By Sarah Douglas of  Names4real.

What would our significant others name our children if we left it totally up to them?  Well, according to this blog on Nameberry, Joss (born Joseph Hill) Whedon is a big inspiration.

And no wonder.  When perusing his shows, the character names range from the classics to the bold.

Here’s a list of some of the most interesting character names and which show they were featured on.

ANGEL 

Angel:  A vampire with a soul; at least on most episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and her spinoff show, Angel.  Angel’s real name (pre-vampirism) was Liam. His vampire without a soul name is Angelus.

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By Pamela Redmond Satran

Have you heard of Warby Parker?  They’re the cool vintage=inspired online eyeglass company that launched a huge trend.  And now they’re joined by a host of other geek chic eyewear purveyors, including one for kids called Very French Gangsters, where we found our adorable glasses-wearing model.

But the real point here, as it always is on Nameberry, is names.

I was perusing the wares on Warby Parker the other day when I was distracted by the names of the frames.  Some embody a lot of geek but not much chic: Fillmore, Digby, and Duckworth. And then there are those like Sloan and Sawyer, Reynold and Larkin, which are chic without the geek.

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By Donna Davenport

When I was a child, I had seven children…or so I believed. They may not have actually walked or talked,  but I loved them unconditionally in spite of these limitations. Some of you international Berries may not know what I’m talking about, but you American Berries who were children of the ‘80s and ‘90s understand what I mean when I say that my Cabbage Patch Kids were my babies. This American line of dolls has been going strong since the late 1970s, each one coming with a unique set of features, clothing, and best of all, birth certificates, complete with first names, middle names, and birth dates. They were, as the legend goes, born in a magical cabbage patch presumably located in some supernatural corner of America that is birthing plastic-headed, soft-bodied babies to this very day.

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This week for her Nameberry 9 newsiest names, Appellation Mountain‘s Abby Sandel highlights some names that so unusual, they really off the grid!

Jacob and Sophia might still be on top of the US rankings, but any name nerd knows this for sure: names change.

Sometimes the changes are subtle.  In the late 1800s, Sallie was more popular than Sally.  In the 1950s, Kerry, Jimmie, and Lester were ordinary names for little boys, and their sisters were called Toni, Yolanda, and Marlene.

It’s easy to focus on the big stories – the headline-grabbing rise of Messiah and King, for example – but I like this quote from last week’s Oxford Dictionaries blog:

… it makes sense that we constantly adapt and expand our vocabulary to account for new concepts, events, inventions, etc. For example, we may invent new words, give existing words new meanings, or borrow words from other languages.

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By Pamela Redmond Satran

Looking for truly unusual and distinctive baby names?  Then we have an amazing collection for you: thousands of names never in the US Top 1000 collected in the very first Nameberry book, The Nameberry Guide to Off-the-Grid Baby Names.  Here is a sampling of a dozen of those wonderful names; for thousands more, download your copy of the book today!  

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