The Hat

Hands Up!

Originally uploaded by Mike’s Flickr Account.

Anyone who has ever had a young child knows that it is notoriously difficult to keep hats on them. Well, let me take that back — other people seem to have passive and compliant children who will wear whatever their mommies put on them, but I struggle with keeping hats on my kiddos. Which is unfortunate, because living in Florida, they very much need the sun protection. I have a series of cute and adorable hats for both kiddos — bucket hats, hats for our favorite sports teams. I could never get them to wear them for very long.

And then Alex and daddy one day went to the mall together to run an errand. And there was a car show vendor there. And said vendor, enamoured with Alex’s insane cuteness, gave him a freebee hat. Specifically, a freebee hat that states “Auto Styles” in a devilish print. Let’s just say it is not the hat I would chose to dress my child in every day, given my druthers.

But Alex loves it. He wants to wear it every day. He looks for it in the morning, knows to store it on top of his cubby until it is time to go outside to play at school, and puts it on when it is time to go home again. He knows he must remove it at the table for grace.

And I let him wear it, cheesy as it is to me, because at least it gives him a little bit of protection.