As a mother of redheads

My two daughters - who for the sake of this blog will be referred to as Big M and Little M - have red hair.  Not strawberry blonde, it looks red in the sunlight, but gorgeous, flaming red hair.  It is beautiful, no ifs, ands, or buts.  But the constant attention it attracts sometimes gets old.

Twice in the last week people have come up to us while we were eating and interrupted us to say something.  Or ask.  Wish I had a dollar for every time we've been asked where it comes from, as Dad and I are not redheads.  

I've gotten to where I mentally assign a score to the originality of the comment.  One of this week's meal interruptions warranted a fairly high score for his question of whether they got it at Kroger or Tom Thumb.  But mostly, we just all smile and say thank you, and say it came from Granddad rather than get into a lesson on genetics and recessive genes.

After a family bike ride this weekend, Big M commented that she likes biking for many reasons, one of which is that her helmet covers up her hair.  

My niece, also a redhead and older than M&M, commented several years ago that people always say things about her hair but not about her.  Which brings me to my point.  It's just plain not good to make comments about kids about things that are out of their control.

I'm going to make it a point to say nice things to kids, especially redheads, about them.  Tell them how sweet or brave or kind they are, depending on the situation.  It will probably be a welcome change for them.