Well? Not long ago I was walking past a mirror with my infant daughter in my arms. As I did, I turned so she could see her reflection and said something like, “Who’s that pretty little girl?” or something equally corny and fatherlike. And was promptly reprimanded. Seems everybody in my wife’s family thinks a baby shouldn’t see her reflection or something bad will happen. This is a new one to me. What’s the bad thing, why would it happen, where did this superstition start. Just curious. Thanks in advance. 
Supposedly, it will cause the baby to stutter later in life. :rolleyes:
In Jamaica, you can’t let your baby see their shadow or a ghost will follow them home.
It won’t make them stutter, though. That only happens if you cut their hair before they start to talk.
Definately a superstition, but not one I’ve ever heard of.
Saying corny little things to my daughter is one of the joys in my life. After almost every bath I give her, I hold her up to the mirror and ask, “Who’s that!?” She grins and giggles, and so far her soul hasn’t been stolen by the spirits of the mirror. :rolleyes:
Your in-laws are just flaky. 
Weird, I wonder why?
Nuh-uh! You’re making that up! Aren’t you? Because that does sound kinda familiar . . .
You can’t even begin to really understand . . .
Eh, don’t worry about the mirror thing.
BUT, if you clip her toenails left-to-right, or if she was born under a new moon, you gots yerself some problems, brother.
Your in laws are weird
Everyone knows that it’s PETS that aren’t supposed to see themselves in the mirror. Fancy getting babies and pets confused. :rolleyes:
Fact is that pets never reach the point of intelligence that they know they are looking at their own image. A baby also does not know this and there is a point at which they are able to do this just like a lot of other things. The fact that they don’t recognize themselves is probably the basis for the superstition.
Only piece of advice I have is to pray your daughter does not stutter, because in-laws can make life miserable.
In Orthodox Jewish circles, the baby-seeing-himself-in-the-mirror thing was a superstition that the kid will be conceited.
I don’t know, however, how much of that has any genuine roots in Jewish tradition.
This is all a conspiracy on the part of behavioral scientists who want to conceal the fact that children really are animals, isn’t it?
No word on origins, but according to this page:
Apparently cutting her nails before she’s a year old will cause her to become a thief.
My favorite from that page:
When anthropologist Louis S. B. Leakey was born in the bush in Kenya in 1903, the local Kikuyu tribesmen visited his cradle and “baptised” him by spitting all over him. In their culture it was considered a blessing on the newborn.
[[Apparently cutting her nails before she’s a year old will cause her to become a thief. ]]
Many people in Jamaica say that, too. Well, not exactly that. They say, “Naw cut a fi im nail dem or im a ton tief.”
Apparently a baby shouldn’t see their reflection until they are one because it can mean an early death for them.
How else are you supposed to see if the baby’s a vampire or not?
There are so many stupid baby superstitions, it’s a wonder parents with newborns ever did anything at all.
Cut their hair before they speak and they’ll stutter.
Let them see their reflection before they’re a year old and they’ll die.
Cut their toenails and they’ll become a thief.
Let a baby girl touch the ground and she’ll become a streetwalker.
I suggest inviting the in-laws over and doing all of those combined into a nice baby-parent-interpretive dance, and then giving the inlaws a look like:
“What you going to do about it now?”
I’d have figured that, since the baby didn’t recognize their reflection, that their soul must be in the reflection. Thus you are creating a soulless child, or, at least one with less of a soul (having it split between the real and the reflection.)
Stuttering seems like an odd thing to connect, unless there’s some connection with stuttering and having less of a soul.
Or a zombie!
My grandma always said that the baby will be vain if it looks in the mirror before the 1. birthday.
And you’re not supposed to cut the hair, too so the stupidity can grow out.
If you tickle the baby it will stutter.
This was the reason I always heard why babies shouldn’t look in mirrors