I'm currently reading, The Memory Keeper's Daughter, which during last nights reading passage was discussing the decision to choose a baby name before birth or to wait a few weeks to discover the baby's personality. It got me thinking. Choosing a name for another individual is a lot of responsibility. A name can have lasting effects on a person's mental health (as some reading this may know). It's never as easy as picking a name you like and assigning it to a new life. No, first you have to decide do you want to honor someone in your family and create a namesake or choose a name that has its own identity. Do you want to go traditional or trendy? Once you've made these choices its time to move on to scrutinizing the name you like. Does it rhyme with anything obscene, is it shared by any notorious persons? It's probably in your best interest to think of any way possible that this child's friends (or enemies) may twist this name around to make fun of him or her.

So you've taken all of this into consideration, selected a name that you think will be perfect, and think you're done. Not so fast, now you need to decide if you want to tell family and friends before the birth. You know this is going to open the door to everyone else's opinion and quite possibly bring you back to square one.

To help you out with this process we have lots of baby name books here at the library on the parenting shelf and in the adult non-fiction areas available for you to check out...

Beyond Jennifer & Jason, Madison & Montana : what to name your baby now / Linda Rosenkrantz and Pamela Redmond Satran

Baby names for the new generation / Pamela Samuelson and Albry Montalbano

The baby name wizard : a magical method for finding the perfect names for your baby / Laura Wattenberg

The baby name survey book : what people think about your baby's name / Bruce Lansky & Barry Sinrod

The complete idiot's guide to baby names / by Sonia Weiss

According to the US Social Security Office here's a list of the most popular baby names of 2005.