I came really, really close to convincing my husband to take my last name, but he couldn't do it.  His last name is a harsh mess of consonants that's hard to remember and spell, and my name is simple, unique, and memorable.  His last name isn't even the "real" last name of the family, since they changed it into something totally different so it wouldn't sound Jewish during some persecution.  

He did agree to take my last name as his middle name (and drop his given middle name), but somehow never got around to it.  I remind him of it every now and then (7 years later), but he just thinks it's too much trouble and isn't going to bother.  I hypenated my name, and I'm generally happy with the choice.  Our kids both have my "maiden" name as their middle names, and it would be nice if my husband had the same middle name as them, but I'm not going to fight it.  It's crazy that California made that so difficult!  

I've known people doing this in California since the 90's. I didn't know it was such a trial.

to a balance.

it is little and it he did it because he is closer to her father, so it is still a man thing.

BUT - they have a matralineal family now! awesome.

and I remember that there was space on the marriage license for each of us to enter our new name. We briefly considered making up an entirely new last name for both of us, but then decided that we should each stick with our own names so that we could save ourselves the hassle of getting new checks, drivers licenses, etc...

We both have my maiden name as a middle name and we were annoyed by the $350 plus a court appearance. The ladies in the court office were all excited for us that he was changing his name but then the female judge was not amused.  Here is how it went.

Judge: "You want to change your name from __ to __?"
DH:  "Yes."
Judge:  "You do realize that this will not get you out of any legal or financial obligations that you may have."
DH:  "yes."
Judge:  "You do understand that your identity will remain constant."
DH: "yes."
Judge:  "Then why are you changing your name?"
DH:  "Well, you see I have a new wife and..."
Judge:  "Oh, I see.  One of those new age marriage agreements.  Ok, see the clerk."

It's funny now but at the time when the judge was looking down on him from her perch with a disapproving glare, not so funny.

How about nobody taking anybody else's name? It's a strange custom, imho, changing your name. I don't understand the appeal.

Kids could have one parent's last name as their middle name, and the other parent's name as the last name.

It would be really simple that way.

My first husband and I both hyphenated, and had no drama (again, we were in CA).  But OMG! changing back was such a pain after the divorce.  I still haven't done it with the cell phone, because I consider the information they demand to be unnecessarily intrusive (no, you really do not need a copy of my divorce decree, and why do you need my driver's license again?  CC company took me at my word.).

I'm engaged again now, and I've decided to keep my last name.  I realized how attached I am to my last name, AND to the family story behind it, AND given that there are people in my life who still call me by my last name, it would be silly to change it.

DF doesn't care, don't know if his family knows or will really care, and my family hardly thinks of such things.  I'm sure some of the older generations in our families will end up addressing mail to Mr. and Mrs. Husband'slastname, which will be a little annoying but not terrible.  I suspect our kids will have my last name as their middle name (or one of them, anyway).  

HOWEVER, living in rural SW Iowa, I am sure this is going to freak some people out.  The hyphenated thing was apparently very complicated for some individuals for whom it should have been easy (do we file this under "D" or "G"?  Well, see, the first letter of the last name is "D," so why don't you use that?; plus some deliberately obstinate folk who just refused to acknowledge my last name.), so I am sure that the keeping of my own name will raise some eyebrows.  That, and being a minister.  Oh, and getting the legal stuff done in Canada, in solidarity with our GLT brothers and sisters.  WHEW!  

I took my husband's name because mine is difficult. And I don't like it that much. His is nice and simple. If I'd married someone with more consonants than vowels, I might have kept mine. I still use mine professionally, to keep the continuity of my publications, but otherwise I just use his. Mind you, I use Dr. and not Mrs. That "Missus" has always annoyed the crap out of me. I was Ms. before I was Dr.

The only thing that annoys me more than "Mrs.(husband's last name)" is "Mrs. (husband's first and last name)". What? I suddenly lost my first name too? I think not!

DH and I each kept our own names, and we hyphenated DD's last name.  We thought a lot about it, but decided that if she was hyphenated, then both of our names would be in her name.  It seemed to us that it would maybe eliminate the confusion that comes with just one parent having a different name from the others in the family.  She's not quite 2, but she uses her whole name when someone asks her what her name is, "I'm Lucy X-Y," she says.  I think it's adorable, but no one else can understand what the hell she's talking about with that answer.  She refuses to use her middle name--perhaps adding in "Anne" is just one syllable too many for the little gal.  

IMO, feminist ideals aside, the best thing about DH and I keeping our own names is the way you can honestly get rid of telemarketers.  "Mrs. X?"  "No, I'm sorry, there's no one here by that name."  Once someone even persisted with, "Um, the future Mrs. X?"  I said, "sorry, wrong again, no one here by that name" and they  apologized and hung up.  

The worst thing is that it's never simple.  But we can live with that.

We didn't realize how difficult it is to do. Totally makes no sense. I'm glad there's a pioneer out there who made it easier for us to accomplish this goal.

I used my family name as a second middle name. I always liked my middle name and wasn't prepared to jettison it. Hubby took my name that way too. We hyphenated our little girl's last name, but almost immediately regretted it. People misfile her paper work ALL THE TIME. She had two different files at her pediatrician's for over a year, we kept wondering why her records seemed incomplete. The Next kid will be First Name, Middle Name, My Name, His Name... to be called Her Royal Highness of course.

I'm considering taking my husband's name.  I prefer it to mine, and I'd like the whole family to have the same last name.  No rush, though.  We've been married 12 years.