all the kids in my child's daycare/preschool/kindergarten are named...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I also watched SSA site- and somehow or apparently DS's name is up and coming- but it's a classic- so I guess I don't feel as bad- but for DD- a friend whose daughter is named Emma and is now in 4th grade has like 3 or 4 other Emmas in the classroom- so they call her by her middle name too (like Emma Grace) to distinguish them- I think it's harder for females than males with similar names- down the road, males call each other by their last names or nicknames- but females are more stuck.. that is my impression.. anyway, I agree w/ a PP who said if you watch the top 10 names (at least) that you may want to consider the consequence of a common name (at this time- trends change). I also agree that trendy names like mackensie or dylan - well, i;d rather stick to a classic name.. just my opinion of course!

Okay - I have to express my annoyance. I know there are some people that truly picked a name and didn't realize there would be 4 or 5 other kids with the same name, or somehow managed to amazingly pick Hannah which was their great-grandmothers name and of course has special meaning over the Mildred, Irma, Bertha, Sarah Jane, Nellie etc. that were the names of the other great-grandmothers, grandmothers, parents etc. between the father and mother - but please just admit that you picked trendy in it's own way instead of making it a "oh I just love the classic names they so aren't trendy even though half the parents in the class had the same idea" Is that not the definition of a trend? It's like the person that thinks they are low maintenance and really aren't and points out high maintenance another person is. Just own it please. There's trendy modern as in no one had these names 20 years ago and trendy old-fashioned as in people had these name 40 years ago and now they are making a comeback. Okay, off that soapbox.

Actually my daughter is named after my husband's mother. The name is mentioned in this thread numerous times. I liked it and no I did not realize that it was "trendy modern" or "trendy old-fashioned". So I'm supposed to admit to picking trendy and own it? What does that even mean? Why do you have your panties in a wad about my reasons for picking anything?

Last paragraph - AMEN!

[Anonymous]

Exactly - and why expect that everyone do their due diligence in ensuring that their child's name is not on the SSA's list of popular names. Some of us are a bit more spontaneous than that.

Also - hate the comments on whether a name is trailer trashy - very classist.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With my first, we didn't know the gender. We shared the names. The second time we knew the gender, but wouldn't tell. We shared the names we picked out though.

I didn't use Veronica Charlotte or Jackson Paul. I can't tell you how relieved I am that we didn't have a Jack. We ditched it as a name when Monica and Chandler (on Friends) named one of their twins Jack, all I could think is how popular Emma became after another child from that show was given that name.

Emma was already exploding in popularity before that. In 2001, it was ranked 13. For 2002, it was ranked 4, and some of that increased popularity came before the Friends baby's name was revealed.

To avoid picking a popular name, I recommend exploring the SSA site and looking at the approach this woman took:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0CE6D6143AF935A35754C0A9659C8B63

My girls both have names that are classic (and ancestral) but aren't in the top 1000 names. They are not names that people think seem odd in the least, and they are not "50s names."

Why on earth try to avoid a popular name...just so you don't get the wrath of some of this crowd??

Nonsense.

If you love an old family name, and it's up there on the list, select it, who cares?
If you love another name, and it's up there on the list - and you don't care - select it, who cares?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With my first, we didn't know the gender. We shared the names. The second time we knew the gender, but wouldn't tell. We shared the names we picked out though.

I didn't use Veronica Charlotte or Jackson Paul. I can't tell you how relieved I am that we didn't have a Jack. We ditched it as a name when Monica and Chandler (on Friends) named one of their twins Jack, all I could think is how popular Emma became after another child from that show was given that name.

Emma was already exploding in popularity before that. In 2001, it was ranked 13. For 2002, it was ranked 4, and some of that increased popularity came before the Friends baby's name was revealed.

To avoid picking a popular name, I recommend exploring the SSA site and looking at the approach this woman took:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0CE6D6143AF935A35754C0A9659C8B63

My girls both have names that are classic (and ancestral) but aren't in the top 1000 names. They are not names that people think seem odd in the least, and they are not "50s names."

Why on earth try to avoid a popular name...just so you don't get the wrath of some of this crowd??

Nonsense.

If you love an old family name, and it's up there on the list, select it, who cares?
If you love another name, and it's up there on the list - and you don't care - select it, who cares?

I posted the link to the article because the OP seemed to want an uncommon name for her child. I wanted uncommon names for my kids, too, so that they wouldn't go through life as First Name Last Initial - which is what my DH and his sister had to do. My best friend named a dd Emma, who now goes by both her first and middle names to differentiate her from the other two Emmas in her 5th grade class. For me, my primary goal was to name my children after ancestors. Thus, we did consider names that were more popular than the ones we ended up using. But my secondary goal was for my kids to not be one of many Emmas or Emilys or Jacksons (which is an actual family surname of mine). My tertiary goal was to give my kids lots of nickname possibilities, in case they wanted to go by something else at any point in their lives.

