"What's his name?"

Benji and I decided to keep our baby's gender a secret througout our pregnancy. For us, it was one of those few surprises in life. Despite the frustration of relatives who wanted to know what kind of clothes to buy the baby, we enjoyed not knowing. We let them know that our baby boy could rock pink and our baby girl could rock blue, so don't worry about it. We ended up with some very gender neutral colored clothes: green, yellow, brown, beige. Blah.

I appreciate that when Soluna catches the eye of older immigrant Chinese or Japanese women, even if Soluna is wearing pink or a dress, they always ask if she is a boy or girl. Maybe people get frustrated that they ask at all, but to me, it shows me that they come from a culture that doesn't blatantly gender all that kids wear. My cousin, who recently immigrated from the Philippines, told me that it's only in America that baby girl clothes are all pink.

I don't care if Soluna is mistaken for a little baby boy. She's a baby! It doesn't matter. She doesn't seem to care. All she is worried about is having someone to hold her, something to play with, her diaper changed and a lot to eat. She has a lifetime to deal with social gender pressures, why do we have to start now? But the grandmas get offended. "They thought she was a boy *gasp*" ... "She should be wearing dresses." .. And they insist that I must get her ears pierced.

Goodness, relax.

I'm gonna dress Soluna the way I want, for as long as she lets me. And, sometimes I will dress her in "boys" clothes and sometimes she's not even going to match! Take that!

Soluna... rocking the green fit when she was super little: