That cutie up there is my middle son. He's three years old and he definitely loves to express himself by the way he dresses.

When he insisted on wearing the fedora from his Indiana Jones costume everywhere, we assumed he was just playing dress up. That he wanted to pretend that he was on an archeology hunt or running away from a giant boulder -- not that we have many of those in Boston, but three year olds are awesome that way.

Turns out, he just liked the way it looked. He loved the attention it brought him -- especially from little old ladies at the grocery store, who would stop and tell him how handsome he looked and how men always wore hats back in their day.

We loved the fedora stage.

Then, he moved on to ties. He begged me to buy him a tie. But of course, I couldn't put a real tie on him. I tried to explain that he wasn't old enough - that little kids simply don't wear ties.

Then I came to my senses and bought him a couple of clip on ties.

Why on earth would I discourage his desire to dress up? Isn't it my job as his mom to encourage his creativity and self-expression? And creative he was: He wore them with button up shirts. He wore them on SpongeBob sweatshirts. He wore on T-Shirts. Plus, it made him and the little old ladies in town happy.

You've heard that old saw about how boring it is to dress a boy. I hear it all the time and I think it's nonsense. Sure, my oldest son doesn't seem to care one way or the other about his clothes. But my middle child does -- and he's all boy.