Real hair dye, or a kool-aide wash? Go to a beauty supply store and see if you can get a hair "stripper" to strip the color.

Take the pics in black and white? Pin her hair up in a bun under a cute summer hat?

Don't let BM ruin an important moment to you....

my ex gave my 3 yrs old a mohawk the weekend before my wedding and then in court attempted to claim that I had overstepped my boundaries and was attempting to alienate his son from him by giving him a buzz cut prior to the wedding.

he did the same with my youngest daughter's hair as your BM did. Go to a salon and have them braid it up and put some sort of small flower in it. It ended up working out great. I also made sure that I took plenty of pics prior to cutting and putting it up. I never let the kids know that I was upset and it back fired on their dad because they ended up thinking I was the cool one.

One of the worst things I have ever seen was that my exGF's daughter, now exSD15, who was SD5 at the time, was with BD and BD's wife took her to a salon. The little girl has GORGEOUS long, flaxen hair, a beautiful blond color and the hair went down to her waist. BD's wife cut it all off into a bob.

exGF cried and cried and cried when she saw it. She had the sense to go into another room and come out smiling and say "wow... do you love it? Good for you..." but the truth is it crushed her. She was a pretty good Mom.

Boy I fucked up dumping her... Oh well...

Anyway the whole point of this diatribe is that I know where you're coming from. Adults overstep their boundaries constantly, and it usually involves the kids sadly.

i think the mousse idea is a wonderful one! I dont think its evil (kinda hahahaha bm wont like it) but isnt your baby due soon? Can you wait till next weekend to take pics lol.

OMG- just remembered something Loca Grande did to us years ago, regarding hair! It was her 4 consecutive weeks in the summer. Loghead's grandfather passed away, and even though the kids were only like 4, 5 and 7 at the time, Loghead wanted the kids at the visitation and funeral since they were close to their great-grandfather. Loghead asked for the kids "back" for a few days (we have primary custody and she only has them EOW and 4 consecutive weeks in the summer.) Loca Grande shocked us by being so generous, and saying she would by the kids new clothes and shoes etc.

Should have known better...

She "had car trouble" and ended up running late so brought them straight to the funeral home. Probably her plan anyway, so she could see the rest of the family (crazy b^*&%)... Imagine our shock when the two boys piled out of the car with shaved heads! They looked like concentration camp survivors!

I could see Loghead starting to boil, so I just grabbed his arm to rein him in. I asked their older sister about it later, and she said "mommy" had shaved their heads that morning.

Nice.

At least the clothes were nice, and were appropriate for the situation, but good grief!

lol thats funny! i think you should do it! and if its temporary, its not like its gonna take out the pink/purple highlights will it..? it would be funny if it did though!

Is it out of spite? Maybe. Is it even right to dye a kid's hair? I don't think so...BUT it is her child and in 99% of households mom takes girls and boys to get hair done and dad is never involved...in the rare instances he is, it is usually with the boy's hair. Thread lightly...while I do not agree with her decision, it is HER daughter and I do not believe smoms whose husbands do not have custody should be messing with anyone else's kid's hair.

Either take a BW pic or sepia or put a hat or other on her hair or leave her out of the pics.

Hey Thetis. So sorry to hear about what your BM did to SD4's hair, especially right before you had planned to take the pix with you & your baby bump & DH (very cute idea, btw).

This topic TOTALLY enrages me...to the point that I feel it is a form of child abuse. I completely agree with crazymunke above. What kind of "mother" dyes a little 4 yr old's hair???? Especially the bright pink, purple, blue, etc.... THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO EXCUSE WHATSOEVER FOR THIS TYPE OF BEHAVIOR TOWARDS AN INNOCENT 4 YR OLD GIRL (excluding say, a school function or Halloween or something - but really that's even stretching it). That is just completely abnormal. Seriously, your BM has major mental problems. Using a child as a pawn in an adult world game (shaking my head back and forth)...this type of behavior should be criminalized. Your BM has obvious jealousy/spite issues and needs to be stopped IMMEDIATELY. What did your DH say he was going to do about it? If he does nothing, then he's a moron (sorry, no offense) - and it renders you literally powerless.

