Some pretty girl names–and a couple of attractive boys’ too–are highlighted by Appellation Mountain‘s Abby Sandel for this week’s The Nameberry 9.

It was a good week for gorgeous girl names. From current favorites to up and coming possibilities, pop culture gave us a quartet of new daughters with noteworthy names.

Beyond new babies, a literary character from none other than J.K. Rowling’s latest novel answers to a promising appellation, as does the teenaged vampire sweetheart from Halloween-themed box office winner Hotel Transylvania.

This past week wasn’t all about the girls, though. One classically named boy also makes the list of newsworthy birth announcements.

All of this reminds me that while the mainstream media prefers to focus on headlines like “Celebs Choose Crazy Names” or “Parents Try Hard to Be Different with Baby Names,” it is very possible to find something lovely and different without resorting to the outrageous. That’s something that berries have always embraced.

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Today being the first day of the merry month of May, why not consider a name that starts with that upbeat, springlike syllable for your baby born this month?  Here are the most likely May names suspects.

MABEL –When Bruce Willis, who, with then-wife Demi Moore, was one of the original creative baby namers with older daughters Rumer, Scout and Tallulah, recently named his baby girl Mabel Ray, he brought this vintage Victorian charmer further into the modern world orbit.  It had already been used by Chad Lowe, Nenah Cherry and Dermot Mulroney, as well as for the sitcom baby on Mad About You. Mabel—originally a short form of Amabel—could well join other ascending sassy showgirl names like Ruby and Sadie. Maybelle is rarely heard outside Nashville.

MACY—Macy entered the popularity list in 1990—almost a decade after it had been noticed on the soap opera The Bold and the Beautiful—and has been well used ever since, a much more modern sounding replacement for the dated Tracy and Stacy, and more solid than the lacy Lacey.  Apart from the department store chain, the most noted bearer of the name, singer Macy Gray, was born Natalie McIntyre; Carmela Soprano/Nurse Jackie Edie Falco named her daughter Macy.

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