Dimples.....????.....

[momrek06]

My DS has DIMPLES. We have absolutely no one in our family, either mine or DH's that has dimples...zero...no one!! Not my in-laws or out-laws...!! I would like to know how exactly does someone come to have DIMPLES.

Everyone always says to DH & I, how they love DS' dimples. Sometimes it is hard to keep a straight-face when DS is telling me a story or relaying a conversation he has had with someone with these dimples going in and out!!!

When he EATS, it is hysterical. Now DS is not a kid, he is 20y.o. and they are STILL there right in the middle of his cheeks. And extremely pronounced in photos of him. That is always the FIRST thing someone will say when looking at a photo of DS is "look at his dimples"!!!!

Anyone else have a child with dimples? Is there someone in your family with them? THIS IS A MYSTERY TO ME....but a cute mystery at that...!!??

BTW: DS could care LESS if he had them, he says he never SEES them anyway!!! HHHmmmm!!!!

 

[dis ms.]

Both my kids have one dimple. The weird thing is that my DS didn't have one for the first 2.5 years of his life. Then, after DD was born, his magically appeared! Both have the dimple on their left cheek, but not quite in the same spot.

Anyone else know of someone getting a dimple later (not at birth)? I hadn't heard of that being possible.

ETA: No one else in my or DH's family has dimples.

 

[luvflorida]

I have three kids and only the youngest has dimples. Funny, it was one of the very first things that I noticed about her when she was only a few minutes old! She was wrapped up and held near my face so I could give her a kiss, and she was making sort of a grimace and her tiny dimples were very obvious! The one in her left cheek is a little more prominent than the one in her right cheek. I think dimples are adorable!

 

[allie&mattsmom]

I love dimples! My DS has them, but the one on his left cheek is much more noticible than the one on the right. I'm always getting the "how cute are his dimples" comments too!

 

[Southern4sure]

Sad to say but I have dimples...two as a matter of fact and both my boys have two dimples. I think dimples are adorable on children but as an adult....lets just say I'm tired of getting my cheeks pinched!

 

[momrek06]

Like ALL of you...I would just LOVE to know this...seriously...

My older DS has the biggest, brightest BLUE eyes!! He (does not have any dimples) BUT there again NO ONE, ZERO, NOTHING, NO WAY, has anyone in any of our families have BLUE EYES. After he was born everyone said WOW, but they will change....I thought they would as well. ME deep brown eyes and DH, green/hazel. Well older DS is 23y.o. and still the brightest blue eyes!! Some really weird science going on here. I actually told DS when he was in the 6th grade trying to figure out what he would do for his science fair project: ME: "what determines eye color?" NO MOM, that is dumb!!! I, personally, wanted to know why HIS eyes are so BLUE!!! Oh well, just like DIMPLES (he doesn't care) so BLUE EYES doesn't care....

JUST ONE OF THOSE.....I WONDER WHY???? HHmmmm......

 

[HaleyB]

Well it is a little complex, but I will give it a try.

It is genetic. It is a dominant trait so you only need one parent to have one copy of the gene to have a dimple. However this gene does not have 100% penetrance. That means even if you have the gene you may not show the trait, or in the case of the one dimple kids it might show up partly.

Not much research is ever done on things like this because there is really no money in it. It may be that there is more than one gene at work here, like in eye color (modifier gene). Or it might be enviornmential, I am not sure which it is.

A classic example of low penetrance is the gene for a 6th digit (finger or toe) while a large number of people have this gene very few have the trait.

Does that make sense?

Basiclly a dimple is just a strage tissue connection to bone. Cleft chins are the same thing (but not the same gene). Sometimes they are there but they are not noticeable in very young children and show up as they get older. The structure was always there, as far as I understand it. But like I said befor, almost no research or data collection has been done on dimples.

They are so cute, though. My oldest son has a really deep dimple and I just love it. He is 19 and could care less.

 

[dis ms.]

Sometimes they are there but they are not noticeable in very young children and show up as they get older. The structure was always there, as far as I understand it.

Thanks for explaining that! We just figured DS got jealous of his new baby sister's dimple, so he willed himself to develop one, too.

 

[HaleyB]

Like ALL of you...I would just LOVE to know this...seriously...

My older DS has the biggest, brightest BLUE eyes!! He (does not have any dimples) BUT there again NO ONE, ZERO, NOTHING, NO WAY, has anyone in any of our families have BLUE EYES. After he was born everyone said WOW, but they will change....I thought they would as well. ME deep brown eyes and DH, green/hazel. Well older DS is 23y.o. and still the brightest blue eyes!! Some really weird science going on here. I actually told DS when he was in the 6th grade trying to figure out what he would do for his science fair project: ME: "what determines eye color?" NO MOM, that is dumb!!! I, personally, wanted to know why HIS eyes are so BLUE!!! Oh well, just like DIMPLES (he doesn't care) so BLUE EYES doesn't care....

