

For boys,
Damon, Kerrigan, Kirian, Keaton, or Kasey
if I side with my "brown-ness" for boys I would consider.
F-a-u-s-to, (GC Won't let me spell out the name, it just turns into ****) Salvador, Vicente,