These may be my favorite pair yet. They were commissioned by my friend
Anne, for her baby girl Maeve. Anne chose the fabrics, and I admit (with some shame) that I was a little skeptical at first - I felt that the two prints would clash a bit at the borders. But then I landed on the idea of using a little bit of contrasting trim at the meeting point (red, of course), and I have to say: Anne has an amazing eye.
I want a pair of these for myself, as pajama pants. I love love love them.
You may have perceived by now that orange is one of my favorite colors, especially for babies. I do not subscribe to the pink/blue gender divide. I like bright, saturated, gender neutral colors on babies. And stripes. And
faux bois. If a pair of pants
must be frilly and feminine, they should at least be green. Or orange. Or orange and red, with mixed prints. I don't dislike pink at all (in fact, as a girl, it was LIKE TOTALLY, my VERY FAVORITE color), but it is
so overdone. As Anne says, "I like pink, pink is great, but does everything have to be pink?"
Rhetorical question: Why is it so important that our babies be recognizable as girls or boys from a mile away? First of all, babies don't care one bit whether they are boys or girls. Second, I don't need to wear pink all the time to assert
my femininity. Other colors are allowed!
The only reason I can think of to assign gender identity to children from birth is
so that we (as a society) can start the gender programming as
early as humanly possible. Starting with that 24 week ultrasound if possible! Keep everyone in their place!!
Police those babies! This way, no one is the least bit confused about their proper roles!
Am I just being cynical?
I acknowledge that little girl clothes and little boy clothes are adorable ... perhaps it's as simple as that. But gender neutral clothing is pretty cute too. Let's face it, these balls o' chub would be just as cute in a loin cloth. So I'm not convinced.
I wish I had the guts to dress Joe in pink. It would complement his dewy complexion. It's annoying that pink isn't "allowed" for boys. It's a perfectly lovely color, and it is not intrinsically "girly."
It doesn't bother me when people think Joe is a girl. I correct them, of course, but it does not bother me. I mean, you have to admit, he is a very pretty little boy! So I also don't understand people who get upset because someone thought their little girl was a little boy for a split second. It's hard to tell. Boys and girls
look amazingly alike until puberty. In my opinion, there's no shame in "guessing wrong" or asking gently, "she? or is it he?" It's true that if you don't dress your child in head-to-toe blue or pink (and maybe even if you do), people will guess wrong, but I don't see anything annoying about that. Why do we care so much?
So - what, are we afraid that the wrong clothes will make our kids gay or something? (
Heaven forbid! I'm not going to even start trying to unpack that one!)
Talk amongst yourselves ...
Oh, yeah, I almost forgot.
Pants.
Maeve might be the (second) cutest baby in the whole universe. She is simply delicious. Don't you just want to chew on her chubby arms?
That's my boy there, in the
overalls. Of course.