"How can they be your children?"

It's a question Cissy Gore-Birch gets asked all the time.

Ms Gore-Birch is an Aboriginal woman and looks visibly dark skinned, but her children — 19-year-old Quincy-Rae, 18-year-old Scott, 12-year-old Abby, 10-year-old Jacob and 9-year-old Joshua — all have white skin.

She says she has never seen a difference, but others certainly do.

"I remember when I was living in Melbourne, my two oldest were only babies, people used to give me funny looks and ask questions," Ms Gore-Birch says.

"I guess they looked at my skin colour and saw my children's colour and made assumptions."

Stuck between two worlds

She grew up in Wyndham, a small town in Western Australia's far north.

Describing the town as a multicultural community, she never thought she would face misconceptions after having children with fair skin.

But she feels her children are stuck between two worlds.

"I know my kids would face racism because of the colour of their skin from both sides," Ms Gore-Birch says.

"So sometimes they're not accepted from the Aboriginal community and not accepted from the white community."

The mother of five says she is used to people's misconceptions, but still disappointed by them.

"As an Aboriginal woman and having fair-skinned children, I guess it was hard for people to understand the blended families," she says.

"Just recently at Quincy's netball game, one of Quincy's teammates didn't realise she was Aboriginal and that Quincy had a black mother … so I found that really interesting."

Misconceptions, judgments frustrate

Mother-of-three Mala Fairborn faces the same situation as Ms Gore-Birch, only with skin tones reversed.

She is white, but has three dark-skinned boys — Keegan, 14, 10-year-old Taj and Julius, 15 months — along with a dark-skinned stepdaughter, Lettoya.

Mala Fairborn with her husband Michael HajiAli and their children (from left) Julius, Taj, Keegan and Lettoya in the backyard of their house. ( ABC Kimberley: Molly Hunt )

Ms Fairborn says she is frustrated that people constantly question her.

"It concerns and frustrates me that people still see colour and have some stereotypes attached to skin," she said.

"I remember one time going through checkout at Coles and the checkout chick asked me, 'How long have I had these kids for?', assuming I had fostered the children.

"I told her, 'They're mine, I gave birth to them.'

"The checkout chick responded, 'A lot of people tend to foster them now'."

Ms Fairborn was stunned.

"It's difficult sometimes [to know] how to respond," she admits.

Oldest child Keegan says he has received plenty of questions about his mum.

"People would ask me if that was my mother and I said, 'yes' and they would say, 'But she's white?'," he says.

"I thought it made sense to them."

Despite frustratingly common misconceptions about their families, both Ms Gore-Birch and Ms Fairborn are keen to take any opportunity to change people's perspectives.

"I'm not surprised anymore, there's going to be questions, people stuck in their own world," Ms Gore-Birch says.

"But I think it's great because it's all about educating people.

"Eventually the whole world is going to be blended."