Truly, Trendy and their siblings: Parents respond to criticism of their kids’ unique names
The children of influencers Aubree and Josh Jones are unlikely to find their names on a gift shop key chain.
There’s Trendy Chanelle, Zaylee Ruth, Sunny Love, Truly Éclair, Journey Rey and Rocky Joshua.
“An adult woman once made a three-minute TikTok just mocking our kids’ names,” Aubree, 36, tells TODAY.com.
“We try not to let it get to us,” Josh, 33, says.
Josh acknowledges that brushing off the negative responses sometimes can be difficult. Recently, the couple in Utah posted an Instagram video reintroducing their children — and many of the comments were unkind:
“These are real? You named your child Trendy?”
“I pray these names are fake because they are tragedeighs.”
“Trendy and Truly cannot possibly be their real names…”
“Oh these kids are gonna get bullied for their names…”
“I guess they can change their names at some point but …. Wow.”
“These names would absolutely be considered illegal in Europe.”
“So how these people named their kids is they spun a wheel and threw darts.”
"We want our children to be different — we want them to stand out," Aubree says. "Like with Trendy — we want her to get out there and start her own trends and do her own thing."
"When people ask, ‘Why don't you give them regular names?’ I'm like, I don't want my children to be regular," she adds.
Aubree says she fell in love with the name Trendy years before meeting Josh. Trendy’s middle name is a nod at French designer Coco Chanel, but they spell it Chanelle.
“Otherwise, people might pronounce it channel,” Aubree explains.
Trendy, 11, says her name suits her personality perfectly.
“I love picking out clothes in so many stores!” she tells TODAY.com.
The name Zaylee came to Aubree through prayer, she says, while Sunny is after Josh’s solar company. As for Truly, her name was inspired by Truly Scrumptious, a character in the 1968 film “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.” Truly’s middle name — Éclair — translates to “flash of lightning” in French.
“Truly was born in an hour and 30 minutes — she came out like lightning,” Aubree says.
Journey’s name is not a tribute to the rock band, though Josh and Aubree are both big fans.
“I was actually struggling to get pregnant and I opened up a Scripture and the word journey was repeated like 30 times,” Aubree recalls. “A couple of days later, I took a pregnancy test and it was positive, and I knew in that moment that we would name the baby Journey. It has so much meaning to us.”
In Dec. 2023, baby Rocky joined sisters Trendy, 11, Zaylee, 9, Sunny, 7, Truly, 5, and Journey, 2.
“If Rocky had been a girl, we would have given her the same name,” Aubree says. “Rocky for a little girl is super, super cute. For a boy it has a nice masculine sound.”
Aubree says she believes that when you’re naming a child, you receive inspiration as to who they are going to be in the future. As an example, she pointed to daughter Sunny Love.
“Sunny is a bright ball of energy,” Aubree says. “She just exudes happiness and positivity.”
This article was originally published on TODAY.com
