Fashionable names

I often wonder why there are so many baby girls names Isla these days . I have asked the parents and they have no idea it comes from the island of Islay which is pronounced Isla . There is also a river and a glen in Scotland with the same name , however I think it is a nice name . I always fancied Clara after the little girl in the Nutcracker. I was almost named Blanch because it snowed when I was born .

New baby twins just arrived home from hospital a few doors down - Jill and Sally. Gorgeous names

Grandma70s
I think it must have been a thing in our parents generation. My first name is my Mum's name.

My friend and her brother wanted to call their new baby sister Teapot!!

I said before that I have a French name. Just today a friend spelt it wrong when she dropped a note round! Not enough ‘n’s’!

When I was expecting my third, my son and daughter were 4 and 2. One summer evening we all sat in the garden and chose names for the forthcoming baby. We didn’t know if he was a boy or a girl. Three girls and three boys names were chosen. Admittedly we didn’t let our son and daughter choose any old name. We had a shortlist to choose from!

My 5 year old DGS thought PacMan would be a good name for his new brother.
Luckily his Mummy and Daddy were not so keen.

Nana3

My parents gave me 2 names then proceeded to call me by the second one. It means I'm called by my first name in the doctors, hospital etc. I just go with it now, past caring.

I have the same problem. I answer to either.

In some circles there seems to be a fashion for letting the older child choose the younger one’s middle name. The actor Samuel West did this, and apparently it worked out all right for them. He doesn’t say what the name is, but he does say a friend’s child now glories in the name Isabella Spaceship.

A bit risky, I think!

Songstress60, I adore the name Irene, it was my beautiful mums name, my daughter has it for her middle name.

Jemma75, also love the name Lucy, I named my beloved dog that. Hope you enjoy your little Lucy !!!!!

My sister had an unusual name until one or two people with that name who got into the papers a lot.

She had so many misspellings of what was a phonetically pronounced 6 letter name she used to say her name then spell it out letter by letter, until, she said she began to feel that her name was not complete without the spelling out part.

My names origin is Welsh for lake or pool. My husband has an English name but his Hebrew name is much more interesting.

i tend to like traditional names, and more than one syllabub.
but perhaps that's greedy.
the only name i definitely dislike is
gretchen.
for a while i didn't realise that it was an actual given name; i assumed it was an unflattering description of a woman, because it just sounds like it, she's such a gretchen.

It's alright giving a child an unusual name but will it be spelt right. We had this problem when I taught.
My name ended in 1960 I don't like it and hope it never makes a comeback though I have heard it given as a second name after a granny. Names seem to go in areas I'm one of the Jean, Joan, Patricia, Janet and Kathleen generations.
Neither of my children complains about theirs ,maybe behind my back.

To GreenGran78, We have a New Zealand relative of 50 who is called Brenda, but of course it is pronounced “Brinda” over there.

When we were considering names for our DS, we knew very few young children and had no idea what the popular names for boys were. We didn't consider any family names and the short list was David, Paul, Stephen and Matthew. Nobody we knew had children with those names.

We opted for David and then a few months later read a newspaper article that said the three most popular boys names the year DS was born were: David, Paul and Stephen, Matthew was also high up the popularity stakes as well. - and of course, once he started to mix with other children at playgroup and school, we began to realise just how popular all four names were.

When we would have looked at other names had we known how popular they were, nothing exceptional, just something less popular.

We had a whole clutch of Lewis's at school. They were all naughty so I have a difficult time with that name. My name was very unusual at the time ( 40_60) but much more prevalent now.

Sorry OP, I would like Sarah and Alice, also Robert and Thomas to stay popular. Good traditional names that don't really date.

My parents gave me 2 names then proceeded to call me by the second one. It means I'm called by my first name in the doctors, hospital etc. I just go with it now, past caring.

Since my dd was very young she loved the name Lucy. I suggested we call the dog Lucy so we could say, "Lucy we're home." Guess what - she is having a girl and our Lucy she will be!

So many names mentioned here that were common in my classes at school, Joan, Patricia, Robert, Kathleen, Anita, Linda, Gordon, Penelope, Janet, Carole, Pauline, Gillian, Clive, Jean, Edward, Kenneth, David, Irene - will they ever be revived? James and David seem to be fairly perrenial, and it's lovely to hear the really old names, those of my ancient aunts and uncles, like Martha, Dorothy, Emily and so on become popular again. Like some other posters I really dislike the 'celebrity' names that seem to be manufactured with the most convuluted spelling possible.

We have a new addition to our family and hoping her name will be Lily Rose, another old fashioned name

In my class at school there were several boys called Clive or Norman and Jane/Janet/Jeanette, Lynne/Linda and Rosemary were popular for girls. As someone has mentioned, I chose Rosemary for my favourite doll, as I really loved the name.
My mother was Diana which was very unusual for the time but she got really annoyed because most people called her Diane. My MiL was Mabel and my DD has given my GD that as a middle name. Her friends all think it's lovely!

NoddingGanGan

One of my daughters is called Susannah, nobody spells it correctly. I think she's just about given up! "Oh, hello, you must be Suzanne?" (Big sigh, "yes, that's me"!

As I said above, our eldest daughter is called Susannah and for a while she was very friendly with a girl called Suzanne - that was confusing! Not for us but for the rest of the world apparently

My granddaughter (8) is a Pearl, thought it was odd at first, she's beautiful inside and out