Girls Wear Pink!!!

Well my wonderful mother-in-law and I had a little conversation about the incredibly annoying cultural pressure to put my daughter in only pink and purple. We are not annoyed by the random people in the grocery store that mistake her for a boy. That is completely normal, and regardless if she's wearing purple, or grey, or pink ruffles, they still call her boy. It might be the bald head or the fact that I refuse to pierce her ears. Who knows the answer to the mystery of why narrow minded people continue to jump to conclusions about another person based simply on their clothing.

The people in which we are annoyed with are those I know personally. Somehow our society has decided that unless a girl has long hair, pierced ears or eventually breasts, then anyone that has a girl must only dress her in pink or purple, or maybe the more risky yellow! I'm sorry, she's too little for breasts, I can't get her hair to grow, and I don't think anyone has the right to put a hole in another persons body without their consent. She will get earrings when she is old enough to ask for them. I am just thankful that I have breasts, and I can wear what I want!! Because if someone where to tell me that I could only wear pink for the rest of my days, first I would throw up directly on their shoes (hopefully flip flops), and then I would move far, far away.

My whole philosophy on dressing my child is that I put her in things that I would wear. I don't force her to wear frilly and uncomfortable things simply to please other people. It is important to me to teach my child that although other people's opinion does matter, it is only what she thinks of herself that really matters in the end, and she only really needs to make sure that she is happy. I believe that one of the main problems with our culture is the amount of time we spend focused on what other people think. Form an opinion, stand behind it, and if you have to, tell others wear to stick it.

So I pick out clothes for my daughter based on my sense of style. I like black because it's slimming on me. So I will put her in a black shirt with tiny ruffles and a little pair of jeans. Even though she has pink tennis shoes on, she's a boy. My husband's in the military, so we wear camo. This of course makes her a boy. I know they make pink camo, but when my child pulls down the regular green camo off the shelf I'm not about to crush my child's spirit by saying "No hunny, you're a girl, you have to get the pink one." My husband also played football in high school and college, and I played soccer most of my life. We decided early on we would encourage (not force) her to play sports. So she has a soccer ball, a baseball, a football, and even a Frisbee. She also has several pairs of pj's with balls on them. Now I know these are "boy" pj's, I had to buy them from the boys section, but what are we teaching our daughters when they go to pick out clothes and the only thing they will find is My Little Pony, Dora, or Ballet Slippers. Is it okay to say to the future women of America that they can't have that football, they must go play with their toy kitchen? I would love to see the interview with the mother's of Mia Hamm and Danika Patrick, and to hear their answers to, "So, which ballet school did you send your daughters to?"

While I was thinking about all these things, I decided to come up with some t-shirts that I want to have made for Joli. So far I have three ideas:

1. Bald is the new pink

2. Well why aren't you wearing your pink dress today?

3. Sorry my pink clothes are dirty, blue with have to do.

I had a few others, but finally decided that curse words were not appropriate on a baby.

Speaking of blue. Joli has the cutest t-shirt that is blue and says "Everyone loves a blue eyed girl". I have received several compliments on how it really brings out the color in her eyes. But maybe I should get rid of it, I mean after all it is blue, and blue's for boys! While I'm at it, I'll throw out the blue dress with red ruffles, and the blue shirt with a baby chick that says "cute chick", and I better not even think about putting her in the blue sweat set with the purple flowers on it, that's for boys too! I know, I'll save all that stuff for when we have a boy, and then we'll see what society thinks.

I would be lying if I said "forget it, it doesn't bother me", because it does. Joli is my child, and everyone that knows me, knows she is a girl, and also knows my views on the way females should be treated. I will tolerate the occasional stranger making a mistake, and politely tell them she is whoever she wants to be, but I should not have to defend my actions to family and friends, many of which do not have their own children, or experience in worrying about the lesson they are teaching their child. I'm done being nice and polite, because that's not really who I am. From now on, whoever thinks they should voice their opinion on the way I should raise my child, better be ready to defend that opinion, because I have opinions too, and they are not pink and frilly ones.