2011 was quite a year for celebrity baby names, but then again, you could say that for every recent year. Some stars this year mined old-fashioned sources of inspiration, while others went wild with inventions of their own.
Here, the Nameberry Awards for the best, the worst, the weirdest and the wildest of them all.
Follow Pamela Redmond Satran on Twitter: www.twitter.com/nameberry
http://www.000health.com/children-health/12680-oh-baby-choosing-the-right-baby-name-.html
"Laaa???" "LaAhh???"
Upon questioning the mother, she informed them her new baby's name was pronounced, "Ladasha." Have fun correcting everyone on how to say your name for the rest of your life, Kid. Nice.
I
however, apart from that i've always loved gender neutral names.
I also let my first two sons pick their own middle names - at about ages 5 and 7. THAT was chancy I admit, altho i would not have let them pick anything too goofy. Much to my relief, right out of the gate, they picked first names from great grandpa and great great grandpa! It was a wonderful surprise and relief... and those have become their legal middle names now. Whew!
Also used grandmas first names as daughters first names.
George Carlin had it right. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oo8CrY_ZfFk
It's unfortunate that he died before he could go on about girls names.
There's nothing wrong with just choosing a word you like and re-appropriating it as a name. There's nothing wrong with assembling some letters and calling that a name. There's also nothing wrong with letting your kid the seventh "Jenny" or "Kevin" or "Elizabeth" or "John" in his or her class.
Chances are, at various points in life, the child will either be annoyed that he always has to differentiate himself from all the other kids with the same name, or she'll fall in love with a character in a book and want THAT name (I went through this phase with at least 15 different favorite heroines), or she'll wish she had a more boring name so she could at least blend in. Eventually, they'll either settle in to the name they have, or pick a new one. No harm done.
It's an infant when you name it. Less conversant than a cat. You can't possibly know what the kid's going to turn out like, its personality, talents, passions, voice. No name you choose will perfectly encompass the thing's essence, because you won't know who he or she is for years. Choose (or create) a name based on tradition, meaning, how the letters look together, what connotations the sounds invoke, whichever of those qualities is most important to you.
Do that. And then, for the love of Freya, shut the hell up about everybody else's names!
Sounds like whopper of a drink in a tiki bar.