Baby Names

From a young age, I knew what I would name my kids. I guess I was around eleven or twelve the first time I heard the name Ryan. It wasn’t a popular name back then, and I fell in love with it. I knew from that moment, that if I ever had a son, his name would be Ryan. Luckily, when the time came, my husband also liked the name.

Kasandra’s name came from a soap opera. I believe it was One Life To Live. They had a character named Cassie. As is the usual on a soap, Cassie was on trial for something, and when she took the stand, they asked for her full name, and she said Cassandra, and then whatever the middle name was. I knew at that moment what my first daughters name would be, even though when the time came, I did change the spelling.

When it came time for my third child to be born, I let my husband pick her name. Not one to give up total control, I insisted her middle name be Rose. Not for any other reason than that I loved that name. I had no idea that my son’s name would become so popular. Not as popular as, say, Michael or Christopher, but popular enough that there are several Ryan’s in the seventh grade. My girls are a different story. Their names are uncommon, and I like it that way. It helps them to be unique, I think.

Did I think about how popular their names were when I named them? No.

Did I look at the top 100 names at the time? No.

Did I ever crack open a book of baby names? No.

However, this afternoon, I was randomly searching the internet, and I came across a list of the top 100 baby names of 2008. Just for fun, I looked up their names, just to see where they fell on the list. Ryan was number twelve, and I am kind of surprised by this. I thought he would be lower on the list. I was not surprised that both Kasandra and Brandi were not on the list. I wasn’t expecting to find them.

I used this list: 100 most popular baby names of 2008

Where do your kids names land on the list?