JUST ONE OF THOSE.....I WONDER WHY???? HHmmmm......

Hey cool. I have not used this part of my education in about 18 years. Eye color is multi gene.

I think it is 3 gene pairs that determine eye color plus more that can modify it and enviornmential factors too. The simple one is Brown. It is a straight domanint trait. If you have one gene for brown eyes (if there are 3 genes for a trait you have 6, 2 of each, one from mom and one from dad) you will have brown eyes. That means lots of people with brown eyes have a blue gene too. I do not know the population stats.

Blue eyes can come out of a long line of brown eyed people because of this.

Green and the shades of brown and the hazel or grey looking eyes show up because several genes are expressing them selves all at one time. People with hazel greenish eyes have layers of color if you look closely.

This is clear as mud. Eye color genetics is really complex and I have no idea where any of my books are or if I even have any of them anymore. Lets see..

The three gene pairs each have two possible traits:
#1 is Brown/Blue
#2 is Green/blue
#3 is center of the eye brown/not brown.

Brown is dominant over everything. Green over blue. I think for blue eyes you also need the not brown in the center gene from both parents. Brown in the center is the dominante trait of that pair.

So lets say Mom is brown eyed and her gene pairs are Br-Bl, Bl-Bl, and Br-nBr

Dad has Green eyes his gene pairs are Bl-Bl, Gr-Bl, and Br-nBr

Possible kids could be:
Bl-Bl, Bl-Bl, nBr-nBr = Blue eyes
Br-Bl, Gr-Bl, nBr-nBr= Brown eyes with a little green in the center or hazel.
Br-Bl, Bl-Bl, Br-nBr= brown eyes

There are more combos, one of Moms and one of Dads for each of the three gene pairs. Then there are the modifier genes. Those modify how a gene is expressed. One I remember is the "How much color" gene, it will give light or dark intensity to the eye color and is like the hair color or skin color gens which are also very complex.

So aren't you glad you asked?

Also, we have documented cases of two blue eyed people having a brown eyed child. Where we are sure who the parents are. I have not stayed up on research, so maybe that gene has been found and explained, maybe it is just caused by a mutation. Who knows.

Last note, I took the line out of my signature about knowing that I can not spell. I am a terrible speller. Sorry 'bout that.

 

[momrek06]

YES, Haley: THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR THAT INFORMATION!!!

INTERESTING, VERY INTERESTING!!!!

As scientific as this gets....I am still chalking this up to a M Y S T E R Y.

 

[HaleyB]

Thanks for explaining that! We just figured DS got jealous of his new baby sister's dimple, so he willed himself to develop one, too.

Well that could be it too.

My oldest sons dimple got deeper and deeper as he got older. My middle son has one only when he smiles real big. My daughter only has one when she makes the 'Mom has a camera out' smile (which often also includes closed eyes).

 

[momrek06]

YES, Haley: THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR THAT INFORMATION!!!

INTERESTING, VERY INTERESTING!!!!

As scientific as this gets....I am still chalking this up to a M Y S T E R Y.

HALEY: If you will note...we POSTED at the same time and my ABOVE post was referring to the DIMPLES.

WOW, you amaze me. Thank you for that data on the eyes as well.

I flunked all my science classes....actually because I had NO CLUE what was going on....This is all so overwhelming to me. When I was expecting BLUE EYES..he was the FIRST grandchild so the entire family both sides would attempt to guess what he would look like and NO ONE, I mean absolutely NO ONE figured on BLUE EYES. And then everyone is saying...."they will change" ..."yes, they are awesome, but they WILL change"....hhhmmm, now he is 23y.o. and still blue as ever....

WITH YOUR HELP, WE ARE ATTEMPTING TO SOLVE ALL THESE UNSOLVED MYSTERIES!!!!!!!!!

 

[dis ms.]

Okay, HaleyB, you've tackled dimples and eye color. How much do you know about skin color?

I'm black, but I'm very light skinned (not biracial). My husband is white, but has olive skin (we have the same skin color--except in the summer, when he's darker than me--LOL). Our children, who obviously are biracial, are both noticeably lighter than their white father. How does that happen?

I bet you weren't expecting a biology quiz when you logged on to the DIS today, were you?

 

[momrek06]

Okay, HaleyB, you've tackled dimples and eye color. How much do you know about skin color?

