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Two middle names.

I have two last names, my maiden and married - not hyphenated. I use them interchangeably - at work I'm Temperance Maiden. With friends/family, I'm Temperance Married. It works fine and is easy to explain, but I imagine it would be a pain as a kid.

I knew a kid with a hyphenated last name. He got questions about it constantly. Not the end of the world, but annoying regardless.

ETA: Rereading your post, you say, "I think that is is still important to have DH's last name somewhere in our child's official name, if only to make traveling, registering for school and extracurriculars, etc. more simple." I don't think having DH's last name in his name will make it more simple. If anything, it might complicate things. Is DH open to changing his last name to yours so your whole family would have the same last name?

I kept my maiden name when I got married and we just had our first LO on Sunday. We didn2 middle names. My parents did the same for me and my sister when we were born, so I've gone through my whole life with 4 names. It was not confusing or an issue ever. I knew who my parents were and that they were married and so did everyone else. I go by first name last name in my everyday life but on all my important documents, like passport, license, diplomas, etc, I use all 4 names. I'm happy that my DS will have both our names and he can use them as he wishes.

It would be easier to have it as a middle name, I think. This coming from a person with four names...it confuses a lot of places lol. Do you have to have 2 middles? Is it possible to just have DH's last name as a middle name?

I just had my daughter last week and we hyphenated her last name with our separate last names as I kept my name when we married.

I would vote with @sapphire and @wrkbrk-- DH's last name as the only last name, unless you are DEAD SET on having a "pretty" middle name in addition to it.

Then I would vote for 2 middle names. My husband and my son have two middle names and paperwork, etc. is easy peasy. I have a hyphenated/two last names and everything is a pain in the ass.

@lady baltimore: I kept my name when I got married but we agreed to give kids DH's last name. We used my last name as the second middle name for both kids as we had family names we also wanted to use. So that would be my vote.

My mom did not change her name either and gave us her last name as our middle. That worked well too.

@Charm54: I was going to say, if baby has 2 middle names, they can always decide to drop one when they get married, if they want to.

My last name is my son's middle name. I don't have a middle name and we didn't have a middle name we liked and I wanted him to have my name but not a hyphen. I think it works out well!

I don't really have a suggestion on what you should do - I think you should do whatever you want! - but I have some experience with your situation as my LO has both 2 middle names and my husband's last name, while I've always retained my maiden name.

We've traveled extensively (she has a passport too), we've registered with several doctors offices, daycare, extracurricular activities, etc. we've never once run into any questions or issues with her last name being different from mine or questions about our relationship. If there is enough space to spell out both middle names, we do that, otherwise we give her initials in place of a middle name.

We did the same thing but gave her DH's last name and my name as a second middle name. That's definitely the easier option in my opinion. Since second middle names can be so easily dropped.

@lady baltimore: I would go with two middle names. But I'm biased because I have two and my kids both have two. It's really no big deal. For documentation (middle initial) we use the first one since technically I think it's considered one middle name with a space.