Hellobee Boards

At first I thought this was an article about wanting everyone to go Team Green and not find out the gender of their baby in December. . . . Whoops.

This reminds me of some FB friends' recent post. Their youngest child just had his second birthday and with two older sisters he's played with all sorts of toys. The parents tongue & cheeked thanked folks for gifting him a ton of gender-oriented toys.

Even though I believe in this concept I will probably have my own hurdles when it comes to actually doing it.

@Anya: Yep. This is how I treat my daughter.

I hate how gender geared toys are. My son has a baby doll that he loves to play with. I also got him a tea set for xmas which I think he'll love. I seriously hate the pink explosion in the girl aisles.

I am in favor of this in general and can't stand that the girls toy aisles look like pepto bismol was vomited all over them, while the boys toy aisles have cool science and mechanical toys. It boggles my mind that toys are still so gendered- it's not like grown men don't cook or rock babies, and women don't build things or drive cars. I think the stereotyping is very harmful.

I think its awesome. At my parents house my DS's (18months) current fav toy is a baby doll. Granted he is quite rough with it but he loves to feed it a bottle.
I always think of this

My poor DH has listened to me rant on and off over the years about gender stereotyping, specifically as it relates to kid's (mostly girls') clothes and toys. We're both aerospace engineers in the military, and my hobby is astronomy (hence, the user name) so obviously the concept of pigeon-holing girls is a sore point with me. I also grew up playing ice hockey (yet faced discrimination in my small town for doing so!).

Now that we are expecting our first, I am even more passionate about this cause. We're expecting a boy, but plan to ensure he gets as much nurturing toys (baby dolls and kitchen sets) as scientific and building toys. I think it's important to raise well-rounded individuals. @Snickers: I love that cartoon!

We have a boy and we just get him stuff he seems interested in. Daycare will relay that he likes this or that or we'll see him gravitate towards stuff during play dates and we purchase accordingly. That being said, he has gravitated towards anything he can climb on, anything he can build with, and anything with wheels. He has some stuffed animals but he has never shown any interest.

I don't really put a lot of thought into whether it's a "girl toy" or "boy toy", but, my favorite color is blue, so if there's a color option, I'm going to buy blue. If he liked dolls, I'd probably buy him some dolls, but I won't buy them just for the sake of being gender neutral. I'd rather buy him things he'll enjoy.

@applesandbananas: I'm not sure if your comment about not buying toys just to be gender-neutral was in reference to mine. If it wasn't, please disregard. I don't mean that I will buy my son toys whether he likes them or not, but I do think it's important to expose children to a variety of toys to foster a multitude of interests (and then, of course, allowing them to develop and follow their own interests), rather than just buying what is currently marketed at their gender. Kids are sponges, after all. If your son's daycare provides this, all the better!

@Astro Bee: no, it was just a general comment of how I pick out toys in relation to gender neutral parenting. His daycare does seem to have a wide variety of toys and activities. He also has both male and female teachers and classmates, so I do think he's exposed to many different concepts of toys and imaginative play. He just gravitates towards trucks, blocks, tools, etc. He loves building things, taking things apart, and playing with tools so we bought him a tool bench rather than a play kitchen. I'm not opposed to play kitchens for boys, I actually bought a play kitchen for daycare because it seemed like fun and it was on their wish list, but the tool bench at home was something we thought he'd get more enjoyment out of.

@anonysquire: just curious, what about your future son?

I personally love this! P plays with whatever he wants. I just go by his leads. The other day at the store.he grabbed Minnie mouse stuffie and a blue monster stuffie. He loves anything doesn't matter if its "boy" or "girls" toys. He has baby doll, dolll houses etc. And I don't buy.the boy version of these.

@stargal: balls and cars til he asks otherwise.