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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By Linda Rosenkrantz

Every year, a small number of new names manages to move onto the Top 1000 list for the first time ever.  Sometimes this marks the beginning of a climb up the ladder, other times it’s a name that will linger in the nether regions, and sometimes it might prove to be a one-shot wonder—perhaps an eccentric spelling picked up by just enough parents  to make the grade.

In 2011, for instance, we saw the debuts of such nouveau names as Elliot for girls, Aviana, Blakely, Juniper, Liv, and Temperance; Bowen, Brecken, Flynn, the musical Crosby and Hendrix, the presidential Nixon and the Ivy League Princeton.

But how about the recently released list?  Of the forty-five possibilities, here are the Nameberry Picks for the twelve most promising newbies of 2012.

girls

Azalea—Though there were fewer than three hundred baby girls given this name in 2012, it has now definitely crossed over from the wilder fringes into the main flower garden.  Azalea embodies a delightful combination of the fragrant floral with a shot of z-infused energy.

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It was an intriguing question posed over on the forums: What would your children be named, if your partner had complete control?

In my case, my husband would have chosen names from his family tree….very very sleepy names.

Our daughter would be named Molly instead of Rory — Molly Rose. Or maybe Rose Elizabeth, after my husband’s grandmother and mother.

One of our sons would probably have been John and the other one Edward, called Ned. I’m guessing John Richard and Edward Victor. All serviceable choices but…..yawn.

Of course, turn the tables and my husband would say my unedited choices would be unacceptably outrageous. Flora, Otis, and Penn, maybe. Sounds fantastic to me.

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The big news in baby names this week has been the Most Popular Names 2012: Top 1, Top 10, Top 100, Top 1000.

But swimming just below the surface — not quite on the radar but not truly off, either — are dozens of more unusual baby names poised to find wider favor….or dropping from view.

Many Nameberry favorites exist in this limbo of baby names, including choices such as Aurelia and Wren for girls that missed making it into the Top 1000 by a single point.

Of course, that may bring relief rather than disappointment to many parents.  If you want to name your baby Magnolia or Clementine, Bishop or Langston — or already have — you may tremble on surveying the new Top 1000, hoping your favorites stay off the list.

We looked below the Top 1000 for girls and boys and found those names within 50 points of the cutoff that we felt were heading back into style, along with those sailing off into the sunset.

In raw numbers, 251 girls received the Number 1000 name Katalina while 197 boys were named Number 1000 boys’ name Dangelo.  The numbers after each name below represent the number of children given that name in 2012.

One note on the names we say are Heading Out: Some of these may appeal to parents in search of a name with Geek Chic or an unusual classic.  Hello, baby Ralph!  Or….dare I suggest….baby Pamela?

Here, the names just under the Top 1000 coming into style and heading out:

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This week, Appellation Mountain‘s Abby Sandel looks at the “quiet” classic baby names  and measures how they stand in the new popularity ratings. 

 There were dozens of stories in the baby name news last week, but they all shared a common theme: the Social Security Administration’s release of the 2012 baby name data

We talked about Titan and Briggs, Landry and Geraldine.  About how Jacob remained number one, but only if you didn’t tally up the many spellings of Aiden, Jackson, and Jayden.  Television’s influence was clear – Arya and Aria, Litzy, Major, and Jase.  Movies, sports, and music shaped our choices, too, as did faith.  Nevaeh’s little brother might just be called Messiah.

But what about the quiet classics, the names that rise and fall, but still appear in nearly every generation?  Hemlines change.  We graduated from the party line to the iPhone, the horse to the Prius.  And yet these names remain, worn by men and women, boys and girls of every age.

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