Monday, June 5, 2017

What's Your Name, 2016 version

334 times in the year 2016, parents of newborn baby boys in the state of Maryland said, "Let's call him 'Noah'!"

"Noah" rode his ark to the top and joined 308 brand-new "Ava"s in Maryland last year.

I know we didn't have a blizzard, or even a significant cable outage, to spike baby business, so there's no big rush to choose baby names later this summer/early fall, but still, if you're in the family way, you might want to think now about a moniker for little Leon.

Leon is one of the names I wish my parents had given me instead of Mark, which continued its slide down the popularity chart and is at #195 this year, a sure bet to drop below the mythical Top 200 list.  I also would have been thrilled with "Jackie," or "Elvis," but oh well.

For the entire nation, there was not a lot of change in the top 10 names list.  Elijah is in the national top 10, but only #17 in Maryland, where if you lean your head out the window far enough on a statewide drive, you can hear 211 of 'em hollering out loud.

Here's the top 10 new boy names for our state last year (number of babies in parentheses:)
Image result for noah
Noah, 334
Mason, 307
Liam, 284
Ethan, 282
Daniel, 279
Michael, 279
Jacob, 273
Benjamin, 266
Dylan, 266
James, 264
And the girls' list: 
Image result for ava gardner
Ava, 308
Olivia, 299
Emma, 257
Charlotte, 253
Sophia, 249
Abigail, 237
Isabella, 215
Harper, 204
Elizabeth, 200
Emily, 187
If you'd like to go check your name (and the one you WISH you had, just go here to see the Social Security Adm. list).

It will definitely make you feel really old to hear that the name Kehlani is way up there for girls, and similarly, Kylo had the largest jump for boys.

And then they explain that someone named Kehlani Parrish is a singer and songwriter who is hugely popular, and there was a Kylo character in the Star Wars movie "The Force Awakens."

And "Donald" is currently 488th in America, but even though "Ferdinand" is #487, Donald still claims to have more votes. No bull.

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