My last name is two words, take two

I recently received a question asking my thoughts about a last name with two words, a year after I first posted about changing my last name. As a small reminder, my last name is not hyphenated, but consists of two separate words, Wilson Sayres, where the first word is my maiden name and the second word is my husband's last name.

I love it. It was the best decision for me.

For family-related things, we are Melissa and Scott Sayres (which has been nice for Holiday cards this year!), and for publishing, research and professional applications, I am Melissa Wilson Sayres.

It has caused minor confusion at some places where the staff claim they can only allow one last name, so either require that I hyphenate it (instead of two separate words), or choose one, but it has been a minor inconvenience.

With respect to having kids, we have decided to give our children my husband's last name only. I had thought it would be neat to give them my last name as a middle name (Wilson is a perfectly acceptable middle name), and Scott's last name as their surname. However, we've moved away from that idea because it would only be fair to do that for all kids, and it might be a little weird for them all to have the same middle and last name.

I do have a friend whose last name is two words, one is her mother's last name and one is her father's last name, and she really loves having a piece of both of them (note that both parents kept their "maiden" names).

Now, regarding baby's first name... that's a whole other can of worms. :)