I kept my surname when I got married. All my kids have DH's surname and my surname as a 2nd middle name. My surname is a popular boys name atm too so it worked well. DS is known by all of his names but I tend to drop the girls 2nd middle name (my surname) for some reason.
I hyphenated my surname when I married DH, DH kept his the same and our son has DH's name only. DH is a bit of a traditionalist and didn't want to hyphenate DS's surname so we compromised and his middle name is my dad's name. Ideally if it was just my choice I would have done it as there are only girls left in my family so that's the end of the name. It took DH a while to accept that I wanted to keep my surname as well as take on his. He thought it only made me half his wife hahaha
It was a no-brainer for us as I have a truly appalling surname and while wild horses wouldn't have me changing it for a man, I'm not willing to inflict it on my daughter. So she has her dad's as will our next one. I'm actually thinking of changing my surname to my daughter's middle name - Mackenzie - then there will be a link. If this one's a boy he can also have the middle name Mackenzie. But then I kinda like doing things a bit back to front.
If we both had acceptable surnames, I don't think I'd do the hyphenated thing either. It has English upper-class overtones for me that I don't wish to emulate. However, I would consider coming up with a new surname that combined the two old surnames. Or maybe having one as a middle name rather than officially part of the surname.
We did the hyphenated thing, it just seemed more democratic. We would have preferred to choose a family surname but couldn't think of something that resonated without sounding utterly pretentious (that is, less pretentious than the hyphenated name we've saddled our poor kid with). And to be honest, we couldn't be bothered with the paperwork LOL.
We'll work on something though. Maybe we'll get hitched one day and do it then.
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