Thoughts on sharing initials?

I always have a rule when it comes to making sibling sets that if my children share initials, the others will also! By this I mean I would want an even number of pairs as to not make one left out!

ex: [name_f]Viola[/name_f], [name_u]June[/name_u], [name_f]Vera[/name_f], and [name_u]James[/name_u]

However I do tend to see that a lot of parents hate sharing initials! Recently I started hating the “Dugger system” of having each child have the same initials, as it becomes lazier and harder and makes names seem less unique to me, but what are your thoughts? I think a lot of people steer from it as to not sound too matching!! ex: [name_f]Violet[/name_f] and [name_f]Viola[/name_f] as a sib set

Though I do love the appeal when it’s done well and the names are distinct, ex: [name_f]Violet[/name_f] and [name_f]Vera[/name_f]

I’m definitely not a fan of the matching initials trend. I like names to have individuality. Siblings sharing an initial here or there by coincidence is one thing, but I definitely wouldn’t do it in purpose.

The whole Duggar name trend 100% makes me cringe! I know a couple who are J.on + E.mma, and gave all their children J E or E J initials. It just comes off as over the top and tacky to me.

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I wouldn’t purposely go looking for matching initials, but I could see it happening by coincidence with some of the names I love. [name_f]My[/name_f] goal in naming my future kids is to give them names we love. If, by chance, we fall for and agree on multiple names that begin with the same letter, c’est la vie. If and when we have first names that start with the same initial, the middle name(s) will not be starting with the same letters.

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Personally, I don’t want my kids to share initials. I don’t even want them to share initials with their cousins. (They only have two cousins right now) I don’t see anything wrong if other people do it if they love a name but it bugs me too much to do it.
Editing just to say that for me this applies to kids in a close family around the same age. I don’t care about adults and kids sharing initials or extended family. We’d run out of letters. :joy:

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I share an initial with my sister, and I will honestly say that it bugged me as a kid to be a matched set. I don’t mind as much now. However, it doesn’t annoy me on anyone else, especially if they are both loved names; it can be sweet and distinctive! I don’t like the idea of using a name specifically to match with a sibling; that seems disappointing.

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One of my pet hates! But then I always love names that share an initial so I may end up being a total hypocrite :woman_facepalming:

Mirroring is acceptable though (like your suggestion - V, J, V, J). Nothing grinds my name nerd gears more than a family that uses the same initial for 3 children and then a different one for a fourth. I know two families like this and I don’t understand! As far as I can tell there was no rhyme or reason to it either, in one the solo initial is the oldest and in the other they were quads.

Of course I don’t actually harbour any real angst for these families, it’s just my name OCD that gets set off lol.

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All my brothers shared the same first initial of E and so did my dad, never been a problem and I am not against it as long as the names aren’t too similar. [name_f]My[/name_f] brothers are called [name_m]Erik[/name_m], [name_m]Edvin[/name_m], [name_u]Elliott[/name_u] and [name_m]Emanuel[/name_m] which I don’t think is too similar, my dad is [name_u]Elias[/name_u] so close to [name_u]Elliott[/name_u] but it doesn’t matter. I personally wouldn’t have all my children share the same initials but I don’t see it as an issue unless they share the same middle name initial then I think it is too much like [name_f]Anastasia[/name_f] [name_f]Rose[/name_f] H and [name_m]Adam[/name_m] [name_u]Ray[/name_u] H.

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This is one of the many trends that I have mellowed on over the years. I still dislike overly matchy sibsets that could lead to confusion – think [name_f]Karlie[/name_f] and [name_f]Kaylie[/name_f], or [name_u]Robin[/name_u] and [name_m]Ruben[/name_m] – but I actually think alliteration can be quite cool if the names are distinct enough and are chosen because the parents genuinely love them, rather than because they were scrabbling for names to fit the “theme”.

A good example I think is [name_f]Claudia[/name_f] Schiffer’s children: [name_m]Caspar[/name_m], [name_f]Clementine[/name_f] and [name_f]Cosima[/name_f] :two_hearts: I love all those names, they sound clearly distinct, and they all feel similar stylistically. I think that’s a gorgeous set of siblings.

And while I personally would prefer all of my children to have their own initial, in practice I wouldn’t rule out a favourite name for this reason alone. For example, I love [name_u]Jem[/name_u] for a boy and would certainly consider using it even though I already have a daughter with a J name. I think it helps that I have other children with different initials too though, so it wouldn’t feel like a theme so much as a coincidence.

Apart from really similar sounding names for siblings, the only other kind of letter-themed sibset I really don’t like is when names are respelt just to fit the theme – like [name_f]Jinger[/name_f] or [name_f]Jorja[/name_f] instead of [name_f]Ginger[/name_f] or [name_f]Georgia[/name_f], for example. That to me says that those names were picked with the overall theme as the top priority, rather than with the individual name as the top priority.

