haha! Are you in the US and do you hang around children under the age of 5?

I'm promising you, anything that rhymes with Aiden/Ayden/Cayden/Braden/Jaden. 50% of my son's preschool class, Sunday School class and 2 of my nephews LOL

Yep, I know an Aiden, 2 Bradens and 2 Jadens... very, very popular right now.

Craven is a name? I thought it meant cowardly? In my mind it has a very negative connotation of cowardly (not just a scaredy-cat).

I'm sure a lot of kindergarteners won't have the vocabularly to mercilessly tease any kid. But once they all start studying SAT vocabulary words...

As an adult, I would have to wonder if the parent knew the definition before giving it to an innocent kid!

My name is a standard name, Maria, but the REAL meaning of Maria is from the rootwords like Mara and Miriam that are both Biblical and mean "Bitter or Bitterness". I use to be sad about it, but then realized if it was good enough for the mother of Jesus, its okay for me too! :)

I heard in Germany you have to name your kid from a book of Govt approved names? That makes me laugh! Sometimes though, when I'm grading kids exams and alphabetizing the papers for a large lecture in college I wonder how the kids feel about some of the random obscure names they get here in the free USA!

I like Silas though, I think I'd use traditional spelling. I like some weird Biblical names like Othniel, Uriel, Josiah and Jeremiah is a standard Biblical name.

So many great options!

But its important to remember that your child isn't really an extension of YOU so much as he'll be his own individual person. The name won't make your child special, he'll make the name special :)


If you're a geek, there's no guarantee he'll be a geek too, if you like rock music, there's no guarantee he won't like classical! He'll be an individual separate from you, and its important to give him a name he can easily turn into anything! So I prefer to give my kids standard names that they can easily be the most amazing at whatever they want to be. Whether they're rockers, nerds, geeks, musicians or whatever. When you hear the name you won't immediately think "Oh she's a preppy girl" or "Oh, he must be a comic book fan" or "He's probably a LOTR cult-worship fan". I try to choose names that aren't associated with any particular media culture. (i.e. I won't name my kids Edward, Jacob or Bella even if they are just nice names! That and I don't want them to get confused with the 50% of their class that aren't named something that rhymes with "Aiden" LOL And I'm definitely not naming my kid Feanor although I have a close relative that did! I just want my child to be considered and individual and not have presuppositions made about him or his family due to a name, I want him to be able to present himself for who is without any distractions from a name that people pay more attention to it than to him. Do you know what I mean?)


But anyways, remember that the name won't make the kid something special, the kid will make the name special!

Pick a name that has a decent abbreviation and goes well with your last name. I personally like girsl name to be girls names and boys name to be boys name. I wanted to name my son Terence but knew he would be called Terry and there are so many girl Terrys. I also like Aaron for a boy but it would get confused with Erin for a girls.
I like Stephen James or Steven James. I think Jayden is too trendy and he would end up being called Jay, do you like that ?

Boots- you made some good points. :) I personally do not always like my very common name. And, Josiah made me think.. OOOO. Adding that to my list. I had forgotten that one, it's been soo long since I have been to church... yikes.

bargoo - you as well make a very good point, first names should go with last names!!

We always try to consider nicknames when we're thinking of baby names. Our first one is Caleb David and this one is going to be Elias (Eli) Benjamin. I LOVE the name Eli so I'm good with the nickname on this one. :) There's not much you can do to shorten Caleb. But, when we were considering girl's names with Caleb the one I liked the most was Natalie. Completely love the name, hate the nickname Nat (reminds me of tiny, annoying bugs.) Of course, sometimes kids will come up with nicknames that have nothing to do with a person's name... not much you can do to anticipate that! People call my son "Red" because he has fire-orange red hair.

I say pick a name you like that goes with your last name and make sure you're ok with any shortened versions. After that, you can't control it! I feel bad for teenagers right now with the names Edward, Bella or Jacob, but it's not like their parents could have anticipated the Twilight series 15 years ago, you know??

Josiah was on the short list for names for our first son. It's a great name, and not too common. Just be prepared for him to be called Joe!

I like Stephen James, it has a nice flow to it. We had a heck of a time naming both of our boys, especially the second. Names are tough, you don't want to follow the trend, but you want something individual but not too out of the ordinary and something they can live with as adults. We ended up with Connor James and Desmond Cole - still haven't run across any Desmonds!

Gale and Emiloots I LOVE those choices, holy goodness. I had not thought about Josiah being shortened to Joe... I don't like that...
Interesting change on Natalie - Talie.. I think its cute..

When I was in my twenties I had three friends who had babies within 2 months and ALL of the girls were named Ashley Nicole. Now I have friends with grandbabies with the Aiden, Cayden, Braden, Shayden, Jayden and throw in some Madisons on top (I know of two girls and one boy Madison). My given name ended up in the top five girls names for four years in a row (the year I was born and three years after) and I felt invisible! So, I guess my little rant is give a name that is special to you, fits your family name and the heck with the trendy names!

Oh, yes . . one thing more. Always good to research name meanings (whether foreign or English words). One poster mentioned "Craven", which means "abject coward."

favorite boy names

Wyatt
Noah
Josiah
Ian

I still like Josiah, I doubt I'll get another boy to name it. I don't mind the nickname Joe either, my grandpa's name is Joe :)

Desmond MIGHT make a small comeback as they had a Lost character named that ^_^ and he was a sexy Irish guy I think I remember? (finishing the last two seasons of Lost is on my longterm to-do list). haha!


It almost doesn't matter though. My uncle told me people WILL find nicknames you don't like for whatever you name your kids. Its impossible to nickname proof any name. My baby is Daniel, I call him Danny (my dad's actual name and I like the name) and my inlaws call him his initials....DJ.

My name is Zoë and I can say I have never had a nickname...David Bowie did name his son Zoë too. ;)