Deciding on a baby’s name can be difficult, but for Kristina Hobbs, the mother of a 2-month-old girl, it was simple.

“My husband and I were contemplating Elizabeth,” said Hobbs, 24, of Denton. “But one day he overheard another name and said it to me, and I thought it was beautiful.”

The name?

Isabella.

Isabella was the most popular name for newborn girls in Texas and across the country for 2009, according to the Social Security Administration’s list of the most popular baby names, released this month.

Jacob was the most popular name for boys in the country, but the name couldn’t assert its dominance in Texas, where Jose reigned supreme.

Texas’ top 10 includes names that have gained greater appeal among parents within the last decade, such as Jayden or Ava, along with the more established Michael, Daniel and Emily.

To some, this trend is a sign of the changing times.

“The older names have died off,” said Jamie Dear, director of Tender Loving Care Preschool. “People just want the modern thing now.”

Linda Luster is a programmer at On the Cuff, a Denton embroidery service that sees hundreds of requests for stitching baby names into blankets and clothing.

“Many of the names we get are out of the ordinary, like Gunner, Petra, Kinsli or Azrael,” she said.

“We haven’t seen many requests for Isabella or Jose,” Luster said. “It’s rare for us to even see a David.”

Four years ago, Denton resident Shelby Garrison and her husband wrestled over what to name their baby daughter, both of them hating what the other suggested.

“My husband wanted to name her Mallorie, but that felt too old for me,” Garrison said. She was out of ideas until her mother reminded her of a name she had picked out while she was still in high school: Sydney.

“I didn’t want it to be like everyone else’s name,” Garrison said. “I wanted it to be different, but not too far out there.”

They went with Sydney because “it was the only name he agreed on,” she said.

Data for the baby names list was taken from Social Security card applications for babies born in 2009, according to the Social Security website.

The list features the top 100 names from all 50 states and territories of the United States as well as the top 1,000 most popular names in the country. The Social Security Administration began compiling the list in 1997, but its records go back to 1880.