I can't stand men that sit back and allow themselves (or their young children) to be treated this way and to be used as pawns in these games. Your DH should've immediately contacted BM and BLASTED her for this. Despite the suspicious "timing" of dying SD4's hair, he should still be putting a stop to BM abusing her - she's HIS DAUGHTER TOO, for heaven's sake!!! AAAAHHHHH!!!

He should also definitely take pix of this ridiculous looking "punked out" hair on SD4 - it's not Halloween, nor any other type of holiday/school show/occasion where there is remotely even any EXCUSE for BM to do this to her. Even if you feel it won't do any good, document, document, document. You never know if your BM will decide to take her little games to a whole new level in the future - putting little munchkin in the middle of it all. Shame, shame, shame on BM for her obvious lack of judgment on how to treat an innocent little child. Poor, poor little girl.

I would be checking with any attorney, the internet, etc...for what, if anything, you can do to have BM stopped immediately (legally). What does your DH's divorce decree say about this??? He has 50/50 joint custody and he's allowing BM to do these things to HIS DAUGHTER??? Pfft!!

With that said, I must admit I think that most people on here would recommend that you "take the high road" and put a hat on her head for the pix, or braid her hair, or take the pix in black & white or sepia, blah, blah, blah. Those are all great ideas to check into. They say that giving your BM ANY reaction is exactly what she's looking for - and that NO reaction is better because it "cuts her off" and doesn't feed into her crap. I suppose technically, that would be the way to go - not dying SD4's hair to match yours/more natural.

Unfortunately, if your DH is going to sit there and "take" this type of passive aggressive bullshite from BM, then there's really nothing you can do. Is he THAT afraid of BM that he's not going to do ANYTHING about it??? Sounds to me like he needs to grow a serious pair...

I don't know what to tell you because I'm really too disgusted by reading what your BM did to SD4 to even think of good/creative ideas for you to fix the problem for the pix. Maybe just keep washing it, like 3 times/day, and hopefully all the pink, purple and blue crap will start to fade.

Good luck Thetis!! Sending hugs your way.

P.S. Just out of curiosity, what kind of background does BM have? Is she a former hairdresser or something? What did SHE say her reasons were for DYING HER LITTLE 4 YEAR OLD DAUGHTER'S BEAUTIFUL BLONDE HAIR all different punky colors?? Did DH speak to her about this at all? Didn't he see it right when he picked up SD4???

Thetis, I have to go back and read your older posts because I don't know what you mean about the dramatic bday party coming up. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE tell me that they aren't trying to give SD4 a joint birthday party!!!

Also, CONGRATULATIONS on the impending birth of your new child!! I wish you all the love & luck in the world with your new little angel. So happy for you!

what does SD think about her hair?

PS most picture editing software have sepia as an option and depending on the pictures can look very modern too

PS the judge won't care about your "preference" of hair, BUT do some research on the dangers of hair dye especially in developing brains/children, etc and build a case on THAT basis

I can't believe she'd dye a 4 year old's hair! I have very fair, blonde hair and in the past I've made some big-time mistakes with hair color (in college I dyed it red, and a few months later attempted to dye it back to blonde...result=neon-salmon!).

In order to get it to "go away" without a lot of damage, you should really take her to a hairdresser. They did some Malibu treatment on mine...not sure what that did but it helped! But you don't necessarily want to spend the money and damage her hair more though if you think BM will just do it again anyway.

However, I love the hat idea, or the bun idea. You could get a nice scarf to tie like a headband in her hair, this would cover up a lot of the front part so it might be not as noticeable if her face is facing the camera most of the time. I really think the black and white picture thing will work well enough that you wouldn't notice in a family portrait.

I'd still include her in the picture. It's not the 4 year old's fault that her mom is an idiot! Looking back on it one day, you'll probably laugh!