My son attends swim lessons at a gentlemans house along every afternoon, along with several other kids his age (5).
One of the other kid’s moms also brought a baby along, and was bouncing it in her lap. I like babies, and they’re one of those socially nuetral items you can stare at without seeming rude, so I did several times. Cute kid.
And I’m glancing at this baby girl, who looks to be about 6 months, when I notice she has little gold studs in her ears. Expensive looking ones. Then I noticed that she was wearing mascara.
Mascara? on a 6-month-old?!? :eek: This wierded me out. A little. Am I too easily wierded out?
I took my son to swim lessons the next day, and the baby was there again – same gold pierced studs, same mascara.
I guess since the parents haven’t tatooed political slogans or song lyrics on the little darling, it’s mostly no harm done. But who the heck pierces and mascaras thier not-even-toddling baby girl?
I’m hispanic and it’s pretty common in our culture (at least where I grew up) for girls to have their ears pierced as babies. I don’t know very many who don’t have their ears pierced. I was in my early 20s before I found it that other people didn’t do the same thing. It just never seemed like a big deal to me and I really was surprised when my co-workers discussed waiting until their daughters were pre-teen or teenagers before allowing them to get their ears pierced.
As far as the mascara… :eek: All of my nephews and nieces had a lot of hair and had dark lashes. Is it possible that the baby you saw was just blessed with long, dark lashes?
If the baby was wearing mascara, then holy crap! That’s not cool. I don’t want to imagine a baby with an eye infection. It could be possible, though, that the baby just had really thick black eyelashes. My younger brother looked like he was wearing eyeliner and mascara until he was about twelve or so, his eyelashes are so thick and heavy. And my family’s entirely of western European descent.
Yes, I was informed of the same thing by my SO, so I didn’t want to make too big a deal about the piercing. It’s really the combo that struck me so odd.
No, I was at a distance of maybe 3 feet from her. Definitely mascara. An adorable baby juxtaposed with the lashes of a Vegas streetwalker. Shiver.
That was my first thought as well - babies get everthing onto thier hands, and thence into mouths, eyes, everywhere. I sure wouldn’t want to be responsible for keeping the mascara on a mascara’d baby from getting where it shouldn’t.
Mascara is pretty weird. You said you’re sure, so I’ll take that, but I do have to say, my husband (who is hispanic) gets asked often, sometimes even by me, if he is wearing it.
I too, am hispanic, and like Grace said, it is very common for baby girls to have their ears pierced within weeks of birth.
For what it’s worth, this kid may be hispanic, but I doubt it. We do live in a hispanic area, but Mom was tall, blond, and fair, and looks vaguely scandanavian. Baby was extremely fair (but many babies are, of any extraction), but she pretty much looked like Mom except for dark hair. Very whitebread caucasian, at least on casual inspection.
In any case, I was skeptical as well that it was mascara so I kept glancing at the kid – discreetly – to be sure. But from a distance of a couple-or-three feet, which was how close I was, you really can tell: the eyelashes visibly have some sort of dark goo applied to them. You could even see little bits of the powder clinging to the lashes. Either this kid had black eye-dandruff, or it was mascara.
OK, point more than taken. I withdraw the piercing objection. Although those gold studs still looked really expensive to be baby baubles.
If you live in a hispanic area and the baby has pierced ears not to mention dark hair, it’s possible that the the father is hispanic. Still, if you noticed black goo around the lashes, that certainly sounds mascara to me. Now THAT is weird. Who puts mascara on a baby? Heck, I’m 35 and I don’t even bother with the stuff. I have dark lashes, but they could be longer and better shaped if I used mascara and maybe an eyelash curler. I don’t do it because I can’t stand the thought of putting that gunk on so I can’t imagine putting it on someone else.
BTW, baby earrings aren’t really that expensive. You can get tiny 10k gold studs or hoops at WalMart for around $20. I have three piercings on my right ear and I’ve purchased baby earrings for the top two holes.
I didn’t know that was common in hispanic families. In the all-white, stick-up-yer-butt town I grew up in, pierced ears on babies was considered trashy. I hereby promise to be more culturally sensitive on the subject. Mascara on a baby I cannot imagine, though I don’t know why it would be worse; it’s not like mascara is permanent.
I think we might all be falling into the trap that everybody who’s Hispanic has dark skin and black hair. Do a Google images search for “Tessie Santiago.” She’s a Cuban-American (I think – she’s Hispanic at any rate) actress and is blonde-haired. Natural blonde. She was the Queen of Swords.
I was about 6 months old when I had my ears pierced. My family’s of Indian Asian extraction, and my first earrings were gold studs. Its a cultural thing, I think.
Oh boring of me, but my reply is simply to echo Jodi - ie my first reaction to the earring thing would be “BAH - how tacky!” but I also herebey promise …etc. Hey to be fair to myself, I reckon very young kids from Indian/Pakistani families around here often have pierced ears, and I always have managed not tto see that as trashy, just assuming it is a cultural difference thing, but I cannot say for sure that it is done when they are actual babies.
The mascara bit? Well, I must be more of a cranky old fogey than even I knew because I have been a bit shocked that at age 10 my twin nieces, so I gather, when out for the day with their Grandmother, their great desire was to go and spend their pocket money on make-up and nail varnish. But for an actual BABY??? That jsut does seem to weird, and the eye infection or even only eye irritation point is a very good one, I think.
hmm- 'round here of LOT of little girls have ears pierced, regardless of race or culture. I always thought it was weird that my 4 year old niece doesn’t have pierced ears.
FWIW, I had mine pierced when I was a baby and I am of Italian descent.
To tell you the truth, I don’t see how it’s possible to put mascara on a baby. You have to sit still, blink your eye properly, and not be flailing and squirming because pointy objects are near your eye. I think you should ask the woman next time.
The earrings thing used to be strictly a Latino thing, but lately, I see parents doing it when they have a little baldo baby so’s the world knows it’s a girl. I see it in all races and economic groups these days.
Where I live, the population is predominately Hispanic, and Hispanic babies tend to be born with a full head of hair. My daughter’s hair is blonde and extremely fine, so she sported the Eisenhower look until she was about two. A lot of people assumed my daughter was a boy, even when we dressed her in pink. When my wife and I would patiently explain that our bald Anglo baby was a güerita and not a güerito, the invariable response was to ask why she didn’t have earrings.
And I’ve seen babies with makeup applied to cover up birth marks. But mascara? WTF???
I am Hispanic so I am used to seeing little girls with earrings. The one time I did do a double take was at Babys R Us. I saw a baby girl with double piercings in each ear. That seemed really wrong to me.
