Many people—berries included –sometimes complain that it’s harder to find names for a boy than a girl, that we’re running low on male names that are usable but not overused (outside of or as far down the Top 1000 as possible), interesting, distinctive, appealing, and authentic—names that would fit into our old Fitting In/Standing Out...

　　It’s Labor Day weekend, and so time once more to turn our attention to the original, pre-barbecue significance of the holiday and celebrate some hard-working occupational names. 　　We’re focusing on the more uncommon, fresher sounding examples, and those with less obvious meanings, so no Archer, Shepherd or Baker.  The er-ending...

　　Last week we brought you our underground list of most popular girls’ names 2011; now it’s the boys’ turn. 　　You may be familiar with Nameberry’s most popular boys’ names 2011, with Asher, Henry, and Finn at the top all the way down to Axel, Nathan, and Landon. 　　You may even...

　　There’s a whole posse of cowboy baby names in Appellation Mountain‘s Abby Sandel’s roundup of this week’s newsiest names. 　　Some weeks, it feels like all of the birth announcements are from one big extended family. 　　Nameberry dubbed this style trend Iconoclastic Cowboy, and indeed, it does seem to be popular...

　　It’s all-boy week in Abby (Appellation Mountain) Sandel’s latest round-up of the most recent interesting baby names. 　　Happy Halloween, berries!  Let’s start off with a very important piece of business.  The winner of the bookplate give-away from Etsy shop My Kids Eat Off the Floor is Emily (emily.m******@*****.com).  You should have already...

　　Why does Henry consistently rank as one of the top two Nameberry favorite boys’ names? (Finn is the other one.) 　　Because in many ways Henry is the most perfect of the classic boys’ names—as historic as James and John and William –yet with a quirkier edge that makes it seem modern, and even hip. 　　Henry...

　　I have a friend, a pretty quirky guy, who has one of those generic boys’ names: Bill.  I was thinking recently what an advantage it is for Bill to be named Bill rather than something like Jasper or Jarvis, one of those boys’ names that’s his equal in quirkiness.  Bill...

　　The news is out–even if it hasn’t been formally announced–that the soon-to-arrive third Jennifer Garner and Ben Affleck baby will be a boy. This provides us all with a perfect opportunity to display our sibset-crafting skills.  　　I think all will agree that the couple made gorgeous (and trend-setting) choices for...

　　Just as we’ve been heralding the trend towards cowboy names, it looks like we could be in for a posse of new ones. 　　In the L.A. Times the other day, an article talked about prime-time television’s “reinvigorated love of the western, where projects are sprouting like cactus in the desert…and...

　　Nameberry’s top boy names 2011 includes big news: Asher has leapfrogged over Henry and Finn, last year’s number one and two, to take the top spot. 　　The Nameberry popularity lists track which names attracted the most views on our site this year.  Consider them a predictor of which names parents...

　　Are there really any good unusual boys’ names left in the Bible?  Old Testament names for boys have been fashionable for going on half a century now, from the 1960s Adam to the present day Asher. Could there possibly be any obscure-yet-usable choices left? 　　Hundreds of them, in fact. The...

　　Ohio mom of two Kristen Hunger had an easy — make that ecstatic — experience naming her first two children, Colette and Weston, pictured above.  But this time around?  She can’t find a single name she loves….and she’s afraid she knows why. 　　It was bound to happen. After two pregnancies...

　　Megan , who lives just outside Philadelphia, is expecting her first boy after two little girls in June. Her daughters both have family names, but now her husband, Thomas IV, would like to continue the tradition of naming the boys in his family Thomas, making their son Thomas V. Problem...