This is a post years and years and years in the making. It will likely come as no surprise that names are one of my favorite topics to think and talk and write about, but though I’ve devoted many words to discussing the names we actually chose for our three children (June, John Shepherd, and Susanna), I’ve never talked about the runners-up. Like, not ever. We hold our names close to the vest – even speculatively, and even in casual conversation, I’ve kept pretty tight lips when discussing future children’s names… forever. But now that we have closed this chapter and all our names have been given out, discuss this topic we shall! I’m excited to talk about some of the other names we considered for our kiddos, and other names I love. A few days before Annie was born, I clicked over to Nameberry to pull a few details for her name post. While there, I got sucked into their Baby Name DNA quiz, which labels your naming personality. (Take it here, if you’d like!) I was labeled a Charmer-Romantic, and I found it to be quite accurate: This description reflects a lot of what we valued when choosing our kids’ names: that they are easy to spell and pronounce, that they’re not too “out there,” that they are “slightly rarer with a touch of whimsy,” and – ding ding ding! – that they are “personally significant to you in some way.” Here are the names Nameberry suggested a Charmer-Romantic might like: I do, in fact, like most of these names in a general sense, and as you’ll see below, a few of them were even on my short list! Interestingly, I wouldn’t have chosen most of the names on Nameberry’s list of “names similar to Annie” (though