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I would honestly get way too confused if any of my kids’ initials matched!
“[name_f]Margaret[/name_f]! I mean, [name_m]Malcolm[/name_m]! Darn it! [name_u]Marie[/name_u]!” :joy:

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Three of my cousins growing up shared the first initial K and my poor grandma would go through all of them every time. :joy:

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I wouldn’t intentionally choose matching initials for my kids. I will say that if I was absolutely in love with a name that happened to share the same first initial as my son, I would probably still use it. But if I were to have a 3rd child I would definitely try to pick a name with a different initial because to me 2 can be a coincidence, but anything past 2 is a pattern.

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As long as the names are distinct and not like your [name_f]Violet[/name_f] and [name_f]Viola[/name_f] example, I’m okay with it! Personally, I’d hold an “all or nothing” philosophy. Either all of my kids have to have the same letter or none of them, otherwise it will bother me. As it is, two of my favorite names are [name_f]Cleo[/name_f] and [name_m]Cassian[/name_m], and I wouldn’t discount one just because it starts with the same letter.

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I like it when they’re cute and don’t sound the same, ex: [name_f]Ivy[/name_f] & [name_f]Isabella[/name_f]. [name_f]Joy[/name_f]-[name_f]Anna[/name_f], [name_f]Johanna[/name_f] and [name_m]Joseph[/name_m] are too close in my opinion, but I do like the idea. I’m not sure I would do it myself, but I’m not entirely against it.

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I am not a fan and want our children to have their own initial. Still, never say never, some names are worth breaking the rules for! The example katinka brought up about [name_f]Claudia[/name_f] Schiffer’s children is a good way to use all-C names! Those names are beautiful.

My husband and his brothers share FN and MN initials, and he didn’t like it growing up, but now he doesn’t mind because they lead separate lives in different homes. So it cannot be all that bad. For myself? Nope! each one gets their own initial for the sake of practicality and organization!

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Well, I don’t have any really personal experience with something like this ([name_f]My[/name_f] initials are SL, my sibling’s initials are ER), but I don’t think it’s too matchy if the names aren’t matchy. Agreeing with @namesleuth23, a [name_f]Joy[/name_f]-[name_f]Anna[/name_f] with siblings [name_f]Johanna[/name_f] and [name_m]Joseph[/name_m] (or worse, [name_m]Joseph[/name_m] and [name_f]Josephine[/name_f] or even Joselia as a sibset) is just too over-the-top. [name_f]Violet[/name_f] and [name_f]Vera[/name_f], for instance, is fine. Joselia and [name_f]Josephine[/name_f] is not.

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As others have said, I think it’s fine if the names don’t sound too alike. With the Duggars I think it’s ridiculous just because they have so many kids (and [name_f]Jinger[/name_f] was what? Number 3? If they couldn’t even come up with three J names, they should have just given up on the same initial thing). Like I could probably come up with three names, maybe four, that started with the same initial and sounded good together but after that, it’s diminishing returns.

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I think matching initials has always been a common trend, both my parents’ families did it. [name_f]My[/name_f] dad and his siblings all start with D like their father, and my mom’s older brothers are [name_m]Bruce[/name_m] and [name_m]Brian[/name_m]. [name_f]My[/name_f] mom was gonna be [name_f]Beth[/name_f], but it got used for a cousin. Apparently, my grandparents were rather flustered by this and floundered around for other B names until the last minute, when they threw in the towel and just went for a name they liked- [name_f]Jeanette[/name_f]. Completely different in sound and style! So she’s the only non-matching one in the extended family. It’s funny how much they worried about the same things we do when it comes to naming!

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Guilty as charged, though it wasn’t something I went out with the intention of doing. It just so happened that both of “the ones” happened to start with a B. It didn’t concern me at the time, though I wonder sometimes how to best proceed if there’s a third go around. That concern is compounded because the two existing Bs aren’t even really of a similar style.

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I don’t like overly matchy/themey names, but I do like a lot of names that have the same starting initial because the sound appeals to me. I would have no more than two children with the same first initial, if I had more than two children overall, but I would feel that doing two pairs of matched initials would be too matchy. Like…if I did two kids with the same initial it would be because I liked those names, not to match, I guess. Unfortunately, I love a lot of J names but I have one myself so I think I would further limit myself with kids to only one J name. Basically I don’t think I’d want more than 2 shared initials in a family, whether siblings or parent/child.

On the other hand, my dad and his siblings are S, M, C, S, and S and it was never an issue or even something people really noticed.

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The first letter initial doesn’t bother me so much, it’s fine if a couple kids match. I don’t think I’ll be using the same initials anyways… (Although right now I’m crushing on a ton of S names for girls like [name_u]Skye[/name_u] and [name_f]Soleil[/name_f]) it would be nice for organizing kid stuff if each kid had their own initial, but you can always assign your kids colors like my parents did (and we didn’t even have matching initials) To this day dark green screams “me”.

My problem is I love so many boys names that end in the “er” sound… and the rhyming is an absolute no go. Overall I think having different sounds at the end is more important to me.

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