This comment was by Tom B. on the post “Raising a Son within the Princess Culture.“
I raised a boy and a girl. When my daughter was a year old, I bought and built a doll house which has become a lifelong project that the two of us continue to work on improving. She now has the house at her house and is showcased in her family room. My basement is storage for no less then 7 bins of Barbie dolls and associated items.
My son and I began model trains when he was old enough to understand how to use the controls. When he got his own house, he took the 8’X4’ layout to his house and STILL plays with it. Along side of my daughters bins are an equal number of bins with his toys which include action hero’s, army soldiers, cars and trucks.
Both my kids are now in their mid to upper 20’s and I’m sure glad my wife and I didn’t have all these hang ups with identifying if it’s gender appropriate or if we were denying one of them an option of the kind of toys they played with.
Parents sometimes live vicariously through their kids. I know I did. I loved buying the trains and slot cars, cool trucks with realistic sounding engines. My son and I had a great time buying sports trading cars which also helped him learn stats of players and so on.
I’ll be honest with you, I would not have been a happy camper had my wife introduce “girl” things to my son. He’s a guy and as he developed, he liked guy things, just as my daughter liked girl things. Her bedroom was pink ( I personally hate the color) and my son’s room was Green Bay Packers Green and Gold (I personally like the colors). It’s just how things developed.
When my son and daughter were around the age of 10, they were both taught how to use a shot gun. My son took to it like a bird in flight whereas my daughter quickly lost interest.
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“Girl Power?” The fact that it exists, IMO, sucks. My kids were raised to be “individuals” with their own traits, personalities and gifts. I see a lot of people talking about allowing boys to experience girl things and be okay with it but I don’t see a lot of talk (other then defending) bout people being okay with boys liking and doing guy things.
I now have two small grandsons. I’ve bought three train sets and each birthday, Christmas, I’ve been buying tracks, buildings and landscape materials. Next summer, My oldest grandson and I will start the layout. Like my sons model train, it will also be 8×4. BTW, anyone interested in model training, I’ve got some great deals on ebay.
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photo by enjoypixel / flickr
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Model trains and slot car sets are really great hobbies to get involved in. Me and my son spend ours building and repairing slot cars, just some great family time.