Rana writes:<\/p>\n
We just found out we’re pregnant with our first child and need some help with names!!!<\/p>\n
My husband and I both LOVE Savannah for a girl and Jack for a boy. But I want to consider other names that are maybe a bit less popular, while he is absolutely convinced we should use Savannah and Jack!<\/p>\n
Here is our name list.<\/p>\n
Girls:
\nSavannah Grace – both ADORE
\nEstella Grace – I absolutely LOVE this name, husband does not, but can be convinced
\nEllary Grace nn Ella – again I love, husband not so much
\nLilliana Grace nn Lilly- we both like this a lot too but is it too popular? Also, our puppy’s name is Tilly!
\nNoella Grace – I like this more every time I say it, my husband doesn’t like the No part of the name!<\/p>\nBoys:
\nJack Benjamin – both ADORE this, but I’m afraid its so popular
\nBenjamin ? – we can’t seem to find a middle name for this ?
\nAugustin – I love this my husband thinks its strange!
\nCharleston nn Charlie – We both like this a lot, is it too strange though? Wdyt of it?<\/p>\nHow much should we take popularity into account and what do you think of the above names, individually and compared to each other???
\nAny more suggestions based on our styles?<\/p>\nThank you so much for your help!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
\nThis is an enviable situation: both parents are agreeing on two names they both love.<\/p>\nI would not worry about popularity, if I were you. No, no: stop worrying about it. These are the names you like best. Even if you liked Isabella best (that’s the most popular girl name in the U.S. according to the Social Security Administration<\/a>), I would still push you to use it and not to worry about the popularity: at #1, it’s still only used for 1.17% of baby girls—or about 1 girl named Isabella per 5 or 6 classrooms (assuming 15 girls per class). That’s not too bad. It’ll vary a bit: the statistics are national, and some areas might have almost no Isabellas, which makes other areas more Isabella-rich. Maybe an area would have six times the national average of Isabellas—or one whole Isabella per class. See also: Even the Top 10 is Not Necessarily the Kiss of Death<\/a>.<\/p>\n
But the name you like is not Isabella, it’s Savannah! That was #46 (and falling) in 2010, given to .2736% of baby girls born that year. That’s approximately one Savannah per 25 classrooms. Barely popular at all!<\/p>\n
Jack is a little harder to track: many boys are given other names and then CALLED Jack. We can estimate a little:<\/p>\n
\n
- .42% of baby boys named Jack in 2010,<\/li>\n
- plus .56% of baby boys named John, of which some percentage is called Jack,<\/li>\n
- plus .58% of baby boys named Jackson, of which some percentage is called Jack.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Let’s go for worst-case scenario, in which ALL the baby boys named John and Jackson are in fact called Jack. We know this isn’t the case, but it’ll show us that the actual percentage resides at some point BETTER (i.e., lower) than that, and it will also help compensate for all the little boys who are called Jack but don’t fall into one of our categories above (for example, I know a little boy whose name is Richard John, but he’s a IV and he’s called Jack). In our worst-case scenario where all the Johns and Jacksons are called Jack, approximately 1.55% of boys in the U.S. would be called Jack—or one Jack per four or five classrooms (again, assuming 15 boys per class). And that’s IF there are way more Jacks than there actually are, so the actual situation is BETTER (i.e., fewer Jacks) than that.<\/p>\n
Use the names you love! They are not too popular!<\/p>\n
But of course it’s a little disappointing to have the names chosen so early when it’s so much fun to keep looking! Susannah\/Susanna is similar to Savannah but virtually unused—and with cute nicknames. I love Sukie as this generation’s Susie, but don’t underestimate the vintage charm of calling a little girl Susie Q. And if you like Jack and Benjamin, I wonder if you’d like Jonathan, nickname Jon?<\/p>\n
Now, as to what I think of the other names on your list and your style overall, I have the advice for you that I give to all first-time baby-namers: try to figure out now which names on your list are your actual style and which names are outliers you happen to like even though they don’t fit your usual style; and see if any names you’re considering would rule out any of the other names you’re considering (different styles, duplicate sounds\/initials, wildly different levels of popularity).<\/p>\n
If you have a boy and name him Jack, will that rule out the name Charleston for you later on because of it being such a different style and so much less common? Or will it be fine because you’ll mostly call him Charlie, which is pretty much a perfect-beyond-perfection brother name for Jack? If you have a baby girl this time and name her Savannah, will that make you feel like you couldn’t use Lilliana later, since they both end in the same sound? If you used Estella this time, would you not want to use Ellary next time because of the repeated initial and ella sound in both? And so on.<\/p>\n
It isn’t that you MUST give your children compatible names—not at all. It’s only that if you would LIKE to give them compatible names, this is the moment you are setting your course. We all have names we like that fall outside our usual style (I think of them as “I hope someone I love will use it for THEIR baby!” names), and the trick is to identify those names before inadvertently locking yourself into finding sibling names for them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Rana writes: We just found out we’re pregnant with our first child and need some help with names!!! My husband and I both LOVE Savannah for a girl and Jack for a boy. But I want to consider other names that are maybe a bit less popular, while he is absolutely convinced we should use […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6322","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3iyiG-1DY","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6322","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6322"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6322\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9830,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6322\/revisions\/9830"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}