M's Extreme Makeover

M reaches his 4th month milestone on 28th Jul and it is usually signified with a haircut. I remembered that it seems forever before J finally had his 4th-mth haircut (his hair constantly tickled my neck whenever I carried him) but for M, time passed by so much quickly.

As both J and M have a significant amount of jet-black hair, it seems like a waste to cut and throw it away. Thus with J, we decide to have the hair made into 胎毛笔 (taimaobi).

The tradition of giving a baby boy a "taimaobi" — fashioned out of his own first growth of hair — dates back to the Tang Dynasty some 2,000 years ago. When the boy goes on to be a scholar, he would use the brush when sitting for the Imperial examinations to be a government official. Only boys were given this gift as only males were allowed to sit for the exam in ancient China. The catch is that only the baby’s first strands of hair can be used to make these brushes. The brush has been widely used by Chinese officials, scholars and students to write, practise calligraphy or paint for thousands of years. Its popularity diminished with the advent of fountain pens and ballpoint pens.

These brushes does not come cheap. However, it is the only physical item that I can preserve for a long time and hand back to them when they grow up to remind them of their roots.

How do you like M's extreme over?