If you’ve read anything here, you’ve probably guessed that I’m a voracious reader. Always have been. My obsession of the moment is Stieg Larsson’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. The tale is gripping. And the reluctant heroine? She wears the nicely pared down Lisbeth, a German diminutive form of Elizabeth that stands on her own, too.
In the anything-but-spare category, check out these over-the-top appellations, some lovely, some less so:
- Babynamelover spotted a Quinelle Lily-Kate and a Kypreece Page;
- Those daring Canadians at ParentCentral.ca chronicle how they landed on the not too very unusual Nyla Margaret;
- Here’s one I kind of love – the botanical Chyrsanthe, profiled by Sebastiane at Legitimate Baby Names;
- Hat tip to DaddyTypes for the heads up on this one: Jason Kottke’s list of names they didn’t use for their child, a daughter called Minna, who would’ve been Milo if she had been a boy;
- Could it be that the trusty just add -an/-en formula for creating baby naming is waning in favor of just add -er? As in Catcher Grant and Pledger Dean, both appearing at Names4Real this week. Catcher was also the name of Ewan MacGregor’s character in 2003′s Down With Love;
- I’m not saying that creative name spelling is criminal. But, while watching Lifetime’s Who is Clark Rockefeller?, I couldn’t help but notice that the swindling not-Clark named his daughter Reigh.
I neglected to mention All Things Irish on March 17, but Sebastiane posted on Patrick and Patricia, and Nameberry offered a nice write-up of Patrick, too.
File this one under good advice about bad advice: Nancy explains why you needn’t worry about choosing a baby name that lends itself to a distinctive user name. All those parents who created email addresses like brittanysmith@aol.com can explain why, too. On the other hand, Nancy gives excellent advice regarding the use of gratuitous Xs in spelling your child’s name. Dear me, has she really spotted a Roxxi?
In starbaby news:
- Actor Joseph Fiennes is apparently flipping through baby name books, trying to agree on a baby name for his newborn daughter with wife Maria Dolores Dieguez. He’s asked for suggestions, but I don’t think he’s really crowdsourcing. But he could check out the list at kottke.org;
- Gisele Bündchen apparently wanted to name her son River, but dad Tom Brady put his foot down. The baby ended up Benjamin Rein instead;
- I don’t watch Dr. Phil, but apparently he’ll be able to dole out advice on grandparent issues from a personal perspective – his granddaughter Avery Elizabeth was born last week.
Lastly, Pamela Redmond Satran, one-half of the Nameberry team, penned The Elite’s Top 50 Baby Names last week over at The Daily Beast. It’s a great article, and I love how she’s utilized Nameberry data to explain the phenomenon that makes us all tear out our hair – our perfect, unusual, never-heard-before baby name is suddenly everywhere. Most interesting to me: Huxley didn’t make her Elite 50 list, but does surface on the other frequently searched at Nameberry list. There goes my undiscovered gem.
That’s all for this week. As always, thanks for reading!
