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John David and Abbie 6: Flying Off to the Honeymoon


Coconut Flan

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I am not married (and most likely won't be for a while) but if I do get married, I know I want to keep my last name in some regard. It's a name that is decently uncommon in the States (though decently common in the European country it originally came from) and I have not personally run into someone with that last name who I am not related to. I have no brothers and I can definitely see my sister changing her last name to her husband's if she gets married (since that is the tradition). While I do not want to have kids, it would be nice to at least carry my last name on to the end of my life. I had a conversation with my boyfriend (who is Welsh with a last name that is not popular in Wales but is in the area of Europe it is from) not too long ago about what we would do with our last names if we were to get married. He was a little surprised at the idea of me not taking his last name but we ultimately decided that if we were to get married, we would hyphenate our names. It would my my last name-his last name and combined would be five syllables and 17 letters. Definitely a mouthful but worth it since we would both get to keep our last name and get to share the same last name. However, I could definitely see us both going by our maiden names professionally.

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I have a very uncommon, not particularly beautiful last name. I've always had to spell it. My opinion was nevertheless always that I'd only change my last name upon marriage if I liked my future husband's last name better.

MrJuly has an uncommon last name that even native French speakers struggle to pronounce. We both dislike his paternal grandfather with whom we mainly associate this name. MrJuly's mother has a beautiful last name that - added bonus! - easily works in many different languages. MrJuly not only loves and uses this name a lot (when making reservations, on Facebook, etc), he is also much closer to the maternal side of his family.

We agreed that if he could change his last name to his mother's, I would happily take this name and pass it on to our children. If he couldn't change it, any daughters would have my last name and any sons his. (The reasoning behind this was that the girls names we picked worked well with my last name whereas the boys names worked better with his :crying-pink: )

Unfortunately Belgium is extremely strict when it comes to changing names. My husband went through the expense and hassle of consulting with a lawyer who had to break it to him that there was no way it would work in his case.

Thus my husband kept his last name, I kept mine, and LittleJuly has my last name. Hyphenating LittleJuly's last name was not an option because neither my husband nor I wanted to saddle her with that abomination.

Apparently the law here states that any further children would have to have the same last name as LittleJuly, so now we're screwed if we ever have a son... we'll either have to make sure we only have daughters, or reconsider the boy names we like. Argh!

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5 minutes ago, SweetJuly said:

If he couldn't change it, any daughters would have my last name and any sons his. (The reasoning behind this was that the girls names we picked worked well with my last name whereas the boys names worked better with his :crying-pink: )

Apparently the law here states that any further children would have to have the same last name as LittleJuly, so now we're screwed if we ever have a son... we'll either have to make sure we only have daughters, or reconsider the boy names we like. Argh!

This is something I've thought about as well--husband and I have decided that any odd-numbered children (1st, 3rd, etc) will have my last name and even-numbered ones would have his.  I knew some families growing up who did this, and it's important to me to not be the only one with my name if we have kids. 

But it's actually not allowed under German naming laws, so our plan will probably only work if we're living in a different country when a second child would be born. 

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5 hours ago, adidas said:

 

In the end I changed my surname legally but kept my maiden name socially, so I answer to both, or sometimes people double barrel it (without a hyphen). So we all have my husband’s surname and my maiden name is tacked in the middle for me, and used about 75% of the time. It’s messy but we’re all happy.

I'm kind of the reverse. I kept my name - but tacked on his last name on FB so that I could "hide" a little bit better. You REALLY have to know me to find me over there because you're not going to guess his last name. And I'll answer to Mrs. HisLast but I bristle at the assumption that I'm automatically Mrs. HisLast.
I supposed I could give up my middle name (which I've never really liked... It starts with T and my last name is an animal - like Bird - so I used to tell people my middle initial stood for The.... get it? FirstName The Bird?) 

But ... enh. I'm good. 

 

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A close friend of mine is married to a countess with a very long fancy name.

My friend, despite being rather wealthy, has no title. And a short ugly last name that sounds like the French word for "fart".

He has a brother who has kids as well. His wife has 3 sisters, no brothers.

I asked my friend once whether he didn't ever consider taking his wife's name, given that this way his daughters would have a title and pass on a very cool grand old name.

My friend, who normally is a very liberal person, looked at me in horror. No, he never once did! Then he added that his wife's family would have been absolutely opposed to anything of the sort. Apparently the father-in-law would rather have the name die out than one of his daughters pass it on.... :5624798e9d94f_No-clue-man-no-clue-shurg:

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