After two plus years in our urban(esque) rowhome, we’re out of excuses for not having paint on our walls.  My challenge is to choose based on the actual color rather than my enthusiasm for having walls called Tate Olive.  Which really could be a baby name, or possibly a sibset.

But it’s actually a shade of green that might be in our living/dining/kitchen room.

Speaking of design, anyone else think Bravo’s new show 9 by Design likely to up the number of baby girls called Bellamy in 2010 and beyond?  Even without the Novgoratz clan’s delightfully named brood, she’s a successor name to popular pick Avery and a tailored way to get to Bella, too.  Bellamy has yet to appear in the US Top 1000.

Another reality show name that could pop? Tinsley, as in socialite Tinsley Mortimer, now appearing on The CW’s High Society.  I’m not watching HS, but I can imagine Tinsley taking off.

Elsewhere online:

• Via Daddytypes, an unusual sibset spotted: Apollo, Diana, Athena and Hermes – and they were kids in the 1960s, proof that Extreme Baby Naming is not a 21st century phenomenon;
• Babynamelover spotted a Troyden Cooper, a little brother for Bentley and Rexton.  It’s interesting to watch a trend morph, isn’t it?  While Brayden and Caiden aren’t feeling original anymore – even to those who don’t obsessively follow baby name news – there’s still room to take a DIY approach to baby names, adding a -den, -ley or -ton to nearly any plausible first syllable;
• For Real Baby Names brings us Awesome Lee Sunshine -  it’s a girl.  As 4Real wrote: “It takes a lot to surprise me these days when it comes to baby names, but this one did.”  While Lee is a pretty neutral choice, the combo is wildly over-the-top;
• Sebastiane at LegitBabeNames covered Polish rarity Cieszygor and Japanese staple Haruko – charming, because they showed up in my Google reader back-to-back and I found myself thinking up scenarios where a couple answering to the names met and fell in love – and named their kids Jane and Michael;
• Via Elisabeth at You Can’t Call It “It,” I found the blog Design Mom.  Which would be great all on its own, because, as I mentioned earlier, I could use some inspiration.  Written by Gabby Blair, she and husband Ben also have five nicely named kids - Ralph, Maude, Olive, Oscar, and Betty – plus #6 is on the way! Elisabeth suggests ideas for baby Blair and the comments are fascinating;
• Another megafamily, with a very different naming style, can be found at BakersDozen.  The kids are Jubilee, Ezra, Mordecai, Boaz, Adalia, Hezekiah, Kalina, Keziah, Avi, Tilly, Enoch and Judah.  And mom, Renee, is also pregnant!  They’re not quite like the Duggars, though – about half the kids were adopted.  Renee is also a truly gifted children’s photographer – too bad she’s in Bellingham, Washington, or I’d be calling for an appointment;
• Just for the fun of it, The Stir takes a stab at writing a recipe for naming celeb chef Jamie Oliver’s fourth little one, due soon-ish.  My personal pick is Carnation Shmoopy Roxanne, but I doubt they’ll go with it;
• Nancy combed through the Quebec name stats to report on the most popular picks, plus the true rarities.  There’s a girl called Shadey (please stand up) and another named Harvest, plus boys named Nervastone and Rafter.  And so many more on her lists that you’ll just have to go check ‘em out;
• Namipedia has published their fastest risers so far, giving rise to many a post elsewhere online, like this one at ParentDish.  For girls, it was Sookie, Tenley, Eloise, Genevieve and Piper; for boys, Castiel, Declan, Atreyu, Dashiell and Phineas.  It’s an intriguing list, but remember that not all of these searches are done by those about to name a child – odds are that it will be more than five years before every kindergarten in the country has a Sookie and an Atreyu sitting side-by-side;
• Also from the NameLady: Are Matching Twin Names Too Cheesy? My initial reaction was yes, but the name set in question – Alice and Celia – seem perfectly reasonable, and it took me a minute to realize that they’re anagram names;
• A Mother in Israeli asked readers to chime in about what’s popular for babies right now.  It’s a fascinating conversation, and a great resource if you want a name that wears well in Jerusalem.

From the Hollywood desk:

• Namberry asks why some celeb baby names pop and others, like Suri, fail to catch on;
• Erin Blakely at Famecrawler figures out which celeb used which celeb fave-name first;
• OK, Sean and Rachel Campos-Duffy have long since left The Real World for, well, the real world, though he occasionally surfaces on ESPN and she’s been known to guest host on The View.  Their new daughter’s name is intriguing: MariaVictoria Margarita.  Lotsa syllables, check.  Compatible with older sibs’ names, check. MariaVictoria joins Evita Pilar, Xavier Jack, Lucia-Belen, John-Paul, and Paloma Pilar. But is MariaVictoria really what they intend to call her?  And won’t her name appear Mariavictoria – a seven-syllable smoosh – on most official forms?  Guess we’ll have to wait for the interview.

April 15 was the deadline to vote in the Baby Name Wizard’s 2009 Baby Name Poll. I completely forgot to vote!  The only thing I’d determined was that Esme would be on my “rising” list.  Apparently, I wasn’t alone.  I can’t wait to see the results.  Anticipated due date?  Right around Mother’s Day.

Thanks for reading, and have a fabulous week!