s/o Names you like but rarely hear

[Anonymous]

Norma

[Anonymous]

Hugo
Irving
Miriam
Lilah
Leonora (though I've actually seen this twice recently as both a first and middle name so it might be getting trendy)

[Anonymous]

It's funny because the minute you've thought you've found an under the radar name, wait three years and you'll know at least two people who have used it. My daughter was born in 2017 and among the names we considered, thinking they were relatively unusual at the time, include:

Beatrice
Josephine
Penelope
Dorothy or Dorothea
Hazel

We know multiple little girls with all of those names now from our kids daycare and neighbors/friends, plus two Theodoras (variant of Dorothy). This stuff goes in cycles and they sneak up on you. I guarantee there were people back in the 70s who thought they were doing something novel and different by naming their kids Jessica or Stephanie.

Our kids' names are not as unique as I think we hoped at the time, but they suit them perfectly. I think that's more important than getting ahead of a name trend, personally.

[Anonymous]

For the poster who said "Demeter", I've seen plenty of people use Demetria and then go by Demi.

Personally, I love Remy but since so many people are using it for girls now I would probably go for a longer name and use it as a nn. His brother was Karsten, which I like better than Carsten.

I also like Behati (bay-aht-ee), from Beate/Beata.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's funny because the minute you've thought you've found an under the radar name, wait three years and you'll know at least two people who have used it... This stuff goes in cycles and they sneak up on you. I guarantee there were people back in the 70s who thought they were doing something novel and different by naming their kids Jessica or Stephanie.

It is an incredibly rare name that actually goes from obscurity to top 10. If you care to follow the trends, there are now plenty of ways to do it. I am a fan of the SSA site where you can type in a name to see it's popularity number over time. You can usually see a steady rise before a name is everywhere.

I had one of those late 70s names that my parents thought was so nice and different....and everyone else apparently had the same thought ;P. It annoyed me so much that I went to great lengths to make sure that my children's names weren't anywhere near the top of the SSA list. I aimed for less than 500 with no steady rise over the past several years. Their names are not crazy, out there names - they are normal names that people are familiar with. They are just the ones that are not currently in favor.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: His brother was Karsten, which I like better than Carsten.

Interesting - my childhood best friend used this spelling (with the K) for her first son. Her second child is named something else, though - so there are at least 2 Karstens somewhere nearby.

[Anonymous]

Heather
Lisa
Delia
Dorothy
Minna

Craig
Dean
Thomas
Alistair

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is one really foul Bridget hater here.

I'm Irish, and I love your tribute to your grandma, PP.

+1 It's so strange that they don't understand "When I hear a classic Irish girl's name I just think you're poor! Because Irish people are poor and they had to be maids!" isn't convincing Irish Americans to be ashamed that their ancestors might have been poor. It just makes that PP sound like a bigoted jagoff. Congrats on your great-great-whatever having a maid, I guess? Since that's apparently a source of pride for some people?

Why hello fellow yinzer! The DC area is much snobbier than Pittsburgh, doesn't surprise me a bit that people are shaming others for coming from working class families. They're jerks, just ignore them.

[Anonymous]

I love Jennifer with the nickname Jenny. There were always two or three in every class when I was growing up, but the only young Jennifer I can think of is maybe one of the Duggar kids?

[Anonymous]

Jeremiah
Ellen
June
Tori
Julie
Cheri
Leah
Claire
Rhett
Sonny
Sally
Joy

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's funny because the minute you've thought you've found an under the radar name, wait three years and you'll know at least two people who have used it... This stuff goes in cycles and they sneak up on you. I guarantee there were people back in the 70s who thought they were doing something novel and different by naming their kids Jessica or Stephanie.

It is an incredibly rare name that actually goes from obscurity to top 10. If you care to follow the trends, there are now plenty of ways to do it. I am a fan of the SSA site where you can type in a name to see it's popularity number over time. You can usually see a steady rise before a name is everywhere.

I had one of those late 70s names that my parents thought was so nice and different....and everyone else apparently had the same thought ;P. It annoyed me so much that I went to great lengths to make sure that my children's names weren't anywhere near the top of the SSA list. I aimed for less than 500 with no steady rise over the past several years. Their names are not crazy, out there names - they are normal names that people are familiar with. They are just the ones that are not currently in favor.

I think the danger of being one of five Jessicas or one of three Sarahs in your graduating class has faded a bit. Even many of the most popular names on the SSA list now are less common than the most popular names of the 80s and 90s. People just use more names now, and with immigration increasing overall diversity that only gets more true.

We have been a bit surprised at the popularity of our children's names, which were definitely sub-500 on the SSA list for many years when we selected them. But the prior PP is correct that these trends can sneak up on you. We've encountered children with the same names more than once in our kids school, for instance, which we didn't expect. But they still aren't top 10 names, so it doesn't feel like a big deal.

Another factor is that SSA reflects national trends, but there are often little localized trends. I think that's what happened with us. Our kids' names are uncommon within our families and definitely within the US as a whole, but are surprisingly common among kids of similar ages in our socioeconomic cohort in this region.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Jeremiah
Ellen
June
Tori
Julie
Cheri
Leah
Claire
Rhett
Sonny
Sally
Joy

Oh I miss Claire, love that name.
I used to know a Sandy too as well as a Julie

Jeremy is classic, Jeremiah not so

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's funny because the minute you've thought you've found an under the radar name, wait three years and you'll know at least two people who have used it... This stuff goes in cycles and they sneak up on you. I guarantee there were people back in the 70s who thought they were doing something novel and different by naming their kids Jessica or Stephanie.

It is an incredibly rare name that actually goes from obscurity to top 10. If you care to follow the trends, there are now plenty of ways to do it. I am a fan of the SSA site where you can type in a name to see it's popularity number over time. You can usually see a steady rise before a name is everywhere.

I had one of those late 70s names that my parents thought was so nice and different....and everyone else apparently had the same thought ;P. It annoyed me so much that I went to great lengths to make sure that my children's names weren't anywhere near the top of the SSA list. I aimed for less than 500 with no steady rise over the past several years. Their names are not crazy, out there names - they are normal names that people are familiar with. They are just the ones that are not currently in favor.

I think the danger of being one of five Jessicas or one of three Sarahs in your graduating class has faded a bit. Even many of the most popular names on the SSA list now are less common than the most popular names of the 80s and 90s. People just use more names now, and with immigration increasing overall diversity that only gets more true.

We have been a bit surprised at the popularity of our children's names, which were definitely sub-500 on the SSA list for many years when we selected them. But the prior PP is correct that these trends can sneak up on you. We've encountered children with the same names more than once in our kids school, for instance, which we didn't expect. But they still aren't top 10 names, so it doesn't feel like a big deal.

Another factor is that SSA reflects national trends, but there are often little localized trends. I think that's what happened with us. Our kids' names are uncommon within our families and definitely within the US as a whole, but are surprisingly common among kids of similar ages in our socioeconomic cohort in this region.

Exactly your last point - cohort matters. I know three Calders which is waaayyy down the list.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I really like many 80s girl names: Amanda, Jessica, Heather, Kimberly, Amy, Nicole. Imagine meeting a baby named Amanda!

Right!?? Or Scott, or Eric. Seems insane now.

Totally. Baby Scott! Or Jeremy, or Greg.

I know a baby Amy and a 3 year old named Kevin (different families).

[Anonymous]

Florinda