She's All Ears ... and earrings

My stance on ear piercing for little girls has always been to allow her to choose when she is ready. Some people like to do it as babies or when the girls are old enough to do all the cleansing and turning that the new earrings require - either is fine with me, but I was OK with doing it early as long as the piercee wanted and understood the responsibility/pain/permanence etc.

Claire has been talking on and off about getting them done and I would explain that you have to take good care of pierced ears and clean them a lot and, oh by the way, it HURTS to have them done. Like a shot. Claire would always change her mind and say Nah, I'll wait until I am 5 1/2 (or whatever 1 year older then her current age is.)


This morning was different, because Claire is now four and three quarters old. Yesterday she asked me when she would be four and three quarters (having grown tired of being four and a half) and as it turns out, today is Claire's four and three quarters birthday. So she got up today saying that she has reached that magic age where you can withstand the pain of having your ears pierced.


We went to the mall this afternoon searching for Crocs for Chloe to replace the ones that are now crunching up her toes and Claire pulls us by the hand to ... what store? ... Claire's! Without any hesitation or mind changing, she picks out some Hello Kitty starter earrings and is up in the chair ready to go. She asks to sit on my lap during the stick and the gals at Claire's were nice enough to do both ears at once.






My stomach churned from the time we set foot in the store until... well, it is still churning with nerves now. Claire sat on my lap, still as a statue while they drew the dots on her lobes, lined up and POW! We now have permanent holes in her ears. *sniff*






In 9 seconds, the girl went through all the "rules" to take care of the new bling and we were on our way. Jason was so proud of Claire's bravery (what about mine?) that he promised her some "Silly Bandz" - the current rubber bracelet craze being pumped in masses right out of China. Four sold out stores later, Claire is sporting her new kitty earrings and a set of knock off Silly Bandz (ours are Zany Bandz, but hey.... close enough.)