[name]Just[/name] some background here. My d-i-l is expecting twin girls. One of the names she really likes is [name]Isabel[/name]/[name]Isabella[/name]. She is put off by it’s popularity however. I just found this new name [name]Elizabella[/name] on today’s name list (ancient names for girls). Before I propose it to her as a possibility, I wanted to see what everyone thought here. This name could work to honor many of our family (on her husband’s side). His great-grandmother is named [name]Bessie[/name], his great-aunt is [name]Betty[/name] (both nns of [name]Elizabeth[/name]), his gr gr grandmother was [name]Eliza[/name] and one of his gr gr gr grandmothers was [name]Isabella[/name]. This sort of combines all of those names. They probably want to use [name]Mae[/name] as a mn (it has been in the family for generations on his maternal side and has been thrown in from time to time on his paternal side. They want two mns for each daughter however. What would work as a second mn with [name]Elizabella[/name] [name]Mae[/name]? What would work as the second daughter’s fn? She also is thinking about [name]Abigail[/name] but once again is a little put off by it’s popularity. She is thinking of substituting [name]Avigail[/name]. [name]Do[/name] [name]Avigail[/name] and [name]Elizabella[/name]
work as a twin set? If so, any ideas for mns for [name]Avigail[/name]? Or do you think they should just go ahead and use [name]Isabella[/name] and [name]Abigail[/name]? Any thoughts?
Really not a fan of [name]Avigail[/name]… seems it would be confusing for a child and would have to be re-pronounced over and over b/c people would always hear ‘[name]Abigail[/name]’. As for [name]Elizabella[/name], I love [name]Eliza[/name] by itself - - but less a fan of it combined with ‘[name]Bella[/name]’. [name]Both[/name] of these names together ([name]Avigail[/name] & [name]Elizabella[/name]) feels like she’s trying too hard to be slightly different from very popular names. If it were me, I’d either go with [name]Abigail[/name] and [name]Isabella[/name] if she really likes them, or else choose completely different names that stand on their own (versus changing one or two letters or syllables to create a name variant from a popular name). [name]Hope[/name] this helps!
I actually think [name]Elizabella[/name] is really pretty! That said, I have to agree with the previous poster that pairing [name]Avigail[/name] with [name]Elizabella[/name] is too much in that it does sound like a play on a pair of popular names and therefore borders on feeling trendy in a way that either name on its own wouldn not. . . (though, I do think [name]Avigail[/name] is very pretty also; in fact, I actually rather like [name]Abigail[/name] despite its popularity).
To me, [name]Abigail[/name] and [name]Elizabeth[/name] are such great classic names that the popularity doesn’t bother me so much (they are popular, but not trendy, and if you use nn’s [name]Bessie[/name] and [name]Gail[/name] they are unlikely to encounter others with the exact same name). If it were me, I would probably go with [name]Abigail[/name] and [name]Elizabeth[/name]. ([name]Isabella[/name], while also a pretty classic name, is just too popular right now and doesn’t have the same timelessness to carry it through).
I agree that on their own, [name]Elizabella[/name] and [name]Avigail[/name] might work but as a twinset it is too theme-y or trying to hard to unique-ify popular names. I would probably use [name]Elizabeth[/name]/[name]Eliza[/name] and [name]Abigail[/name] or [name]Isabella[/name] and [name]Abigail[/name] if that’s what I really loved, or move away from those names altogether if I couldn’t get past the popularity.
the name is overly complicated.
A friend of mine had a daughter last summer and named her [name]Eliza[/name] Bellevue, most of us now call her [name]Elizabelle[/name]. Her mother loves that she has a simple, classic fn with a mn that honors her family, and I love [name]Elizabelle[/name] as a nn. For some reason I am having a harder time liking it with the added ‘a’. It seems too complicated, maybe because of the extra syllable.
[name]Hi[/name]! I love [name]Eliza[/name], but when I see [name]Elizabella[/name], I think of [name]Eliza[/name], [name]Elizabeth[/name], and [name]Isabella[/name], and I guess it seems to me like someone couldn’t decide between the three names and opted to combine them into one.
What about [name]Eliza[/name] [name]Belle[/name]?
I think that [name]Avigail[/name] is pretty, but I agree that it’s not the best with [name]Elizabella[/name].
If she really loves [name]Abigail[/name] and [name]Isabella[/name], I think she should use them, popularity and all. 
Names I can see with [name]Elizabella[/name]:
[name]Aurelia[/name]
[name]Anastasia[/name]
[name]Cordelia[/name]
[name]Corinna[/name]
[name]Dahlia[/name]
[name]Francesca[/name]
[name]Georgiana[/name]
[name]Juliette[/name]
[name]Jessamine[/name]
[name]Mariana[/name]
[name]Octavia[/name]
[name]Rosalie[/name]
[name]Seraphina[/name]
[name]Simona[/name]
[name]Viviana[/name]
[name]Violetta[/name]
Good luck!
Thanks ladies for your opinions. You’ve been a big help