Some names (like Amber & Holly) more common among stampers than general population?
 

Do y'all ever notice certain names popping up more frequently on this board than you'd expect?

Seems to me like there are an awful lot of us named 'Holly/Holley/Hollie' here, more than in the general population--in the first 20 posts of this GST thread, there are three of us. And two Ambers, too!

I mean, how many Hollys and Ambers are there out there? And do these names draw us to stamping--or did our parents subconsciously realize that we were born to stamp?

And if anyone has the answer to the eternal question 'why do birds suddenly appear?', I'd like to know that, too. . . .

Interesting observation! My daughter Holly likes here name because there are not a million of them at school and it's easy to pronounce and spell. Not a stamper, though.
We have a similar phenomonom (sp?) at my church -- tons of Nancys and Cindys which are not really common names anymore and every variation of Mary _____ that you cant think of.
Mary Beth

My name is Holly, I never met anyone else with the same name as me until college. I really enjoyed being the only one in my class and school with that name because when people refer to you they know exactly who they are talking about. It beats being Alex M or Alex S.

I have always been creative so I was drawn to stamping. The funny thing is I found my stamp collection from when I was a kid, even then I really enjoyed it ( I had purple embossing powder and everything, no heat gun, i think i used an iron, who lets a 10 year old near an iron).

I have also found that I find a lot of other Holly's here at SCS and on the Cricut message board too, maybe Holly is just a creative name.

me me me....I am Amber Shaw...aka sprtchick...lol maybe I just post too much..lol
:)

I taught school for 30 years and I would have to say these two names were the most common. For boys it was Mike...just plain Mike. For teachers it was Linda--that is me!

I'm a Holly (an old one, too! LOL). My parents had intended to name me Carole as I was due on Christmas day... sure glad they didn't! Although my maiden name was Holly Reinders (yup, I got Holly Reindeer a lot!). As for creativity, I was just discussing this with someone else a day or two ago. Until I was in my late 30s, I did not have a creative bone in my body.

I don't think my parents gave the name too much thought. I, however, named my boys by what I had "planned" for their life. Of course, none of them are doing what I planned! LOL Rats, foiled again.

I'm in the same boat. As a Krista, I have only met one other person with my name, yet there are 90+ here on this site.

I'm wondering if it may have to do with the average age of stampers and names that were popular when we were born. I went to school with lots of Karens, Lindas, Debbies, Julies, and Susans, which are probably over-represented here. My daughters go to school with Kelseys, Maddies, and Emilys--no Kristas, Ambers, or Hollys.

It's an interesting question...I would be interested in what others say!

My mom is a Holly. For her it was a family name, for the men. It certainly not a common name. Oh, and she is very artistic and creative, but not much of a stamper.

My daughters name is Holly, but she's not a stamper.

How funny!! I was supposed to be named Holly, but was born on Christmas, so my parents had mercy on me. LOL

And it's too funny about what we name our kids...I named my oldest son Caleb, and at that point in my life, had only met ONE person named Caleb. Of course, now there are a gazillion in his school. Same for Cole...which was originally supposed to be Caleb's name...:rolleyes:

Well, I guess I'm one of those over-represented Deborah's here. Although I refuse to go by Debbie. Call me Deb, please. ;)

My DD is Katie and I had no earthly idea how popular that name was or I might have reconsidered. I named her after a friend's daughter. My son is Daniel, very popular, but he was named after my father.

My youngest is Mary, again named after her grandmothers. But surprisingly, Mary is not common at all for little girls right now. :D I did call her Bella as a nickname for a while as a shortened version of her middle name. But with the advent of the Twilight craze, Bella has become WAY to popular for me. So now I only call her Mary.

My daughter is an Amber...no stamping blood in her veins tho! When I named her Amber I didn't know any Ambers and thought it was unique. I guess it turned out to be one of the top 10 names during that time (early 80's). There were not many in our area. My other daughter is Eva, which was VERY unique. She is 30. Now there are Eva's.
I'm another Debra.

There are a whole bunch of us Deborahs around here!

Wow, I just looked up Holly on the Social Security Administration's list of baby names by popularity, and Holly is actually in the top 100 names for girls in the 70s and 80s.

Heck, it got as high as 48th in 1979 and 1983.

Never would have guessed that--the only Hollys that I ever met were two others in my 3rd grade class, one the year ahead of me in college, and one at my first job out of school.

Plus all of us here, of course. Wonder what the percentage is of Hollys *not* born in December. . . . .

