These Identical Triplets Are Hard To Tell Apart, So Their Mom Started Color Coding Them With Nail Polish

    Just like Alvin, Theodore, and Simon!

    Alexa Lisitza
    by Alexa Lisitza

    BuzzFeed Staff

    Imagine having twins, triplets, quadruplets, or — dear lord — quintuplets, and having to tell them apart. In the early days, before noticeable differences in personality traits emerge and nights are filled with 3 a.m. bottles and foggy brains, it can be hard for parents to tell their sets apart. To this day, some parents even wonder if they previously mixed their twins up.

    A TikTok comment saying their grandma still mixes up their uncle and dad, who are twins
    TikTok: @heyhoitsamyjo / Via tiktok.com

    So, when mom Crystal Hasselquist gave birth to her identical triplets James, Henrik, and Thomas, she asked their NICU nurse for suggestions for how to tell them apart. "It really started off with me being completely afraid of mixing them up and having to live with that the rest of my life — not knowing who was who. I mean, yikes, who wants that on their conscience?" Crystal told BuzzFeed. "One of the first suggestions was having them wear a bracelet. That idea for me wasn’t ideal because bracelets can be easily removed. So we kept searching for something to calm my fears."

    A photo of the triplets with a caption asking if she's afraid of mixing them up
    TikTok: @heyhoitsamyjo / Via tiktok.com

    Other suggestions included tattooing small dots that would take the appearance of moles on each of the triplets, or differentiating between the visible veins in their foreheads. 

    "In the early days of the NICU, I noticed the left ear on each baby was formed slightly different and the head shapes were a little different. I didn’t know if those features would change as they continued to grow and develop, so I kept thinking," Crystal said.

    Then, Crystal ran across a genius idea in a mommy group on Facebook: painting each child's big toe a different color. Recently, the triplets' aunt, AmyJo Hasselquist, shared a clip of the cute toe hack, and the video has amassed over 16.3 million views.

    In the clip, we see that James is color coded in a green shirt and toenail polish...

    James' green toe nail with a caption saying their mom was worried and that's why they're color coded
    TikTok: @heyhoitsamyjo / Via tiktok.com

    ...Henrik has blue...

    TikTok: @heyhoitsamyjo / Via tiktok.com

    ... and Thomas wears red. Each color was chosen based on the colors present in the custom name tags nurses placed above each of the kids' beds after they were born.

    TikTok: @heyhoitsamyjo / Via tiktok.com

    "The first few months of having the babies at home, the toenail polish was helpful for everyone," AmyJo told BuzzFeed. "There were a lot of family members in and out of the house, passing babies around the room, changing babies' clothes, etc., so it was always nice to have a backup to confirm who was who."

    The triplets lined up with a caption identifying which color goes with which baby
    TikTok: @heyhoitsamyjo / Via tiktok.com

    "Also, babies change weekly, so if we thought we found differences one week, they'd change the next week," she said. "Now, there are small differences in all three and their personalities are so different that it's much easier to tell them apart. I still have weeks, though, where I say, 'Wow James, you really look like Henrik today,' or 'Thomas, I thought you were James for a second.' It's a good thing their 3-year-old older brother Peter always knows the difference — he's the backup for the backup."

    Crystal agrees that the 15-month-olds are coming into their own personalities, which makes telling them apart easier. "Henrik is a leader who loves giggling, James is a sweetheart who is always smiling, and Thomas is a thinker who loves books," she said. "Just this week, I put Henrik in James' bed but he wasn't acting like James when he goes to bed — he usually snuggles his blanket. Instead, he was chatting and wanting to stand up and play, so I knew I put the wrong child in the wrong bed."

    Crystal in her hospital bed with the triplets shortly after giving birth
    Crystal Hasselquist

    "We still use their colors when we dress them and color code other things for them," Cyrstal said. "This is mainly helpful for daycare and friends and family when we send pictures or they help out. The toenail polish was more helpful when the babies were really little and changing every week. Now it's really just the backup for when someone is second-guessing who is who."

    So cute and so smart!

    TikTok: @heyhoitsamyjo / Via tiktok.com

    If you want to keep up with the triplets, AmyJo shares snippets of their evolving world on TikTok. And if your family had a quirky method for telling twins apart, tell us about it in the comments.