My Daughter Likes Pink, And That’s Okay With Me.

When Elijah was born, we wanted to be the best parents we could.  We wanted to offer him EVERYTHING we could regardless of the label of “boy” or “girl” toy.  He was a chunky baby.  Everybody knew he was a boy.  Then he started walking, this thinned him out.  His hair started growing, and getting curly.  People started mistaking him for a girl.  They still do, on occasion.  Whatever.  We gently correct people, or we don’t.  He will or he won’t.  It’s his choice if he cuts his hair.  We offered him dolls, trucks, pink baby strollers, action figures, art supplies, whatever. 
When Grace came along, she got most of Elijah’s hand me downs.  People would mistake her for a boy.  I refused to BAB her (Big Ass Bow) and I’m not going to buy a newborn a whole new set of clothes when we have perfectly good onesies and sleepers.  And really, what else does a new born need?  We had all the toys from Elijah as well, so score! 
We really didn’t think much about it. We aren’t, “Oh, that’s a BOY toy” or “ You can’t play with that, it’s a GIRL toy.”  We didn’t really THINK about putting labels on anything.  We knew that we didn’t want to define our kids by color, and we didn’t want to push anything on him.  Most of his toys were second hand… which meant to Grace, they were third hand. 
So what happened?  Elijah uses his pink 2 dollar stroller to race down the road with his animals or super heroes, while Grace uses her pink freecycle find stroller to gently take her babies on a stroll.  Elijah makes the dollhouse up and then throws things around as a tornado hits it, while Grace twirls like tornado spins in her pink, purple, and blue tutu.
Elijah loves Spider Man, pottery, most sports, dancing (which looks a little more like ninja kicks, but it’s all subjective), drawing, reading, racecars…
Grace loves tutus, bugs, dancing, singing, reading, drawing, her “singing baby”, riding her tricycle, her dollhouse, and building.
And MOST people we run into comment on how beautiful both kids are.  Maybe it’s different in other families.  I find that most people think our children are beautiful and that’s what they comment on.  Most people we don’t know don’t engage our children in small talk.  People that don’t have kids and come to stay with us make conversation with both of our kids and they give them as equal time as allowed by the children.  Elijah is excited to show most people his toys and his soccer ball, Grace is apt to show off her mad swimming skills or how fast she can twirl. 
And so what?  What if people tell her she is beautiful.  So what if her favorite color is pink or purple (and she HATES green!)  So what? So what if she wants princesses and fairies.  Who cares?  Does it make her weaker somehow that she could care less about soccer?  That she would rather swing and sing made up songs than ride bikes?  She tolerates her brothers games at best.  Why shouldn’t I foster this so called girlie-ness?  Is she not expanding her imagination building castles and making up songs?  Is she not being athletic while dancing around? Should I make her play a sport she doesn’t really like simply because it’s not considered a “girlie” sport? 
And again, so what if there are books out there that are obviously aimed toward girls about pink and purple and ladybugs and dancing?  Aren’t the heroines in the book portrayed as strong girls.  Overcoming obstacle xyz?  Shouldn’t we tell little girls that it’s VERY okay to dress up, to love pink and purple, just as we tell them it’s okay to like soccer, climbing trees, and playing with bugs?  Isn’t telling them that they are beautiful and perfect just the way they are worth something?  Maybe I just hang out with people that treat our kids as equals.  Both are asked what they like to do.  Both are asked their favorite colors.  Both are listened too attentively. 
Quite frankly, in our family I have a bigger problem with too many white dolls living in our house or not enough books portraying strong multi-racial children.  But even that seems to be completely null and void.  When given a choice today, Grace picked a darker skinned fairy, one that looked like her.   Elijah can be found in the gym play center cuddling a small black baby.
So to end (and sort of begin…) this is the article that got me started on the topic.  And again, maybe we are just abnormal.  Maybe this happens more often than I think it does.  And maybe it just doesn’t bother me.  Maybe I just KNOW that I have a strong little girl who already doesn’t take any crap.  And I KNOW that I have a sweet kind little guy who also doesn’t take any crap, but deals with it in a way that is most often well beyond his years.   AND this is the article that had me more concerned, but got less FB time.  heh. But that too seems to be a null and void point.
I guess we ARE the perfect parents after all!