The many hats of Evelyn Cage

When Evelyn was a few weeks old she developed a nasty case of baby acne (just in time for Christmas pictures poor baby). It cleared up after I started washing her head with baby soap every night.

This has led to very dry and irritated skin. When I skip a night her skin does not dry out as much, but the rash flares up. So right now the dry skin is the lesser evil.

Unfortunately this means that she scratches her head a lot. No matter how short I keep her nails she still manages to gouge furrows in her scalp. To combat this I drench her in Vaseline and baby lotion every night, which is not very attractive, and keep a hat on her at all times, which can be very attractive.

Here are some of our hat solutions. My Aunt Jan made Ian a beautiful bunny hat that I am waiting for Evie to grow into.

Totally adorable.

Until she grows into that one, hand-me-downs and the occasional Etsy buy are fulfilling our hat needs.

I am struggling a little bit with the ethics of it all. One the one hand, damn she is cute. On the other hand, I don’t want to be one of those moms who plays dress up with her baby like she was a little tea cup poodle or something. And who knows what the long term consequences will be?

If I start dressing her in hats now will she turn into a girly-girl who actually knows about fashion and likes to accessorize?? What will I do?? How will we relate??? I am perfectly confident in my ability to raise a half-wild feral child… but a fashionista? JD will never forgive me!

So I ponder little camo pants and mini tie dye shirts at Babies ‘R Us while I secretly shop the net like a junkie for flowered bonnets and tutus.

Luckily I get lots of cute, girly hand-me-downs from baby Sophia. If I couldn’t blame Evie’s beautiful wardrobe on her older cousin I would probably have some kind of psychotic break in the middle of the mall. Thank God for Miriam and her intrepid trail-blazing into the world of baby fashion! I don’t have to face the questions of my wide-eyed friends “You bought that for her? You? It’s pink! And it has RUFFLES!!! Bwahahaha!!!”

But speaking of baby fashion let me address my pet peeve. Pink and brown. Why is EVERYTHING pink and brown? With Aqua and lime polka dots? And paisley? I just managed to have a little girl in a time period that is trying to bring back the worst fashion mistakes of the 60s?

To be fair I actually like pink and brown together. I like brown. And *mumble*pink*mumble*. I even like paisley. But on every. Single. Piece. Of clothing? And I could do without the pink and brown and lime green combo. When was lime green ever a good idea on a baby? Where are my pastels? Where are my cute circus animal prints? EVERYTHING is pink and brown.

Ish.

On a completely different note: today is Evie's 3 month birthday!! She was so tired and grumpy when we got home that I decided to wait on the picture taking... which is too bad because she had a really cute dress on. All she wanted to do was eat and curl up on my lap and I didn't have the heart to shove a flash bulb in her face and try and get her to smile. But never fear -- tomorrow (if she is happy) I will post up her birthday-plus-one-day picture.

On another completely different note: Ian is on the Vineyard with Grandpa and Grandma for the week. I know he is having TONS of fun -- but we miss him. It is very quiet without him!