Tuesday, July 19, 2011

My Dirt-Lovin' Little Man

When I had a little boy, my friends warned me that boys are very different from girls. These are not friends who have determined, fixed gender assignments for their children, these were very progressive women who would have been quite happy to have a boy who played with dolls, loved musical theatre and whose favourite colour was pink. I was warned (maybe warned isn't the word but I haven't come up with a better one) that my life would be filled with diggers, dinosaurs and defense (although that won't be happening in this house, we are not a pro-violence family).

It's been amusing to see how right they are. LB might be just a year old but already, we can clearly see that we have two VERY different creatures inhabiting our house. Reading is a contact sport, balls and wheels are where it's at and, most of all, dirt is something that needs to be explored in a close-up and personal kind of way, best if it can be explored with all five senses.

This is so much fun. I love having a girl and I love having a boy - while I would have been happy to have two of one gender, I must confess, this is so much fun!

(This photo was taken just before the handful of dirt was put into his mouth)
(Sadly, this doesn't capture the amount of sand around his mouth - or that emerged in his diaper)
(this pirate ship water table BLEW HIS MIND)
(I am not kidding, we had to stop to change his diaper and I decided to bang his shorts against the side of the car to get the dust out - there were clouds that harken back to drought sandstorms from the 1930's)

(Visiting my m.i.l's hair salon, his feet were BLACK)
So, while I may inhabit a world of tiaras, tulle and tea parties, I also get to see how the other half lives.

4 comments:

  1. This is so funny! Does that Carter's outfit have a green dinosaur on the side? We have it :) I loved laughing at this.

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  2. I kind of get that with two girls - Syd is ALL science (bugs and creatures) while Kay is very much a princess loving girl. I like how my two girls balance each other out. I love to see Sydney dressed like a princess and Kayleigh catching frogs.

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  3. Yes, Gin, that's the one. I love that! That's another thing I am getting sad about - I know that he will size out of the Carter's baby stuff in not too long. It's a shallow thing but I love their soft cottons and cute little onesies for every holiday. I know they make stuff for older kids but I don't like it half as much.
    Jill, you are right, in every family, the kids are individuals and gender stereotypes often don't apply. I love seeing the photos you post of Syd with her bug catchers!

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  4. Sounds like my daughter... She is a mess. she literally buries herself in the sandbox or any other patch of dirt she can find and comes home daily so dirty that it's hard to tell what colour she started out as. She's getting more rough-and-tumble as she goes! Bugs, mud, matchbox cars, and now she's into Star Wars.

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