Fashion forward

This hysterical hat was an Easter gift from a family friend. Riley was about 9 months old when it arrived. She was happy to wear it for about a month. Then nothing could convince her to keep it on.

But one day last week before she even got out of her PJs, she rediscovered it. Once I held her up to the mirror and she saw how stunning she looked in it, she refused to take it off for the rest of the day. Now every morning she hunts it down and struggles to pull it on by herself. After a minute or so, she stops, looks up at me expectantly and hands me the chapeau. Once I've set the blossom at the proper tilt and pulled the edges over her ears, she goes about all of her important Riley business with that ridiculous hot pink flower flapping on her head.

There are many reasons why I love the new hat ritual, above and beyond the obvious cuteness. It's a developmental milestone. This is Riley's first real assertion of personal taste and independence. She found the hat, she decided she liked it, she tried to get it on by herself.

It's also one of those random funny moments where I see the wheels turning and I know she's got some kind of logic pattern to why it now makes sense to love this hat. I don't know what the reason is, but I know it's a good one.

I just hope that in 50 years or so when she's eligible to join The Red Hat Society, http://www.redhatsociety.com/, that fabulous group of ladies who wear red and purple hats, she has a copy of this photo. I want her to know that she's always been bold enough to clash her colors and go fashion off-roading.

Because as much as I want to hold her close and protect her from any and all bumps on the winding road of her life's journey, it's even more important to me that she can navigate those twists, turns and jostles all by herself. So if a brash splash of fuschia and violet somehow helps her make sense of her map and personal compass, color wheel be damned. As far as I'm concerned, the pink and purple combo is the new black.