Baby Names

Jessica's doctor asked her what she was going to name her baby. When she said River, the doctor said, "She's going to get made fun of with a name like that" or something along that line. He was very abrupt about it, but he was just speaking his mind. I don't think he meant to be unkind, although it came across that way.

I said something like, "Well, she's going to be a really cool kid so no one will think of making fun of her name." I also told him the obvious--ever since River Song on Dr. Who (don't watch it but Jessica is a fan), the name has become much more popular.

I looked up the meaning of the name River:

Everyone has his or her own preferences in names. For myself, I avoided naming my kids longer names that had a nickname (Jeff is my only child I didn't name)--No William who is called Bill or Margaret who is called Maggie or Peggy. I think this is because my mom named me Katrina but called me Kathy. That is confusing because Kathy is normally short for Kathryn or Kathleen.

Names have definitely changed over the years. Here are the top baby names from when I was born and now.

1962:

Michael    Lisa

David       Mary

John         Susan

James       Karen

Robert      Linda

Mark        Patricia

William   Donna

Richard   Cynthia

Thomas   Deborah

Jeffrey     Sandra

2014

Jackson  Sophia   

Aiden     Emma

Liam      Olivia

Lucas     Ava

Noah      Isabella

Mason    Mia

Ethan     Zoe

Caden    Lily

Jacob     Emily

Logan    Madelyn

The interesting thing is that many of the girls' names are very old fashioned names that have become popular again.

I wrote more about names and trends on my parenting blog HERE.