It has nothing to do with avoiding the wrath of this crowd, and I don't know where you got that idea. What people on this board think of my naming decisions and choices is completely irrelevant. I was merely trying to help the OP. There is nothing wrong with avoiding a popular name, just as there is nothing wrong with using one.

I'm afraid to give both my girls' names because I could easily out myself (yeah - I'm paranoid). So I'll give one: Susannah. It is Biblical, timeless, feminine, but also similar in sound and feel to some popular names today (Hannah, Savannah, etc.) In addition to the obvious nicknames, such as Susie, Sue and Sukie, there are a few unusual ones, such as Zannah, Sunny and Zuzu.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I'm afraid to give both my girls' names because I could easily out myself (yeah - I'm paranoid). So I'll give one: Susannah. It is Biblical, timeless, feminine, but also similar in sound and feel to some popular names today (Hannah, Savannah, etc.) In addition to the obvious nicknames, such as Susie, Sue and Sukie, there are a few unusual ones, such as Zannah, Sunny and Zuzu.

Just want to say I love the name Susannah; good choice!

[Anonymous]

I'm 7 months pregnant and our #1 name choice was mentioned on here as a older name you WOULDN'T choose because it wasn't very attractive. Ha! That's fine with me -- I've only met one other person with my name (the checkout lady at the grocery store) and thought it was cool growing up to have a weird name. Whether our daughter will agree with us is another story, but we like it (and it's a family name, which I like too).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With my first, we didn't know the gender. We shared the names. The second time we knew the gender, but wouldn't tell. We shared the names we picked out though.

I didn't use Veronica Charlotte or Jackson Paul. I can't tell you how relieved I am that we didn't have a Jack. We ditched it as a name when Monica and Chandler (on Friends) named one of their twins Jack, all I could think is how popular Emma became after another child from that show was given that name.

Emma was already exploding in popularity before that. In 2001, it was ranked 13. For 2002, it was ranked 4, and some of that increased popularity came before the Friends baby's name was revealed.

To avoid picking a popular name, I recommend exploring the SSA site and looking at the approach this woman took:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0CE6D6143AF935A35754C0A9659C8B63

My girls both have names that are classic (and ancestral) but aren't in the top 1000 names. They are not names that people think seem odd in the least, and they are not "50s names."

Why on earth try to avoid a popular name...just so you don't get the wrath of some of this crowd??

Nonsense.

If you love an old family name, and it's up there on the list, select it, who cares?
If you love another name, and it's up there on the list - and you don't care - select it, who cares?

I posted the link to the article because the OP seemed to want an uncommon name for her child. I wanted uncommon names for my kids, too, so that they wouldn't go through life as First Name Last Initial - which is what my DH and his sister had to do. My best friend named a dd Emma, who now goes by both her first and middle names to differentiate her from the other two Emmas in her 5th grade class. For me, my primary goal was to name my children after ancestors. Thus, we did consider names that were more popular than the ones we ended up using. But my secondary goal was for my kids to not be one of many Emmas or Emilys or Jacksons (which is an actual family surname of mine). My tertiary goal was to give my kids lots of nickname possibilities, in case they wanted to go by something else at any point in their lives.

It has nothing to do with avoiding the wrath of this crowd, and I don't know where you got that idea. What people on this board think of my naming decisions and choices is completely irrelevant. I was merely trying to help the OP. There is nothing wrong with avoiding a popular name, just as there is nothing wrong with using one.

I'm afraid to give both my girls' names because I could easily out myself (yeah - I'm paranoid). So I'll give one: Susannah. It is Biblical, timeless, feminine, but also similar in sound and feel to some popular names today (Hannah, Savannah, etc.) In addition to the obvious nicknames, such as Susie, Sue and Sukie, there are a few unusual ones, such as Zannah, Sunny and Zuzu.

My cousin and one of my best friends from high school are both named Susanna. My cousin is "Suz" or "Susie" and my friend is "Zan". Always loved the nickname "Zan" - think it is very cool. I am a "Sarah" and I always had to differentiate myself in school as Sarah S. Then when I went to college, my freshman roommate was also a Sarah. So I became "small Sarah" because I am short and she was "tall Sarah". I have always liked my name except for having to spell it all the time - it drives me nuts when people leave off the "h", but I have learned to deal.

[Anonymous]

Ha! I never knew that Sukie was a nickname for Susanna. I always wondered about Sukie on Gilmore Girls and where she got her weird name. You learn something every day.

[Anonymous]

Not sure how accurate this is, but I heard Sukie means "Beloved" in Japanese. My sister uses "Sukie" as a nickname for her little chihhuahua.

Also, Susanah is the name of one of the most truly beautiful girls I ever taught (inner and outer beauty). Love it.

[Anonymous]

One name I am seeing a LOT of is Michaela but usually spelled Makayla or some other modern incarnation. I prefer the classic spelling myself.

