Back in the day, when I was a new mom, I used to read the BabyCenter boards. It’s a habit I gave up once I got the teeniest confidence in myself as a mom, but for a while, I was checking regularly.
I was a lurker, and not a nice lurker at that. I’d think the evilest of thoughts about some of these mothers. “Oh dear God,” I thought. “Could they make their girls any more girly?” I’d mock their princesses and ballet dancers and divas and think, “If I ever had a girl, no way would I ever fall prey to that crap.”
Yes, dear readers, that crunching sound you hear is me eating my own words. As I create the birthday party invitations to my darling Pie’s third birthday, it is all pink and frouffy and–yes–princessy. To the nth degree. To the point that if someone else had done it, I would have thought, “Are you kidding me?” But, my friends, I kid not.
Pie is, well, she’s Pie. And the thing is, the world encourages her, no doubt about it. Now, I know I’m a mom and all, but my kids are equally adorable. Doodles, with his lovely brown eyes and his dashing smile is about one of the yummiest boys around. But when we go out, the world zooms in on Pie. Out of all her hand-me-downs, she gravitates toward pink and purple dresses. She loves sparkly flip flops. She has painted toenails. And people just can’t stop telling her what a little princess she is.
For instance, today, we went to the paper store to get paper for her party invites. The woman behind the counter ran out so fast, I thought maybe Pie had broken something. But no. She was just bringing Pie a toy to play with while we were in the store. She kept checking in to make sure Pie was okay, “Oh, what lovely painted toes you have! Oh, I love your glittery shoes. I wish I had curls like yours,” and on the way out, ran after us to give Pie a small sheet of princess stickers. I actually don’t mind it too much when it’s just me and Pie, but I always feel a little bad when Doodles is around. “Hey!” I want to yell. “He’s adorable too! And he likes stickers!” Doodles seems pretty oblivious, but it bugs me. And I’m not really crazy about the message it sends Pie.
But as they say, those who live in fairy castles shouldn’t throw toads, or something like that. So I’m off to continue planning a princess party extraordinaire.
And Doodles? He’s going to have a kick-ass dinosaur time. Roooooaaaaar!