the girls with the pearl and butterfly earrings

I've been wanting to pierce Isabel's ears for a while now. Those of who who are American and might think that a very strange statement, remember I'm Brazilian, and in Brazil, we pierce babies' ears at the hospital a day or two after they are born. Having that said, Mike is not Brazilian (even though he loves Brazil very much), and like many of this great nation used to think the idea of piercing a baby's ear ridiculous. Even before I was first pregnant with Isabel, we used to have these long silly arguments over piercing or not piercing our unborn babies' ears. I thought he would never give in. He said he believed the girl had the right to choose. I told him she would, if she didn't want earrings, she could always take them off. It didn't convince him.
Another issue that always brought some cultural disagreement to our household was gun ownership. I told Mike I did not want a gun in the house. I don't believe it's safe to have one with little ones in the house (or even teenagers for that matter). We used to also have long silly arguments over that.
One day Mike said he would be ok with me piercing the girls' ears if he could have a gun. After much talking over the matter, I agreed. Well, I still didn't like the idea of having a gun in the house, so I also just kinda chickened out on the idea of piercing our girls' ears. We dropped the topic and haven't talked much about it since Sophia was born.
Last Saturday I decided just out of the blue to go get both Isabel's and Sophia's ears pierced. I called my sister to go with me to help out because Mike had to work (thanks for coming along, Mari, you were great!). It was easier than I thought. After very little crying, this is the result (sorry the pictures aren't great, but they never hold still!).





Might I also add that Isabel has been asking for earrings ever since she got her dress up chest from vovo for Christmas. It came with 2 pairs of clip on earrings, but they didn't stay on well enough for her taste, so she'd been saying she wanted earrings like mom's.
Oh, I almost forgot... Mike thinks they look adorable with earrings! : )