Names: do you choose popular or unusal?

[GillW]

Just wondered - how did you all choose your children's names? And did you take account of how popular that name was at the time when you made your choice?

I was reading yesterday that the list of popular names for 2002 has just been published, and that Jack has now been the most popular boys' name for the past eight years, and Chloe the top girls' name for the past six years.

Personally, knowing that, I'd avoid those names like the plague, because I'd hate my child to share a name with several classmates, but obviously that doesn't apply to a lot of people, hence their continuing popularity.

Now I can see some advantages in having a popular name, in that you'll always be able to buy personalised products, and most people will know how to spell it, but beyond that....?

Equally, would you choose a very unusual name?

Incidentally, if anyone's interested the lists for the last 5 years for England and Wales are here for boys , and for girls

For babies born in Scotland, they're here , and here for Northern Ireland .

[oxocube]

Oh no! All 3 of mine have names in the top 12 for 2002! I had no idea we were so common

[GeorginaA]

We just went through a baby name book and picked out the names we both liked. Checked that the initials didn't spell out anything bad, that it sounded okay with our surname and that we liked all the potential short forms of the name. Don't think we gave it much thought whether the name was popular or not really...

[Mines]

Must admit to preferring names that are well known but never particularly fashionable - hence Alexander for my DS.

Since I possess a name (Hermione) that has been practically unknown pre JK Rowling, I know all the pleasures and pitfalls of having an unusual name. You have to be relaxed about 'adventurous' spelling and prepared for people not to forget you!

I don't know what DS's attitude to people getting his name wrong would be so I decided to go with something well known.

Damn - having thoroughly blown my cover I shall now have to go and change my nickname

[AngieL]

I didn't want to give my kids a name that was shared by everyone else. Looking at the charts I seem to have done quite well, my eldest dd and ds are both low down and my baby dd is somewhere in the 20's.

I wanted names that weren't common but that weren't wierd either. I think to label a kid with a really unusual name can be a bit unfair, setting them up for ridicule really. I suppose it depends on where you live though, if you lived in some posh celebrity suburb an unusual name would probably be the norm.

[SoupDragon]

Absolutely appalled to see DS2s name climbing the charts. Having accidentally chosen a top 20 name for DS1 we tried hard to be unusual without being wierd for DS2.

We just chose ones we liked really. I was disappointed that DS1s turned out to be so popular

Sigh.

[GillW]

Oxocube - having said I'd avoid the most popular name, we too deliberately chose one which wasn't in the top 20, only to find it's now in the top 10.

I'd be fascinated to see some figures against each name, rather than just a "league position" to see the relative popularity of each, but I don't think they publish those.

[Katherine]

I hated sharing my name with classmates but we ended up with something quite unusual for DS simply because we couldn't come up with anything we both liked. Read a birth story where the baby was called Noah and we both loved it, hence Noah James. With DD we had several names we liked, all fairly uncommon and settled on Harriet Grace. If we ever have another boy he will be Jude Elliot and a girl would be Agnes so yes I supplose we do like them more unusual and it is nice that people always remember their names although I'd like to think this is down to their characters as much as their names. Alwasy find personalised products a bit naff myself so its quite nice not to be able to get them.

[Marina]

With Mines on this - although when we chose ds1's name we knew no other children with the same and still don't. And yet it is in the Top 10. We also favour names with a family connection (possibly leaving out Great-Uncle Wilfred). When our parents are getting us both down we sometimes daydream about having a little girl and calling her Ellen Lucy, thereby infuriating both our mothers.

[bluestar]

Glad to say that I picked a name down in the 70's on the list although since ds was born 2 years ago, I have heard more people being called the same name so will be interesting in a few years to see where it is on the list - glad he will be at the forefront of this name rather than the million-ith Jack etc! Although he does have much more popular middle names however they are named after people we already know.

