I'm Kinda Psychic

Last week, I posted the Top 10 baby names (boy and girl).  Earlier this week, I summarized my deep thoughts on all the apparent trends revealed in the 2011 list.  Today, I'm revisiting predictions that I made last year and deciding whether I should quit my day job and become a full time psychic. 

I'm not sure I can handle the psychic uniform

Last year I posted 3 times (here, here and here) about my predictions of the hot name trends that were marking 2011.  My predictions were based on zero science.  I was just frequenting Nameberry and other baby name websites, and paying attention to naming trends amongst my peers.  My overarching theory was twofold.  First, traditional, century old names were hotter than ever (think Charlotte and Benjamin).  Second, non-traditional, modern names were hotter than ever (think Hudson and Skye).  These two extremes were simultaneously at work through most of last year.  The common, middle of the road names, like Jessica and Jeremy, were out of favor.  And yes, this wasn't rocket science - these trends have been hot for some time now.

With these theories in mind and considering some important pop-culture phenoms, I developed a list of  names that I thought would be big in the 2011 SSA results.  Turns out, I was pretty damn accurate.  Well, I was fairly damn accurate.

For the girls, none of the names I predicted lost popularity.  Nice.  For the boys, I wasn't as on point.  Two of my boy name predictions (Harry and Kyron) fell in popularity.  For both boy and girl names, a few of my predictions didn't even make the Top 1,000 list.  My humble belief for those names is that I'm just ahead of the curve.  Check out the details below:

GIRLS

• Adele – up 282 spots from 909 to 627
• Adelina – up 25 spots from 910 to 885
• Azalea – still not breaking the top 1000 (never has)
• Avery – up 5 spots from 23 to 18
• Dahlia – up 109 spots from 647 to 583
• Daphne – up 38 spots from 488 to 450
• Emery – up 40 spots from 312 to 272
• Finn – still not breaking the top 1000 (never has)
• Frankie – still not breaking top 1,000 (last on list in 1974)
• Joey – still not breaking top 1,000 (last on list in 1970)
• Marilyn – up 2 spots from 547 to 545
• Philippa – still not breaking the top 1000 (never has)
• Pippa – still not breaking the top 1000 (never has)
• Primrose – still not breaking the top 1000 (never has)

BOYS

• August – up 29 spots from 427 to 398
• Brayden – up 3 spots from 40 to 37
• Everett – up 30 spots from 287 to 257
• Grayson – up 25 spots from 122 to 97
• Harry – DOWN 58 spots from 658 to 709
• Henry – up 10 spots from 67 to 57
• Kyron – DOWN 60 from 824 to 884
• Wallace – still not breaking the top 1000 (last on list in 1993)

At some point in the next month or so I should once again pull together predictions, seeing that I'm so good at it.  Have you noticed any particular names or name trends picking up traction this year?