A SPRINGSIDE baby has become the UK’s youngest beauty pageant entry - after entering a contest before she was born.

Luna Collins recently finished second in two national beauty competitions in Birmingham and Glasgow after being entered by her mum Amanda.

Inspired by the hit TV show Toddlers & Tiaras, Amanda decided to enter not only herself but Luna into the pageants.

And the tiny tot returned with two silver tiaras from the UK Prince & Princesses International and Miss Dream UK despite narrowly missing out on the top spot.

But even before Luna was out of the womb, she was already a pageant entrant - after Amanda sent over her baby scan to the organisers.

Luna finished second in the Birmingham with the closest entrant to her age being just over a year old. And it was the same result in the Glasgow competition and had to enter the age 2-4 category because there were no other younger entrants.

Child beauty pageant’s have proven a controversial topic with many people claiming they should be banned for increasingly “sexualising” children. But former soldier Amanda insists the competitions have given her a great confidence booster and hopes Luna will take part in future competitions.

She said: “I was basically inspired by watching that Toddlers & Tiaras programme and I thought it would be a good thing to try.

“So I basically had a look online for competitions and I found a Facebook page for one in Birmingham.

“I went along with Luna and it was brilliant. I’m not a very confident person but I had always wanted to enter and it was a great booster to my confidence.

“I thought it would be full of all these pushy parents but it wasn’t everyone was really nice.

“The funny thing about entering Luna wasn’t that she was the youngest but I had actually entered her before she was even born!

“I sent over a picture of my baby scan to the organisers and it was accepted!” Amanda also revealed that Luna will take part in another pageant in November - clad in a poppy dress to raise money for the Royal British Legion. Hopefully Luna will maybe go on and take part in the next few years because it’s a great community and they do a lot of good things.

“There’s a lot of events for charities and being ex-army I’ll hopefully be raising money for Help for Heroes through the pageant’s.

“If she wins the event in November she’ll come home with a 50” crown which would be amazing.”