I love Margaret.

Molly #1
Not a fan of the other 2...but "ok."

Name her Molly. Great name.

Behindthename.com says diminutive of Mary:

"MOLLY

Meaning & History
Diminutive of MARY. It developed from Malle and Molle, other medieval diminutives. James Joyce used this name in his novel 'Ulysses' (1920), where it belongs to Molly Bloom, the wife of the main character."

http://www.behindthename.com/name/molly

Name her Molly. It's a great name. I don't think of it as a nickname for Martha or Margaret, and my name is Margaret. I love nicknames, but I have never understood why you would name someone Mary and call them Molly. They are different names with the same number of syllables.

My DD is Margaret and I love it. She's named after her great-grandma, the nicest old lady ever, so anyone who doesn't like it can GFY. She's 2 now and I have no regrets. We get lots of compliments on it, and it hits the sweet spot of classic, yet not overly popular, yet not too unusual either.

I do have to tell people not to call her Maggie. Nobody has tried Molly. My dad, I think, secretly dislikes it and tries to call her Gretchen, but she doesn't cooperate. Ha.

Anonymous wrote:
[There are many names that began as nicknames, but are accepted independent names now. One begins to think that the person (people?) who immediately chime into these threads with comments about how you are dooming your child if you don't do what is "traditional" don't get out much; certainly they cannot have attended an actual Ivy League school in the past 15 years or taught or sent kids to private schools. Certainly the first name "Molly' on a resume or application doesn't doom a child, and you know what? If affluent, well-educated parents did choose to name their child Nevaeh, that wouldn't either.]

I was just reading today about the president of St. Mary's College of Maryland, Tuajuanda Jordan.

http://www.smcm.edu/president/biography/

All are perfectly fine names for a girl, but if you want to assure that she will be called Molly, you should name her Molly. If you don't mind a little girl who might become Meg or Maggie or Martha or Marty at one point, go with one of those.

[There are many names that began as nicknames, but are accepted independent names now. One begins to think that the person (people?) who immediately chime into these threads with comments about how you are dooming your child if you don't do what is "traditional" don't get out much; certainly they cannot have attended an actual Ivy League school in the past 15 years or taught or sent kids to private schools. Certainly the first name "Molly' on a resume or application doesn't doom a child, and you know what? If affluent, well-educated parents did choose to name their child Nevaeh, that wouldn't either.]

I have a uncommon nickname that I have always used for my formal first name. All my life I have been grateful because when someone would ask for me on the phone by my formal name, I always knew it was a solicitor. Invaluable!!

If you like Molly, use Molly.

Anonymous wrote:I like Margaret "Molly". I'm not a huge fan of nicknames being used of proper names. I think kids should have have a resume name they can use as adults and the fun nickname in everyday life.

What is the difference between a "resume name" and the name you use on your resume? For example, if your name is Molly Cheddar and you put "Molly Cheddar" on your resume.

Anonymous wrote:Molly is great, but it's a nickname for Mary, not Margaret or Martha. If you want a formal name go with Mary, but Molly on its own is fine.

Molly and Polly are both supposedly nicknames for Mary. On the other hand, how did anybody get from Mary to Molly, let alone from Mary to Polly?

All of the Mollys and Pollys I have known have been just Molly and Polly, not Mary with nicknames.

I like Margaret "Molly". I'm not a huge fan of nicknames being used of proper names. I think kids should have have a resume name they can use as adults and the fun nickname in everyday life.

My daughter is Mary and we call her Molly. Mary Todd Lincoln went by Molly, FWIW.

I knew that Molly can also be a nickname for Margaret, but I've never heard of the Martha connection.

Anyway, we named her Mary after my DH's mother, which also thrilled my very Catholic mother, but if we didn't have that connection we probably would have just named her Molly.

Not Martha. It just sounds like an unattractive girl's name.