Some of us just get lucky with the common names. My generation (I'm 47) has tons of women named Chris, Cindy, Lisa, Lori, Susan, Sharon. The names are paired just like that, too. I have a sister named Cindy. Every Lisa seems to have a sister named Lori, and many of the Susans have a sister named Sharon. Those were very popular names for twins as well.

My mom's age group (she's 67) is all "J" names. When in doubt with that age group, I always guess Jean, Judy, Joyce, or Joan.

I'm a Rachel (no extra "a" in there for me). There were 6 of us (I think 3 had the extra "a") in my class junior year of high school!

When thinking of names for DD #1 (2005) I wanted something unique but not weird (it's a fine line). After thinking about it I chose my Aunt's name since she only had one son who passed away at 22 so no grand kids for her. So DD is Vivian Marie.

DD #2 (due June 15th) is going to be another V name (Violet Grace).

It's hard to find a unique but not weird name that doesn't become really popular after you choose it for your kiddo.

I don't know any Hollys but have a close friend named Amber (not a stamper but SUPER talented in painting, sculpting and really anything else artsy) and a close friend named Deborah (we call her Deb).

Interested to see other responses on here. :)

It definitely is difficult to find a good name for your child that's unique but not strange. We seem to have done pretty well with our kids. Daughter number one is 12. Her name is Juliette. She's always been the only one at her school.

Daughter number two is 9, and is named Katrina. Also unique to her school. Bad timing, though, with the hurricane. It struck a week into her kindergarten year, causing nearly everyone she meets to try to nickname her Hurricane Katrina. Not a happy thing. She finally tired of it and switched to Katie this year. Took me awhile to get used to it, but I can't imagine her with any other name now.

Funny observation! Love it! There are a lot of Deborahs/Debs, as mentioned above, here. The funny part is my son is named Ryne after Ryne Sandberg, former Hall of Fame second baseman for the Chicago Cubs. There is another Ryne in his class in high school! Total shocker! Then my daughter Brooke, a much more common name, is the only Brooke out of about 500 in her school. Really weird!

I do love the name Holly... such a happy, cheery name. I know quite a few dogs named Holly, too! :)

Cindy

There are quite a few Kim/Kimberly's out there for stamping too. Growing up in a small town I was the only Kimberly that I knew of and then when I moved to Nanaimo in Gr. 6 I met 5 other Kimberly's in a matter of 3 months. 3 of them were named Kimberly Ann (like me) and 2 of them named Kimberly Dawn. One of those Kimberly Ann's lived 3 houses down from me when I was a kid and as an adult where I live now I have met 2 other Kimberly's. One with the middle name of Dawn and one with the second name Ann (they live next door to each other and are yet again...3 houses away from me! lol)

All of the ladies as adults that I have met with the name of Kimberly are artistic in some form or another.

PS....Jellybean74 on SCS is a Holly too (she has always been called by her middle name of Angela)

Juliette is a good name. I know one other, in her 40's, but she spells it Juliet I think. Funny about your daughter switching to Katie. Wonder if she'll stick with it? My daughter is Brooke, but is going through a "Brooklyn" phase now. When she was younger and I called her that, She would get mad, not she prefers it!

Yes, there seems to be a lot of Wendys on here as well.
Growing up I was one of just a few I knew---now I know so many of them, I have lost count. All around my age---mid 40's---and then not alot much younger or older than me.

I am a Kelly (just a Y no EY or I) and that was a kinda popular name in the early to mid 70s. I was named that because it was my grandmothers maiden name so I was Kelly McLaughlin til I was 19. Nice and Irish, isnt it?! LOL
I have seen quite a few Kellys (in some variation) on here also. There was only 1 other Kelly in school that I remember. She was a year younger..none other in my class.

Those are both lovely names--and how sweet you were to name your daughter after your aunt! If one of my nieces honored me like that, I would sit down and bawl for a week. . . .

I was surprised to see Debra/Deborah mentioned as an uncommon name--back in my day, *both* those names were in the top 10 for girls!

Interesting that Kimberleys are often either Kimberley Ann or Kimberley Dawn--the Hollys in my age range seem to be either Holly Anns or Holly Beths. . . . maybe Ann is a universal middle name?

