Parents give baby blended surname to avoid choosing one family name over the other

If you don’t share the same surname as your baby’s other parent it can be tricky to know which moniker to give your newborn, but a new trend is seeing parents give their offspring a mix of both parents’ surnames to create a new family name.

Courtney Cassar, 31, and Laura Sheldon, 29, from Sydney, welcomed daughter Lyla Jill last month, but rather than giving their little one a double-barrelled surname, they decided to ‘mash-up’ their last names to give their baby girl the blended surname ‘Casseldon’.

“I like the idea of our daughter having a part of both of us,” Mr Cassar told The Daily Telegraph.

“With hyphens I find a lot of kids end up choosing one name because it is easier.

“We played around with a few last names and found one that we like and sounds like a last name.”

READ MORE: Woman 'cancels future gender reveals' with spoof farting viral video

However they admitted the decision to give their daughter a blended surname had divided friends and family as some weren’t even sure if the move was legal.

Opinions on Twitter were divided too.

Some couldn’t see the point of creating a whole new surname.

READ MORE: Newborn hiccups could be crucial to baby’s brain development

But others thought it was the couple’s right to choose their child’s last name.

READ MORE: Mum-of-six on why she sometimes skips bath time

The Sydney parents are joining a rising band of both newlyweds and parents who are opting to create a whole new family name by combining each of their own.

‘Meshing’, as the practice has become known, originally became a done thing in the US, and may or may not have anything to do with the popular culture of merging celebrity names - Kimye, Brangelina etc...

But the trend has been catching on with us normal folk too as both newly marrieds and parents opt to create their own combined moniker.

Approximately 800 British newlyweds a year choose to mash-up their surnames and the trend has clearly reached parentsville too, certainly in Australia, at least.

According to News.com.AU Statistics from New South Wales Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages has revealed that children who share the same last name as their parents has dropped by more than 50% since 1980.

Those in favour of mashing up their surnames to give their offspring say it’s more modern and equal, rather than the child automatically being given the father’s name, implying that they are more important.

It could also be considered less clunky than giving a baby a double-barrelled surname.

But downsides include the risk of offending family members who might see it as a rejection of both family names.

What do you think? Will blending two surnames to babies catch on?