Real Men Wear Pink!

I bought the most adorable pink shirt for Jack a few weeks ago and he would rather leave the house buck naked than put this hot little number on.  I managed to convince him to wear it on Mother's Day by using the "ohhh... honey, it would mean SO much to Mommy on my special day if you wore your pink shirt." I know, not really fair to use that card, but it worked!  He begrudgingly threw the shirt on for his dear old Mom - who he clearly loves very much to endure this pain.

Fast forward a few weeks.  Every morning as I pick out his daily attire, I spot that awesome pink shirt staring me in the face.  Today I plucked it out of the closet and casually handed it to Jack - "there you go honey, get dressed please."  He happened to be watching Backyardigans so my hope was he'd be so enthralled that he wouldn't even notice the chosen duds.  

Jack: "I AM NOT WEARING THIS TODAY... none of the boys in my class wear pink!!!"  

Mom: "That's not true - Jackson has a pink shirt and the two of you are the coolest kids in the class.  Oh, and Jackson's Dad wears pink too, and Daddy, and Steve (my co-worker)."

Jack: "Mommy, I'm not talking about Daddy's, I'm talking about kids!"

Mom: "Oh, pardon me."

Silence

Silence

Silence

Mom: "I will pay you $1 to wear your pink shirt today." (That's right, I'm not afraid to bribe my kid in the name of fashion.)

Jack: "No, thanks."

Silence

Silence

Mom: "Ok, how about $5?"

Silence

Silence

(Now we're cooking... he's thinking about it!!!)

Silence

Silence

Jack: "Ok, deal!"

Mom: "Cool, throw it on and I'll getchya your money (said like we were making a deal in a very dark back alley.)"

The wearing of the pink shirt had become more of a mission than anything - a battle of the stubborns, maybe.  No, I don't think so.  The real deal is I don't want my kids to have the silly gender color bias' and somehow this pink shirt has come to represent the gender breakdown.  Or maybe I'm just in desperate need of a little pink in my life.  Probably a combination of all three...

Anyway, as we were heading out the door I turn around to see Jack stripping down.

Mom: "What are you doing?"

Jack: "You can just have your money back because I am NOT wearing this to school today!"

Mom: "You win love, you win."

I happened to run into Jackson's Dad this afternoon.  I mentioned that I used him, and his confident, pink wearing son, as leverage while attempting some heavy duty convincing.  He immediately devised a brilliant plot to tell both boys that it's pink day tomorrow and they should both wear their shirts and match (apparently, Jackson doesn't just throw on his pink with no objections either!)  They both got extremely jazzed about the prospect of "matching" for the day and practically signed on the dotted line - if there had been a dotted line they surely would have signed. 

We'll just see what actually happens in the morning when it comes to putting on "the shirt"...

If you took a sip of beer every time I said "pink" in this post, congratulations, you are drunk by now!