Some parents put a great deal of thought into naming their children. Others, well, maybe not so much.
The website, BabyCenter, tracks the 100 most popular baby names each year since 2000. That’s the 100 top names for girl babies and a separate top 100 list of boy’s names.
In 2013, Sophia and Jackson topped these lists. Jackson is the most popular boy name but spelled in different ways - Jaxon and Jaxson, for example. The list lumps them all together under just one spelling. The same for Sophia and Sofia.
Some list highlights:
- Emily jumped from #11 to #9, putting it in the top 10 list for the first time ever
- Emma is the second most popular girl name, as it has been for the last three years
- Madison fell from the girls’ top 10 list to #12.
- Jackson beat out Aiden, the #1 boy name for the past eight years
- J names are popular with the boys, as usual - Jayden, Jacob, and Jack are in the top 10 again
Britain’s newest royal, Prince George, inspired enough parents in the US that the name George rose 10 percent in the boys list and 37 percent in the list of girls’ names. George dropped entirely out of the top 10 list in the United Kingdom, however.
TV characters inspired baby names, as usual. This year’s hottest inspirations:
- Breaking Bad
- Duck Dynasy
- Girls
Politics also inspired many parents:
- Kennedy rose 25 percent on the boys’ list and 21 percent in the girls’
- Abraham and Lincoln gained popularity in the boys’ list, as did Andrew and Jackson
- Barack climbed 48 percent higher than it was last year
- Michelle is up 13 percent
- Wendy soared up 35 percent, perhaps in tribute to Texas Senator Wendy Davis, now running for governor, after charming women nationwide with her 11-hour filibuster on behalf of women’s reproductive rights.
The website also includes a list of unusual names for 2013. Each name in this list must have been given to a minimum of three children to be included.
- Unusual girls’ names include: Blip, Chevy, Eternity, Fairy, Feline, Green, Kalliope, Kiwi, Kukua, and Tulip.
- Unusual boys’ names include: Ab, Ajax, Bright, Chow, Danish, Egypt, Hurricane, Kashmere, Kazz, Legend, Leviathan, Miggy, Panda, Rocket, Stetson, Thirdy, Yash, and Zion.
And, yes, at least three children in 2013 were named Cheese.
Source: “100 most popular baby names of 2013.” BabyCenter. BabyCenter LLC. Dec 2013. Web. Dec 17, 2013.