The Least Popular Baby Names...and Why

The most popular baby names in 2010 were Aiden for a boy and Sophia for a girl (those names knocked Jacob and Isabella off their thrones.)

But what were the least popular names? Well, scanning the list at the Circle of Moms website, I was really surprised not to find my own name on there, simply because of when I was born.

As it is, the list is a roll call of many of my contemporaries...friends, relatives and acquaintances that were born in the mid to late 50's and early 60s.

According to Circle of Moms:

"...the least favorite girls names are largely names that were once incredibly popular—in the late 1930s-1960s, but which have now fallen drastically out of favor. According to the Social Security Administration's name data:

• Patricia was in the top 5 girls names from the late 1930s through early 1950s,
• Susan was a top 5 name from the late 1940s through the early 1960s
• Nancy and Sandra were both top 10 names throughout the 1940s, andPamela and Brenda ranked among the top 20 most popular girls names during the 1950s and early 60s

On the boys' side, a similar trend holds: Again according to Social Security Administration's name data, Larry was a top 10 name from 1937-55, and Roger hovered around #25 for the entire duration of the 40s. Names ending with “-arry” (as in Larry, Jerry, and Harry) were also especially popular in the 1950s but are no longer trendy. In 2010, not a single “-erry” ending name made the boys' top 50 names list.

...Apparently many modern moms have an antipathy for names strongly associated with much older generations."

Go here to read the complete list of least popular baby names.

Don't forget, though--baby naming trends come and go. I remember my Grandma Garrett once told me that she was terribly embarrassed that her father's name was Joshua--she thought it was such an old-fashioned name!

And then there are those names that never seem to go out of style. I noticed that "Katherine" and "David" are still on the top 100 favorites...as are the names of my grown-up sons, Jonathan and Justin.

If you're expecting a baby, what names are you considering?

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Advice & Comfort for New Mommies: This, Too, Shall Pass

My new little great-niece, Brooklynn Nevaeh


My niece Lindsie and baby Brooklynn

Tonight I'm going to a baby shower for my beautiful niece, Lindsie, and her adorable firstborn baby, Brooklynn Nevaeh.

I can't believe Lindsie is a mommy. It seems like just yesterday she was born herself. I remember it very clearly, because Lindsie was my sister-in-law Sherrie's first daughter after having two boys.

I myself had two boys, Jonathan and Justin, and although I was crazy about them, I longed for a baby girl. Little did I know that, probably at the very time I was attending Lindsie's baby shower, I was carrying Elizabeth Ashley in my womb.

Nine months after Lindsie's birth, Elizabeth arrived. And those two have always loved each other. Lindsie and Lizzie. They were so cute together as little girls.

My advice for new mommies

I'm going to be sharing a devotional at Lindsie's shower tonight, and I'm not going to share that here right now. But I will impart some of my advice for new mommies.

Not too long ago, Ann-Marie, whose blog I love, had her first baby. After the initial joy of Sam's birth (she had pretty much given up on being able to have a baby), real life set in, as it has a tendency to do.

Real life, with the attendant lack of sleep after being up all night with a screaming baby.

I wrote this in her comment section after a post in which she poured her heart out about new-baby difficulties:

First of all...he is ADORABLE!!!! I love that picture of him smiling with his eyes closed.

Second of all--all the craziness you're going through right now--this, too, shall pass. And very soon. With every week, you'll be more confident with him, and he will get easier to figure out.

He'll also grow, so he won't need to eat so often. And he'll sleep more.

The day will come when these rough days will only be a fuzzy memory. And you WILL get to write more.

In the meantime, just enjoy...because in two seconds, he'll be 29 years old (like my firstborn Jonathan), and you'll say, "What happened!?!"

SO true. No, you'll never stop worrying about your baby, even when he's 30, 40, 50 and beyond.

But these difficult baby days will pass--and though they seem like an eternity while you're experiencing them, in retrospect it will seem they went by so fast they made your head spin.