I’m saddened by the reactions and comments we get if my little girl is in blue or not in a dress. It’s the seed of something deeper and very damaging for me. She does wear dresses but she also wears trousers, tracksuits, jeans, shorts and sometimes nothing at all! Her wardrobe consists of many colours and lots of hand me downs. People say, ‘I have some boys clothes do you mind’? And I don’t because most of the time the only thing that seems to make them boys clothes are because they are blue or green or have a picture of a car or train. I don’t know if she likes any of this or not and at the moment I dress her, so when she chooses, I hope she will take that choice freely and be able to navigate her choices without the restrictions and impressions (including mine) floating around consciously or subconsciously in her head. I wrote this after many, many comments.
Little Girl Blue
I smile watching my little girl blue
And dream of a glass ceiling removed for you Click To Tweet
I smile watching my little girl blue
And dream of a glass ceiling removed for you
But take a breath and I know it’s up there.
The, why’s she not wearing? It all starts here.
The trapped stereotypes engraved in us
But right now I watch you playing in blue, oblivious
The pleasure to be a palette of free;
You’re the artist of what you want to be.
I can’t but watch my little girl blue
And think of the challenges you’ll go through.
Colour is just one thing that blocks you in,
You’ll see many pretty ugly patterns for women.
You’ll have to keep trying to slip out of the mould.
I’m telling you to ignore what you’re told.
In this case it’s not to benefit you.
Don’t let anyone tell you what you can and can’t do.
Mama Grace
That’s great and I wholeheartedly agree. I’m sure your daughter will be a free spirit with your encouragement to ignore stereotypes
I hope so! Thanks for reading.
Lovely! I think it’s fine to dress them in blue! Gender stereotypes are ridiculous. Am buying my son a doll for his 2nd bday this week as we have a 6 week old and he so wants to love and nurture him but a doll would be much safer.lol. xx #marvmondays
I hope he gets lots of joy from the doll and is equally as free to wear what he likes. No limits on him. Amazing!
This is a great little poem Grace and I couldn’t agree more with the sentiment. Let our children be free and make up their own minds. It’s great to have you at #WonderfulWorldofWriting, thanks so much for joining in and hope to see you again 🙂
Thanks!
I get this, children should wear what they want. Both my boys have dresses, girls clothes, legs etc sadly, people are stunned, some think it is a joke but it is not. We need to stop putting people in categorises and let’s just be free to be who we want to be x #prose4t
It would be a different world, a better world I feel.
I totally agree with not following a defined trend, let little girl blue find her own way, but be warned I’ll put money on her choosing pink at some point! #TwinklyTuesday
I hope she does work out her place in the world. I have nothing against pink, she looks lovely in it.
I love this and totally agree. My little girl is not at all a stereo typical girly girl and she’s much happier in tracksuit bottoms and playing with cars or digging for worms. I think it’s great that we can encourage them to embrace that and be who they want to be now. Blue is most definitely not just for boys! 💙 Thanks for linking up lovely x #DreamTeam
I’d probably cut myself off from people who kept making comments like that, your child, your choice of clothing and hers as she gets older and at the end of the day, she’s still your daughter with her own personality and clothing and comments won’t change that
#TriumphantTales
I think it can be a cultural thing and hopefully attitudes will change, especially as we become more conscious of the impact. Thanks for reading.
so absurd. My daughter is currently wearing a blue, hand me down Superman T shirt and she loves it. She’s five and would be quick to comment back if anybody had anything to say about her outfit. Gender stereotyping is a common rant on my blog #happynow
Beautiful post and very valid point. I often dress my little boy (now 13 months in white), if a I do he is immediately called a girl. I have no idea why the clothes we make define us, but am so glad that you are challenging it both through your actions and through this post. Thank you for sharing this with us at #PostsFromTheHeart
White! That means he’s always a little angel right?
I dressed my little one in girl and boy clothes – as in, if there were clothes in the boys section I liked more, I’d buy her those. I don’t see why people make such a fuss. I love that now she’s older (seven), she doesn’t mind if her clothes are pink or blue, and that when she saw a really cute shirt in the boys section recently, she had no problem asking me to get it for her. #PostsFromTheHeart
That’s lovely! I love that she has the freedom and because there has been no judgement, she’s able to ask.
Love this. You are so right and it’s so important for people not to stereotype at such a young age. Sometimes Oscar could definitely be mistaken for a girl when he’s in his little leggings! But to me he just looks like the cutest little man ever (well, after his brother who wore them first!) Thanks for linking up with #TwinklyTuesday
Yes, yes, yes! I don’t dress my daughter in dresses because I think they are not practical – she is one she wants to play and crawl and explore, not trip over a dress! I also don’t put headbands on her because I think they would be uncomfortable. I get so many questions about both of these things. I’m totally with you – I want my daughter to wear whatever she wants to wear. Thanks for linking with us again at #GlobalBlogging
I can really relate to this. I have twins. One is super girly, the other is not. She wears shorts and typical ‘boys’ tops, but that’s what she likes and why not. Who’s to say what she can and can’t wear? Thanks for linking up to #ThatFridayLinky
Love this. I count it as a win if I can get the twins out of their nightgowns. They wear the same dress nearly every day IF I can get them out of their favorite nightgowns.
Thanks for linking up to #globalblogging.
I agree too! I needed a green hoodie or cardigan to match with some leggings I bought my daughter. I couldn’t find one anywhere, they all seemed to be pink or white. I found one in the boy’s section! There was no reason why a girl couldn’t wear it. #ThatFridayLinky
Oh the colour coding of clothes. I feel like we all need to be deprogrammed. It’s nice to have different colours and be free to wear whatever.
Im all for dressing them in whatever looks good. doesnt matter on the colour! Thanks for sharing this with us at #TriumphantTales. I hope to see you back next week!
I loathe gender stereotyping I have five year twin girls and the one only wears blue great post Thanks for linking to the #THAT FRIDAY LINKY come back next week please
I know for a fact that if I’d had a girl, she wouldn’t be in pretty dresses or typical ‘girly clothes’. Why do they even have to be?! It’s almost old fahsioned and it irritates me that people even have an opinion about other people’s children’s clothes. Great post. Thanks for linking up to #TriumphantTales, hope you’ll come back on Tuesday 🙂
Oh this is so beautiful and I completely agree, girls and boys should be free to wear pink, blue, dresses, joggers, whatever they fancy and a parent should definitely not be questioned over the clothing choices for their child! Thank you for sharing with #bigpinklink x
Completely agree. These stereotypes shouldn’t exist. I dressed my daughter in all colors and plenty of hand-me-downs from her big brothers! Now that she’s older, she does tend towards choosing pink herself, but that’s her choice. She can wear whatever she wants 🙂 #prose4t
I couldn’t agree more – when Emma was a few months old, I used to love her in a navy vest top and grey leggings. She was comfy and looks great in blue with her olive skin…but people would always comment on how handsome ‘she’ is!! It makes you feel a bit pressurised to put her in pink to make it obvious and avoid that embarrassment but really I just want her to wear what she likes 😉 Thanks for linking up to #dreamteam x
Well when I was shopping someone remarked how she looked like Wayne Rooney, so I’ll take handsome over that. My husband was in stitches, we called her our little Wayne Rooney for weeks.
Perfectly summed up. I totally and utterly agree with you. I wish people weren’t so judgemental. Hopefully we can continue to encourage this in our children. Thank you for linking to #Prose4T