Plus all of us here, of course. Wonder what the percentage is of Hollys *not* born in December. . . . .[/quote]

I would be one! That's the 'Ho' part in my SCS 'HoJo'. :D Born in June. Parents just wanted a "short" name to go with my long-ish and usually hard to pronounce last name (Orluske). When I got married, I happened to pick someone with an "easy" last name (that would be Jones to go with the 'Jo' part of my 'HoJo' name) - so now it's all good! :D

BTW - I never knew any "Holly's" growing up either - just me, until I think college. In high school, there were two other "Heidi's" in choir with me and I always got called Heidi by my teacher (in fact, he still called me that when I saw him years later at a friends wedding reception.) I mean, I was choir president as a senior and he still couldn't get it right! Whatever, though, it's all 8).

(Edited to add: My mom loved the movie "Breakfast at Tiffany's" so that was a major influence on my name too.)

Oh Shannan! Caleb would have been my "next" choice for a boy if I had somehow lost my mind and went for #5. All my boys have Biblical names and that was one of my favorites.

Although I was due at Christmas, I was born a month early. At least my parents had enough foresight not to name me Turkey! :)

Want to hear something really strange? My middle name is Elayne. When I first joined facebook, I did a search for my name (maiden). I found TWO Holly Reinders on facebook. One, I later found out is the daughter of my father's cousin (whom I met briefly when I was real young). He named his daughter Holly Elayne! The other Holly Reinders has the middle initial E as well, for Elizabeth. Strange small world, eh?

Turkey...lol....you are a hoot...
blessings.

Names are a funny thing. I have only met two other Jill's in my life, but have seen quite a few on here.

My name is Holley; With an EY (like the carburetor)---that's because dad spelled the name on the paperwork, lol.

Holley
a new project everyday! http://holleybarnhartsblog.blogspot.com/

Gee, as a Jennifer (never Jenny) I hardly ever meet someone with my name. :rolleyes: Just remember, someday we will unite and take over the world! :twisted: Or, just get together and have an all-Jennifer stamp-a-thon! Whichever.... ;)

Yep. Another in your generation (I'm 48) and I'm a Cindy. ITA about the other names. Throw in a Denise or two and you had every grade school class I was in. There was always at least one other Cindy in my class when I was a kid, so I got tagged "Cindy B". When I got married, my DH changed his last name to mine so I'm still Cindy B! (Thank goodness, or I'd be Cindy Williams. No thank-you to the Laverne and Shirley jokes!)

Fun thread!
CindyB

Amber checking in here!

For a while there I hated my name. Everytime I'd meet a guy and tell him my name was Amber he would say "Oh, Amber. Stripper name." Yeah...thanks dude.:rolleyes:

I like it now, though. DD's BFF's mother is Amber as well. So, that can get confusing. My brother also married an Amber and at one point she and I shared the same name.

That SS site is very interesting. I checked on my name, and it was it's most popular in 1932, 34 and 35 :>) I'm not quite there but closer then than now.

Wanda

I agree that SS site is interesting. I have never had a problem with too many Martha's around. It has just gotten more and more unpopular over the last century. I have always thought it was an old lady name and the stats kind of prove it.
We gave our kids pretty basic names since our last name is difficult to pronounce. I have a Brian, Matthew and Caroline. Interesting to see how Brian was real popular in the 70's and less and less ever since. Caroline has gotten more popular over the last 10 years or so. And Matthew is always popular. But it is interesting that even with my kids having fairly common names we have never had multiple kids in the same class with the same names.

LOL Holly! Caleb's middle name is Samuel, but his name was originally supposed to be Isaiah Cole. I loved that name. But he looked more like a Caleb. And his brother is Joshua Cole. :)

If I *ever* go insane and end up with a girl, her name will be Eliana Ryann. After the heroine in Pillars of the earth, but re-spelled so she wouldn't be called an "alien" (Aliena).

Yeah...I feel your pain. Mine is Shannan, with an AN, because my dad thought it was more feminine. And my middle name is RenAE...just because while they were at it, they wanted to go all the way! I get my name mis-spelled ALL the time, especially with Teubner on the end.

I went to school with a few Holly's but I was the only Amber. Still am in this little town. It was the pits growing up as it was so hard to find my name on stuff but not hard for my sister Jennifer! but I do love being an Amber as it is so unusal. I did go to church for a while with another Amber (until her family left) and we actually had the same middle name too: Amber Joy! One year for Halloween we dressed up as siamese twins joined at the hips! lol

What do you have against Turkeys?? ;) I was born on Thanksgiving so it makes an easy screen name that I can always remember.

I am another Amber. :D
My mother is a Susan, and she had 8 other Susan's in her class, so she wanted to give me a unique name. I was the only Amber I knew until the name became popular in the 80's. I think Amber Dawn was a top name one year.