Let Her Be Little

I was reading a (good) friends blog the other day, and I love that I am always learning new things about the people in my life. 

She was talking about her girls and some of the things that she wants to be important to them as they grow up – things other than princesses, beauty and sweatpants with the word princess stamped across the ass.

Clearly, we are princess-ed out in our house, and I am totally okay with that.  We play beauty shop, Gianna loves to “do makeup” with me when I get ready in the morning, she helps me pick out my clothes and my shoes, we do nails and Gianna ADORES anything that sparkles.

And for me, that is all okay.  I am pretty girly (are you surprised?)  One way to get me in a good mood or out of a bad one, is to wear a cute outfit or really fun shoes.  Because I enjoy that kind of stuff, it would be really hard not to portray that part of my personality or rather, reflect that, on to my child. 

I am constantly in search of new hair bows for her, new ways to do her hair, cute clothes, dress up outfits and/or accessories – because she enjoys those things as well.  If she didn’t like to be “girly”, I would still try to put bows in her hair, but I certainly would never push my desires on to her.

I am quickly learning to pick my battles as a mother.  Sometimes, she wants to wear her pajamas all day long, out of the house.  I just let her, because at least she has clothes on.  Many times she wants to wear her dress up shoes and a tutu all day long, and out of the house.  I just let her, because why not? If she asks me to “do her eyes” when I am getting ready in the morning, I pretend to put eye shadow on her and she uses my makeup brush to “do her face”.  It’s a fun little moment of childhood innocence we have in the morning.
What I don’t want – is for her to think fancy shoes, great makeup, painted nails and fashionable clothes are what make up a strong, successful woman.

I want her to see me as a strong, successful woman who has goals, priorities and happiness and gets to wear pretty shoes too.  I want her to love to learn, to continue her love for books and reading, to be expressive, strong and confident. 

Raising kids is a challenge like none other, raising a daughter is scary to me.  I want her to stay little and innocent forever, to love her princesses and her my little ponies and to cook in her kitchen and to adore caring for her baby dolls.  I pray that she never feels insecure, inadequate or incapable of achieving her [age appropriate] goals.

It totally freaks me out to think about her getting older, even starting Kindergarten – let alone as am older child or teenager.  Part of my job as her mom right now, is to teach her – to teach her about life in a way that she can understand.  Right now, that understanding comes in the form of fairy tales, stories and conversations in the bathroom while we get ready in the morning, and making sure she knows that while clothes and shoes and all of the pretties aren’t what defines a person.

I do all that I can to make sure she understands that behind the glasses, jewelry, pretty dress and fun shoes – her mom is a strong, smart, educated, loving, confident person – and that I want her to grow into that same kind of person.  A person who enjoys the pretty things in life just as much as learning, reading and growing with the people around her.

Any way you look at it, parenting is about love, about today, about letting them be little and free from the worries of budgets, gas prices adn work.  About smiles adn happiness.  The future, is so big and scary, but today? Well, that will be gone in the blink of an eye.  If Gianna wants to pretend to be a princess or a fairy or wear pretties wherever she goes, if she thinks her mommy is beautiful and her daddy is her hero, if we laugh, give ridiculous amounts of hugs & kisses and i love yous, then that's all that really matters to me. 

But for the moment, it's about letting her be little.