Happy Mother’s Day weekend!! Don’t forget to enter the Massive Mother’s Day Giveaway — it ends tonight at midnight! I’ll email the winner tomorrow!

Also, if you could help Charlotte, please do — she’s in a desperate state with her health and being unable to afford proper medical care, she just can’t get ahead of it and is really suffering.

Did you all see the 2018 name stats that were released yesterday by the Social Security Administration? Were you surprised by any in the top ten?

A few people over on Instagram expressed surprise over Evelyn being no. 10, which is funny, because it was actually at no. 9 in 2017 — it dropped a spot in 2018 — and I wrote about it in my post on the 2017 data last year:

“From your comments on Instagram, Evelyn also seems to be surprising to some of you. As I mentioned on IG, when my 13yo was three, one of his classmates’ mom had a baby girl whom she named Evelyn, and back then I thought it sounded like such an old lady name. Turns out it entered the top 100 in 2002 for the first time since 1953 and in fact is now, at no. 9, the most popular it’s ever been — its previous highest was no. 10 in 1915. In my mind, it’s part of the Evangeline/Genevieve/Vivian-nicknamed-Evie/Vivi sisters. And in fact Evie increased in 2017 as well!“

I haven’t looked at all the new data yet, but I was perusing the list of names that increased in popularity last night and was so surprised that Genesis was the boy name with the greatest increase in 2018: it went up 608 spots from no. 1592 to 984, entering the top 1000. That’s a big increase! And I don’t know what it was caused by! I did a quick search to see if something happened in 2017 or 2018 to cause such a spike in interest, and did discover that Alicia Keys has a son named Genesis, but he was born in 2014, so I don’t think he was the catalyst.

I was telling my hubs about Genesis last night, which he too was shocked by (he didn’t even know parents were naming their kids Genesis, so he’s not the best gauge), but he also asked a great question: he wanted to know how many births that jump in popularity actually represented. So I looked that up and there were 209 baby boys born in 2018 that were named Genesis, up from 101 in 2017. That’s not a huge amount of babies. Also, Genesis for a girl is vastly more popular — 4068 girls born in 2018 named Genesis, and the spelling Jenesis for girls actually increased 121 spots, from 1087 to 966, entering the top 1000. Quite a year for G/Jenesis!

I was also interested that Meghan was the girl name that increased the most in popularity, up 701 spots from 1404 to 703 and certainly due to Prince Harry’s Mrs. Speaking of Prince Harry and his Mrs. … what about Harry’s and Meghan’s baby boy?? I couldn’t wait to find out what they named him! As I mentioned on Instagram, Archie Harrison Mountbatten-Windsor was so unexpected to me, but I expected his name to be unexpected, so I guess Harry and Meghan delivered! I loved Harrison for Harry’s son from the moment I read it, perfection! Archie and similar names are trendy in the UK right now, and turns out Archie entered the top 1000 in the US in 2018, so that makes it a good mix of British and American to me. (I did just read that Archie was the name of Meghan’s childhood cat … I’m not sure what to think of that.)

Back to the SSA data, I’m sure I’ll have more to say after I finish looking through it all, but in the meantime, I loved reading Abby’s take, as always, as well as Laura Wattenberg’s (the Baby Name Wizard, who has a new web site and a new name!) and Nameberry’s.

Also, I have a great consultation to post on Monday for a mama who’s familiar to many of you and who’s expecting baby no. 10 — I know you’ll all love it!

Finally, just a tip for any of you still looking for a present for the moms in your life: my book is a fantastic gift! And though it won’t be delivered by tomorrow if you order today (unless you pay a million dollars in shipping, depending on where you live), you could always order it and then print out a picture of it to put in the Mother’s Day card you give your mom/wife/whoever, with a promise that it’s in the mail! 😉

Have a great rest of the weekend!! ❤ ❤ ❤

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My book, Catholic Baby Names for Girls and Boys: Over 250 Ways to Honor Our Lady (Marian Press, 2018), is available to order from ShopMercy.org and Amazon — perfect for the expectant parents, name enthusiasts, and lovers of Our Lady in your life!