Boys: Evan, Ethan, the -aden names in various incarnations, Ryan, Jack, Jake, Nicholas, Rory, Christopher, Colin, Ben/Bennett, Matthew, Reed, William/Will. For girls, lots of Lindsay, Grace, Maggie, Emma, Ella, Isabella/Bella, Jessica, Sophie, Julia, Molly, Paige, Madison. Also androgynous names like Morgan, Logan, Riley, and Reagan.

We picked old family names (both first names and last names) which go back to the late 1800s-early 1900s. It was hard though, because seemingly everyone was named Ann, Susan, John, William, or something I would never inflict on a child (Arnold, Alma, Lou, Lura, Florence, etc.). We have not met other kids with our kids' names, but a lot of people will say, "Oh, that was my grandmother's name!" I also like names that are fairly common in my parents' (pre-baby-boom) generation but never used now (Anne, Mary, June, Judy, Ruth, Margaret, Sally, Leslie, Karen, Eleanor, Jean/Jeanne, Donna, Eileen, Edward, Paul, Stephen, David, Craig, Kevin, Robert, Dennis, Andrew, George, Gregory, etc.).

You can also look to your own ethnic heritage and use less-common names from there (say you're German, you could name your kid Dietrich or Clara; Irish, you could use Maeve or Padraic; French, you could use Etienne, Bernard, Brigitte, Suzette, or Louise; Russian, you could use Nicolai or Anastasia, etc.).

Don't discount using a long "classic" name like Elizabeth or Katherine with a shorter nickname. You could call an Elizabeth Eliza, Beth, Liz, Lisa, Lissie, Liza, etc. My name is Katherine. There were many others in my class, but we could all be differentiated by different spellings (C or K, -arine/-erine/-ryn) and our nicknames (Kathy, Katie, Katy, Kate, Kat - although my less-common nickname meant no mini license plates for me ). Of all the kids we know, there is only one Elizabeth.

If you really want to be unique, try giving your kid a last name (like your maiden name) as their middle name! You can honor your family while also giving your kid a middle name nobody will have. I always loved that I had a family name for a middle name and was not one of the many girls whose middle name was Anne, Elizabeth, or Lynn. My kids have such middle names too.

I cannot agree more with not sharing the name beforehand (or even hypothesizing about names for future children). Not only can you avoid other people's opinions, but nobody will steal your baby name!

[Anonymous]

jack jack jack -- we know at least 7 jacks under 4, plus more with jack as a middle name. ugh. and ava seems super popular, too. i hate the "super unique" names, especially if the family has no connection to the name's origin or it just sounds made up.

[Anonymous]

Lucy and Maya. Have 7 or 8 friends with one or the other.

[Anonymous]

Perhaps Jack is such a popular name b/c it is cool and timeless? Jack is a great name for a 4 year old -- 40 year old -- or 94 year old. I really don't understand why some folks have such a burning desire to saddle their kid with such an uber-unique name. A couple weeks ago we were on the metro and noticed another family with a kid around the same age as our little one -- the parents were dressed ultra trendy (funky clothes -- funky shoes -- funky glasses) and they were peppering their little kid with a running commentary and questions about their upcoming museum trip (will we see things as interesting as what we saw in New York? Or Seattle?) -- the kid was named Linus. Maybe it's a family name -- but my guess is that the parents were trying to be cool and give their kid a unique moniker. There isn't anything inherently wrong with that -- until the kid learns from his classmates that it isn't a cool name and he suffers years of teasing and ultimately ends up in therapy resenting his parents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Perhaps Jack is such a popular name b/c it is cool and timeless? Jack is a great name for a 4 year old -- 40 year old -- or 94 year old. I really don't understand why some folks have such a burning desire to saddle their kid with such an uber-unique name.

i like timeless names, too, but i also think they reach a tipping point when it gets old. we picked a timeless name but wouldn't have used it if 6 of our friends already had kids with that name (in fact, we shot down jack and sam for that very reason). i also agree that superunique names can be annoying )not sure why i think it is any of my business, but that's another issue).

it was MUCH harder to pick a name than i thought it would be, i guess because we wanted to strike a balance between being the third jack in a class and giving him a name that either he had to repeat or spell 3 times or one that had some sort of stereotype to it (i agree, linus sounds a bit dorky).

i just find naming a lot more interesting that i thought i would before i had a kid!

[Anonymous]

Just wanted to mention this, going with the spirit of the last comment. I had what was in the 1970s and 1980s a very unusual name. I found it incredibly embarrassing to be so different from everyone else, and often shortened it so that it sounded more common. Now, people seem to be using it with their kids -- it's in the flowery, romantic style of the "-ella" and "-ia" names. I like it now, but I just wanted to bring this up since it's the kid who has to live with their name, and being unusual isn't always what kids want to be.