Captain Jelly Belly and Gal Smiley are only 18 months apart in age. When I found out I was pregnant with the Gal, I knew it would be great if the baby were a girl, but I also thought it would be very nice if the baby turned out to be a boy, since he would be so close in age to his big brother and they’d be buds.

Gal Smiley is a girl in all the important ways, but she idolizes her older brother and thus is quite the tomboy. She prefers to wear clothes that used to be his, and so often leaves the house wearing cargo pants and grey socks with trucks on them and a striped rugby shirt from Old Navy. She likes to play cars and trucks and Buzz Lightyear Show. She likes to roughhouse with the Captain, rolling around on the floor or jumping off couches or slapping each other until someone calls Uncle. So I guess she and CJB are buddies after all.

This morning, CJB was off at school and Gal Smiley was watching me get dressed. She saw me put on some lip balm and so she got out her own cherry-scented lip balm and put some on, and announced that she was now pretty like “when Mommy got married.” Then she saw me put a barrette in her hair and she seemed interested, so I asked her if she would like a pretty barrette too? Yes!

So she skipped over to her room, where she has a massive bucket full of little barrettes and hair clips and funky-coloured elastic bands, all of which have NEVER been used, because she hates having anything in her hair. In fact, if we let her have a buzz-cut like the Captain I think she would gladly take it — she is always asking why she has to have long hair, like it’s a huge hardship, and she never understands when I try to explain that ten years from now, if she looks back at photos of her three-year-old self and she has a bowl cut on her head, she will decry me as the worst mother ever. I’m sure her thirteen-year-old self will not need any further ammunition on the Worst-Mother-Ever front, so thus, I insist on the long hair.

We got down the bucket of hair accessories and I put a few in her hair, which has long been my dream, and then she spent a half hour putting every other barrette she owns into my hair, until my head kind of looked like a Christmas tree. Now this is what having a little girl is all about.

I definitely could get used to playing hairstylist on a daily basis. It’s awesome having a girl.