By Clare Green

This week’s news includes new celebrity baby names, a family with 10 boys, zingy Z names, and more Nigels than you’ve ever seen before!

Celebrity baby names: Marli and Remi

Think rappers always give their children wild names? Think again. Sean Paul just announced the birth of his daughter Remi Leigh, and Chance the Rapper (whose real first name is Chancelor) welcomed Marli, a little sister for Kensli. Two cool, modern girl names that are neither traditional or krayzee.

You could put Hudson in that style bracket too. TV host Christina Anstead chose a double place name for her son, Hudson London. And less of this world, NBC news presenter Kasie Hunt named her son Mars, a deity/space name that has just started rising out of obscurity – deservedly, we think.

Boy names galore…and a girl

After having ten (yes, ten) boys, you might think these Scottish parents would give their girl a very feminine name. But they gave the finishing member of their soccer team a fairly gender-neutral name, Cameron! Her older brothers are Campbell, Harrison, Corey, Lachlan, Brodie, Brahn, Hunter, Mack, Blake and Rothagaidh (the Gaelic name for Rogie Falls, a series of waterfalls in Scotland).

While we’re on the boy names, thousands of Reddit users have been voting on their all-time favorites. It’s interesting to see how their top boy names compare to the Nameberry reader charts.

Reddit’s number one, Henry, ranks #11 on Nameberry, and most of the Reddit Top 20 are in the Nameberry Top 100 (all except Elliott and Alistair). But there are lots of names that you stylish readers love that don’t make the Reddit list, including most of the current Nameberry Top 5: Milo, Asher, Atticus and Silas.

Namespiration: storms, sports and serendipity

No matter how many baby naming stories we hear, it never gets old to read about the different ways parents find the perfect name.

Sometimes the timing of the baby’s arrival makes it obvious. At least one baby has been named after Storm Dorian, an event his parents aren’t likely to forget.

And if you’re stuck between two names, why not do what these parents did and let a basketball game decide? The result: their daughter has the beautiful name Adriana.

When Kirsten Dunst named her son Ennis last year, you might have wondered what inspired her. Connections to the Irish town, maybe? Now she’s revealed all… she and her partner saw it on a baby name website and liked it. (We hope it was Nameberry!)

Zing! Z names in the news

If you make up a name, does that give you exclusive rights to it? An Indonesian celeb seems to think so. She named her daughter the carefully-chosen Zylvechia Ecclesie earlier this year, and had an angry rant at a fan who, in the highest form of flattery, used Zylvechia for her own daughter too.

While we’re on the Z names… if you name your son Zayed after the founding father of the United Arab Emirates, he might just get a discount card. And a new-to-me name spotted in these birth announcements: Zulbah, named after his father. What do you think?

Teacher troubles

As a new school year gets underway, spare a thought for teachers. Not only do they have the challenge of learning lots of new students’ names, fast – which is important for lots of reasons – but they’re also having more names knocked off their own “usable” lists. If you work with children, you’ll know how hard it is to find a name with no baggage!

Calling all Nigels!

Nigel is one of those names that rings very different on each side of the Pond. In the States, most Nigels are in their mid-20s, but it’s never been super-popular and never disappeared.

In Britain, Nigels are firmly middle-aged, if not already collecting their pensions. Every community group has a Nigel on the committee. Only eight bold parents used it for their babies last year.

In celebration of his name, one Nigel is aiming to host the world’s largest gathering of Nigels on 28 September in the Cotswolds. If you know a Nigel, spread the word! Non-Nigels are welcome too, but they’ll have to wear a badge to declare themselves.

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Clare Green writes Nameberry’s weekly round-up of the latest baby name news, including celebrity announcements, unusual naming stories, and new statistics from around the world. Clare, who has been writing for Nameberry since 2015, lives in England, where she has worked in libraries and studies linguistics. You can follow her personally on Instagram and Twitter.