Media personality Emily-Jade O’Keeffe, and her husband, architect Gerard Murtagh, welcomed their first child about a week ago. They have named their daughter Millie Valentine; Millie was conceived after Emily-Jade underwent fertility treatment.
Millie was only one of the names they were considering; Molly and Melody were also up for debate, and Emily-Jade was keen on Molly May Murtagh until she realised the initials spelled out the radio station she worked for. Valentine is what Emily-Jade and Gerard called their unborn baby as a nickname, because it was conceived on Valentine’s Day. As Valentine can be used for both sexes, perhaps the middle name would have been used whether the baby was a boy or a girl. My understanding is that Valentine is a name that Emily-Jade has loved since her early teens.
Emily-Jade is a breakfast radio host for Triple M Brisbane, a regular on Channel 9’s Mornings with Kerri-Anne, and writes a blog for The Courier Mail called Emily Everywhere. She is also a MC and a marriage celebrant.
(Story from Emily-Jade’s blog; photo from her website)
Waltzing More Than Matilda 
Hi there. I know this is a little late, but there’s a couple of factual errors in this article. Firstly, Emily Jade’s little girl wasn’t conceived via IVF. Emily Jade had a small operation after not being able to fall pregnant, which was successful as she fell pregnant almost immediately after (naturally). Which leads me to point #2: she was conceived on Valentines day, hence her middle name Valentine. I followed her Courier Mail blog before and during her pregnancy, and this is how she told her story anyhow. She referred to the bub as Valentine during the pregnancy, and I think it just stuck. It’s a really cool middle name, particularly because of its origin, I think 🙂
Thank you for that extra information, which I have added to the story. I knew she had had fertility treatment, and she often wrote about IVF as if she had experienced it, so I assumed the treatment was IVF.
I did read in one of her blog entries that she had always wanted a baby named Valentine since junior high, so perhaps both things are true, and the Valentine’s Day conception made it seem more special and usable.
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Congratulations to you both. Beautiful name. Miss you EJ on MMM!!
Love Valentine as a middle name, of course — I used it for my daughter! I like it on a boy as well, part of why we chose it is that it’s writer Henry Miller’s middle name.
Oh really, how interesting! I like it because I suggested it as a middle name in my very first blog entry! 🙂
I’ve really started to love the name Melody of late, and Millie is one of those cutesy names we Brits jut fall head-over-heels for. It’s interesting to note that I’ve always wondered why Emily is seldom shortened to Millie, more often ending up as Emmy. It’s a possibility.
I must confess to finding Millie Valentine an extremely cute name myself.
Good question on Emily – I can only think it’s because the -mily in Emily is pronounced muh-lee rather than milly. But yes, parents of Emilys could consider this as a cute option.