Ear Piercing...Take Two

We got Anniston's ears pierced last summer (as in '07) when she asked to do it. She climbed up in the Libby Lu chair and got them both done at the same time, inserting two little pink flower earrings into her sweet little lobes. Fast forward to Christmas time when we go to change the earrings, for the first time, to a Santa pair she has picked out. She flips out about putting the new ones in. I mean she is terrified. We try for weeks to talk her into letting us put earrings, any earrings at this point, back in. No luck. We try at night after she is asleep. No luck. Bribery, threats...nothing works. She isn't letting us near her with an earring. Finally, by spring I accept that her ears are no longer pierced and she'll probably be the only girl in Junior High without earrings because no way is she ever going to want to do it all over.... Until yesterday. We went to Wal-Mart for milk and as we were walking by the jewelry department she starts asking me all kinds of questions about earrings and getting ears pierced, not necessarily her ears, just ears in general. The day goes on and she is still going on about earrings. Finally I say, "Anniston, do you want to get your ears pierced again???" fully expecting a firm "No, thank you." She thought for a moment and said "Yeah". So we hightailed it to Wal-Mart as soon as Alyssa's friend Sarah's dad picked her up after school from our house. The lady, Nell, who was quite old, tried to talk me out of getting it done since she was the only one there and would only be able to do one ear at a time. I looked at her and said, "Look, we've done this before. I know. We aren't going to make a big deal about it but if she wants it done, she will do it." This, after all, is Anniston. And she may not be completely without fear, but she is a girl who knows what she does and does not want and she wanted her ears adorned with little pink heart earrings like all the other Coosada Baptist Preschool 4 year old girls! So she did it. She was the proudest little pierced girl for the rest of the day. She sported her new earrings today at school like a champ. All is good so far, but I think we will wait a few years before changing them out!