My week at the beach was spent listening for names (well, there was ice cream and sand and a giant waterslide called the Hippo) but I didn’t hear much.  There was a Veronica nicknamed Vera, but mostly it was the pleasant Top 100 assortment of Ethan, Dylan, Emma, Riley, Noah, Chloe, Caleb, Jackson, Zachary, Ellie, and the like.  I also heard a girl called Cooper and another girl named Gracen or Graycen or maybe Gracyn.  Thanks for checking out Rerun Week while I was slathering on sunscreen!

In the meantime, a new neighbor has arrived and her kids names?  Be still my heart: Nella and Arlo.  I haven’t actually met them (she joined a listserv for local moms) but I might hug her.

Also in the real world, the incredibly talented Brooke at Dinkypopsnomore is now mom to two!  The incredibly photogenic, more-stylish-at-3-than-I-am-at-37 Temperance is big sister to Verity Blythe.  See the post about her name here.

Elsewhere online:

• Here’s something you don’t know about me: I rarely drive.  I have a license, but we’ve arranged our lives so most of the time, our car stays parked.  And I plain like mass transit.  So Nancy’s recent post about a baby named Queenie after a bus company? That could be me;
• I understand Ever and Everly.  A kid called Eternity would not be a surprise.  But Never?  ForReal spotted one, and it just seems off;
• Did you see the great Nameberry post on TV character names? Ask a parent if she’d be willing to name a child after a TV character and you’ll often get a refusal, maybe a snicker.  But they do filter into wider use.  So get set for birth announcements reading Landry, Horatio, Brick, Remy, Cricket, and Astrid. One not on the list: Dwight, Jason Lee’s character on his new show, Memphis Blue.  Rainn Wilson’s salesman/beet farmer on The Office has put a dent in Dwight – he left the US Top 1000 in 2004 – wonder if Lee can revive him?
• The Globe and Mail has an essay by a parent who really can’t decide what to name son #3.  It’s a common struggle, but what’s particularly interesting is the drama caused by their common surname: Jones.  Nearly any popular choice has a notable bearer: George Jones, Tom Jones, and so on.  After naming firstborn son Jack they learned that Jack Jones sang The Love Boat theme song.  I always thought it was the long, unusual surnames that posed problems, but I guess it goes both ways;
• Here’s a fun list of model names from Babble columnist Ceridwen Morris.  But Nameberry did it first, and even compiled a list of super-stylish names supermodels gave to their offspring (before, we assume, slipping back into some fabulous get-up for a photo shoot with baby on hip like a designer bag.)  Yannick or Mingus, anyone?
• I haven’t checked in with the Toronto Star’s Kristin Rushowy in months.  A few recent posts: a boy called Timo Wolf, a girl named Tanys Aurora Alexandra Piia, and a cautionary tale about pronunciation issues when you name your cute Canadian kid after a Hindu goddess.

In starbaby news:

• Let’s hear it for the double palindrome power of Ava Katherine Otto, a new daughter for country singer James Otto and wife Amy;
• Actor Matt Walton – he plays Eli on One Life To Live – has an Ava, too, plus a brand new son called Greyson James.  Greyson is the new Jayden. Add up all the boys called Greyson and Grayson, plus the girls wearing a variant of sound-alike Gracen, and you have the formula for a gender-neutral, hard-to-gauge usage name that every parent thinks is uncommon.  Too bad, because I do love Gray;
• Army Wives’ Catherine Bell has a new son called Ronan, a little sister for Gemma.  That’s a nice sibset, a pair of names that are underused, but not outlandish;
• And the big news is the birth of Florence Rose Endellion, a daughter for UK Prime Minister David Cameron, his wife Samantha, and three older siblings: the late Ivan, plus Nancy, and Arthur Elwen.  For a humorous and insightful look on place names popping up on birth certificates, there’s this News & Star column. Capri and Dublin, yes.  St. Bees Flimby Pie?  Probably not;
• Lastly, the best use of Twitter for baby naming since Erykah Badu live-tweeted the birth of her third child and claimed she was calling her Twittymilk surely goes to Neil Patrick Harris’ twins teaser. That’s an instant sibset I can’t wait to learn.

As always, thanks for reading!