Hanna came home from camp and asked me a few random questions about piercings. Camp. Has. Changed.

I feared she was going to push the “You can have your ears pierced when you’re twelve” agreement we signed, had notarized and store in an off-site, undisclosed location as three well disguised yet reputable witnesses can prove through video diary.

She asked, “Mommy, have you ever seen anyone with a belly button earring?”

I had, “I have.”

Hanna: It’s really, well, interesting.

I was hoping more for, “Mommy, I saw this girl with her belly button pierced and it was so sick and not in the cool way we kids are using the word sick these days.”

While I considered the right way to suggest piercing her belly button would result in immediate infection and likely future amputation of most of her abdomen, she came up with her own reason not to.

Hanna: I thought who would pierce their belly button? When the baby comes out, it would rip the earring right out and that would hurt.

So, we are now back to our original plan. We continue to tell the girls babies are born through their belly buttons until I feel better about this whole piercing thing.

For now, the original contract has three years before it expires and self destructs…..Gadget-style.