[Jimjams]

DS1's name didn't feature in the top 100 in 1999 when he was born. NOw it's almost (not quite) in the top 50. It's on TV a bit as well. DS2's name is popular. Top 10 since about 1900 I think :-)

I only know one other person with my name and it;s spelt differently.

[breeze]

personally, i chose a name for ds because er liked it and not because it was popular. I think as long as you do not give your child a name that is likely to cause them grief at school, because children can be so cruel and i remember someone from my class being picked on because they had a 'unusual' name.

[Enid]

Cant seem to access the list for England, but looked at the scottish one and am really surprised to see dd1 (Eve) at number 30 whereas dd2 (Alice) is way down at 70. Thought it would be the other way around.

[GillW]

Sorry - afraid "create a new conversation" page doesn't let you preview to test links, etc. Try again - the girls list is here - for England Eve is 58th and Alice 33rd

[forest]

My dh was against any of the more unusual names Which I love. So we gave her an old fashioned name as we both agreed (sp?) that we liked them. Since meeting mums I have found they have all given their babies unusual names so my dd is the odd one out for having a "normal" name!!

[slug]

DD's is no 50. We chose it partly because the short form (Alex) is gender non specific.

Her second name is very unsusal. It's a fairly common NZ name and I desparatly wanted it to be her first name but dh vetoed it on the basis that it is unpronouncable and unspellable to all but us Antipodean born folk.

[easy]

I wanted to give my ds the middle name of Xavier, so in the phone book he would be the only "Fred X Bloggs" (not that he's Fred or Bloggs). I went thru most of the pregnancy believing that would be his middle name. in the last wk from the end dh and my mum conspired to gang up and persuade me no to. He now has nice, not too common names, but i regret being dissuaded.
I see one Xavier at least every week now (in TV credits, magazine articles etc.

[sis]

We went with a name that seemed to suit ds and scapped the name that we had planned to give him as the name didn't 'fit'.

[janh]

I have 3 top 10 names and one that doesn't appear at all! (DD2 - no wonder she's so peculiar. )

Interesting to see Mohammad and Muhammad in the list but separately - I wonder how high the name would go if the figures were added together?

[Podmog]

Message withdrawn

[bells2]

I personally wouldn't worry too much about names appearing on these lists. There are so many names out there that if something appears at say number 6 or so, it doen't seem to be the case that in a class of children a significant number will be called that name. Our names have been chosen mainly for family reasons.

I remember reading an article about an annual convention of people called Linda in the US which I think was extraordinarily popular 40 - 50 years ago. The article made the point that it was one of those names which virtually nobody at all under 40 or so is called.

[janh]

bells2, my class at school (50s-60s) was basically Linda, Christine, Pauline, Ann, Janet/Janice, Carol, Hilary, Rosemary, Susan, Teresa, Wendy, Gillian, Lesley, Alison, Stephanie, Barbara....not a lot of any of those about these days. (Or Hilda, Ethel, Ivy, Vera, Eileen etc from a previous generation.)

Anybody looking for a novel name these days, there you go! (Herbert, anybody?)

[elliott]

fairly surprised to see ds's name not far out of the top 50, and only just higher than my pseudonym (which I partly chose because I like it as a name but consider it too unusual to use for a child! and no I don't know why I picked a male name for myself...)
I did take into account popularity, in the sense that I consciously rejected 'top 10' names (even though I really like lots of them - I suppose that's why they're popular), but I also wanted a name that everyone would have heard of and that would be easy to spell.
I have a theory that people often choose names they think are uncommon, only to find them storming up the charts. Ruby is a name that springs to mind - I know one person whose recently called a daughter ruby, and I thought 'how unusual' (or thoughts to that effect...) and now I see it is actually quite popular. i guess this is how fashions spread.

[WideWebWitch]

I chose unusual and haven't ever met anyone else with the same name as ds. Glad I did really, I like to think he'll be memorable in his future life because of an unusual (but not completely weird I don't think) name. Who knows, maybe he won't thank me for it when he's older.