Awesome Thoughts from our Blog

What can we do about the public feedback loop our kids experience even at a very young age? From the moment we take our kids out of the house, we are all bombarded with messages (subtle and overt) that we are either succeeding or failing to conform to others’ expectations. Combine that feedback loop with the nearly universal human need to feel liked, and maintaining one’s individuality can feel like an onerous daily battle.

That’s why making home a safe place for kids to be themselves is so important. It’s easy to say - but hard to do.

Have you taught your child to be afraid? Good - that’s what we’re supposed to do as parents. We need fear to keep us safe - fear of getting hit by a car, fear of crashing a bike and getting injured, fear of drinking dirty water and getting sick.

But now that we have encouraged healthy fear (and its ancillary, caution), how do we empower our kids to keep fear from controlling and limiting them? Once fear is learned, it can take over a child’s life and paralyze them into inactivity and anxiety. We can empower them to take back control by teaching them to practice fear’s antidote - courage.

A guest post by Shannon Tennyson

As the mom of one tween and one young teen, I understand only too well the challenge of finding versatile, well-fitted clothing for young girls. To solve the problem that I (and many other parents) face on a daily basis, I created CALZICO – a fun and functional tween apparel line that encourages individuality, decision-making and personal style.

When my daughter was 2, she was given a big, fuzzy, neon pink box of generic princess dress-up clothes. She adored it. She (and practically every little friend who came over) wore the dresses constantly. My initial reaction to all this: Dread. Frustration. Fear.

What was my brave, smart little girl going to turn into? Was I a bad feminist for letting her prance around the house in these frilly, sparkly dresses? After all, it wasn’t too long ago that I had promised I’d never buy my daughter anything pink.

Then, one day, while listening to her pretend to drop her kids off at school and then go to work while wearing her pink princess dress and tiara, I had a realization. I harbored beliefs about what my daughter could or could not do while wearing a princess dress - but she did not.

We asked Eunice to tell all of us a little more about her awesome daughter. Here’s what she said:

Name: Kate
Age: Kate just turned two!

The last thing she did that made you laugh: Kate asked me to sing a song about scared hats and food hats. She also has a Donald Duck impression she is working on. Kate makes herself laugh all the time and then says "Kate is funny."

We asked Melanie to tell all of us a little more about her awesome daughter. Here’s what she said:

Vital Stats:
Name: Austin
Nickname: Awesome Austin
Age: 6

Favorite joke: What do you call a two-humped camel? Pregnant!

A favorite story about her: Austin is such a beautiful soul!! Over a year ago, we lost our 12 year old dog. Three weeks later, we were in the car and she said, "mommy, I think we need to get another puppy." Before there was an answer, she said "I know you are still sad but whenever you are ready I think we should get another puppy and name him Celebrate...because I think all puppies should be celebrated." We drove straight to the animal shelter and now have an amazing puppy named Celebrate!

We asked Tiffany to tell all of us a little more about her awesome daughter. Here’s what she said:

Vital Stats:
Name: Elise
Nickname: Leesie, Leesie Lou
Age: 4.5

Favorite joke: She has recently learned the knock-knock joke involving an interrupting cow. (For reference….Knock-knock/Who is there?/Interrupting Cow/Interrupting Cow…./MOO!) We’ve modified it to include other animals, trains and our family members.

Nora is holding a green plastic bubble wand. Her lower lip is protruding as she makes her concentration face. She jabs the wand at the tray of bubble solution. She waves it in the air, mimicking what she saw the bigger children do. She jabs it again, this time submerging it. She waves her wand again and, miraculously, a bubble appears. It floats, a perfect iridescent sphere, on the warm summer air. It lingers in front of my daughter, inviting her curiosity. A bubble with surface area 4πr² and volume 4/3πr³. My daughter, beautiful in her beautiful pi dress, stands fascinated by her close encounter with pi.

The other day I was scrolling through Instagram when I came across a darling video of a little girl playing basketball with her father. In the comments someone had written, “Too bad he doesn’t have any boys to play with! LOL [annoying emojis].”

Like that little girl’s father, it didn’t matter to my dad if I was a boy or a girl. I was his kid, and he liked having me around.

We asked Sonia to tell all of us a little more about her awesome daughters. Here’s what she said:

Vital Stats:
Names: Elena and Fern
Nicknames: Elena's nickname is Snug and Fern's is Ity!
Ages: Elena is 5 and Fern is 3.

A favorite story about each of them:
Elena is constantly solving problems in her mind and then putting together prototypes! The other day we were planning to attend a free symphony concert in the park but it was predicted to rain that evening and I told her that it may be canceled because of the weather. Well she set about building an individual structure out of materials around the house that could serve as a hands free shelter so we would not have to miss future outdoor adventures! Such ingenuity!

Fern is my observer and I will find her at a window staring out into the world. When she was very young, just sitting up, Fern and a robin were having what appeared to be a full on conversation, chirping and gurgling to one another, the hopping came closer and closer, their eyes were locked and they were so engaged. We started calling her our woodland creature for a while after that encounter! To this day she spends huge parts of her day pretending to be different animals as she plays!