Happy Father’s Day!
We tend to head to Disney World right after school gets out, so hello from Orlando. Thanks to employee name tags, embroidered ears, and families wearing customized tee shirts, it’s #namespotting heaven. One of my favorite finds so far: Evianni. It’s gorgeous. It’s awfully close to Evian, the bottled water. I think I kind of love it.
Also, I’m reminded how many little girls are named Abby. It seems like I turn my head two dozen times every day when I hear a voice call out my name. But of course, they’re calling their sister/daughter/granddaughter who is just seven/five/sixteen. I disliked having a popular name as a child, so I changed it as an adult … to a name that’s now very popular with children.
Elsewhere online:
- What’s it like to be a white woman named LaKiesha? Conversations about names sometimes take a quiet sidestep into conversations about race. And class. And a dozen other minefields. While I love names in the way that any collector appreciates a shiny object, it’s this that keeps me writing and thinking about them, year after year. Names lead us into nearly every aspect of the human condition.
- Now this is fascinating: the names with the most recorded spellings. It matters for lots of reasons, but here’s one that escapes many parents searching for names: popularity isn’t just about whether Grayson is too popular at #32 in the US. It also matters that there are 31 other ways to spell the name. And one of those, Greyson, ranks #77. Which means that the name will feel more popular than the data suggests.
- On a similar note: Filipa asks if you prefer Mia or Maya? She’s writing in Portuguese, so the trends are a little different. In the US, I’d want to add Mila and maybe even Mya, though that’s falling in use pretty quickly right now.
- Oh, these questions about patterns in naming are tough! We didn’t go with another A name for our daughter, in large part because I thought she wouldn’t be our last child … and then she was. I’ve never regretted the decision, but did she notice? Yes, she did. Swistle’s advice is spot-on.
- Speaking of good advice, I agree with Duana here, and I do hope they name their son Damon.
- A long list of music-related names, including a few I hadn’t previously considered. Adagio would be a lot as a first … but it could be an awesome middle.
- On my looks modern, but counts as a blast-from-the-past list: Haidee, courtesy of Nancy’s ongoing dive into rare girl names from early cinema. Love this series.
That’s all for this week. As always, thank you for reading – and have a great week!
Image by stinne24 from Pixabay
I’ve long been fascinated with the demographics of name usage. I’m from backwoods Alabama, and know many country/poor white folks with names that would seem just as at home in an African American community as my white circles. My MIL suggested Lyneeta (no idea how she would’ve spelled it) for my firstborn. I went to college with a white Nekeisha. My husband is a white guy named Lamar. If I ever did a Master’s degree, I would do it on some aspect of the naming similarities & divergence of poor white folks & black folks. I’m not as familiar with the higher socioeconomic naming practices, but from what I’ve seen it’s not nearly as similar.
Thank you for your lovely post! I always think about the people whose dads aren’t with us anymore today. I hope you all had a fabulous time in Orlando, Evianni is really interesting!