I'm black, but I'm very light skinned (not biracial). My husband is white, but has olive skin (we have the same skin color--except in the summer, when he's darker than me--LOL). Our children, who obviously are biracial, are both noticeably lighter than their white father. How does that happen?

I bet you weren't expecting a biology quiz when you logged on to the DIS today, were you?

TO HALEY: JUST CALL THIS "DIS SCIENCE 101"!!!!!!!

 

[momrek06]

TO HALEY: JUST CALL THIS "DIS SCIENCE 101"!!!!!!!

I love finding out awesome, fascinating DATA like this. It really leaves one saying over and over again...

HHHHHHHHHHHmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!!!!!

Now back to "DIS SCIENCE 101".....

 

[SillyMe]

Are you sure you weren't sneaking around with him? He's got the cutest dimples I've ever seen.

 

[HaleyB]

Okay, HaleyB, you've tackled dimples and eye color. How much do you know about skin color?

I'm black, but I'm very light skinned (not biracial). My husband is white, but has olive skin (we have the same skin color--except in the summer, when he's darker than me--LOL). Our children, who obviously are biracial, are both noticeably lighter than their white father. How does that happen?

I bet you weren't expecting a biology quiz when you logged on to the DIS today, were you?

Well, this is one of the real mysteries. Skin color is effected by so many genes we have still not figured it out. Common thinking used to be that children would always have an itermediate coloring with one black and one white parent. Life has proven this is not the case. Two light skinned black people can also have very dark skinned children. For a long time a lot of people thought that was impossible, some still do. Part of what makes the genetics so hard is that it is a some what socially charged issue. Another problem is that there are a lot of families that have a biracial person way back that no one knew was biracial because not so long ago some people felt the need to hid that information, even from family members. Another problem is that skin color is hard to classify. What is light to one person might be medium to another. Terms like 'tans easily' or 'burns easily' have been used, and those are subjective as well.

Hair color is a little more studied but is really still an unknown. You can have a family with three kids and one will be blond, one with brown, one with red hair.

Both skin and hair are more examples of things that do not get much research done on them because no one has figured out how to make money from it.

My professer studied identical twins. He had tons of cases of identical twins (geneticly identical) where one had brown hair and one had red. Or one had blue eyes and one green. One is almost always bigger and taller than the other, and more so with boy twins than girl twins. Strange stuff really. I know a set of identical twins that look nothing alike. But they have been tested and they are identical geneticaly.

We know less than a lot of people think about genetics because we still do not really understand expression, why a child with the Cystic Fibrosis marker will be 100% healthy sometimes. Or the breast cancer gene, not everyone who has it will develope breast cancer. Some genes never turn on. Why that is true, and how it works, is the million dollar question. Imagine if we could turn off the CF gene, or the brest cancer gene.

 

[Robinrs]

Everyone in my family has ONE dimple, I was the only one born with two. It's a status symbol in my family! I remember growing up and hearing my mother brag to anyone that would listen, Robin has TWO dimples!

Every child that is born is given the "dimple check". My son, the last born child to the family, appeared with one and a half.... close but no cigar!!

It's so funny how this came up, it's such a hot topic in my family!

As for the skin color, American blacks have MANY different sources due to the multi racial mixing during the slavery days. Not a lot of it was thru legal marriage. We bare very little resemblance to our African sisters and brothers because of this. This century is mixing it up even more in the legal way so we are literally multi colored! My Mom was half Indian and looked white, my father was as black as black could be. My oldest sister is very fair, my middle sister and I are brown. We had children of every color you could imagine. My ex has a very light Mom and a very dark Dad like I did. My son is as fair as dis ms's children and he is not biracial! I know he holds a gene for all colors so he shouldn't be surprised what shade his own children will be!

 

[rt2dz]

Wow, this is really, really interesting. My kids are all so different, and 1/2 white, 1/2 hispanic.

DS#1 has a skin tone in the middle (very dark parent & fairer than snow white), brown eyes so dark they're almost black. No dimples. No cleft chin. Medium brown hair--never lightens in the sun. Lightly curly hair.

DS#2 has a fairly dark skin tone. Dark brown eyes. One dimple. Medium brown hair that seriously bleaches out in the sun. Straight, straight hair.

DS#3 white. Light brown eyes, maybe a bit hazelish. Two dimples. Cleft chin. Light brown hair. Wavy hair.

They also have 3 different noses, 3 different body builds, 3 different shaped faces, 3 different mouths, 3 different shaped eyes. Noticably different.

And get this--people are always telling me how much they look alike! Uh yeah--they all have a male parts.

 

[JVL1018]

How about this one, my son has 1 blue eye and one eye that is half blue and half brown. LOL