< I had an interesting conversation with my two-and-a-half-yr-old toddler last night. I’m going to preface this post by saying that we do not use any type of gender pronouns in our home… >
When Mac has questioned certain body parts, I name them and associate them with either “daddy, because he’s a boy like you” OR “mommy, because she’s a girl”. I believe Mac is at the perfect age to be able to understand men and women have biological differences so I try to guide him by keeping those differences specific to the two biological sexes God put on this Earth. No need to confuse the little guy.
My main job as his mama is to guide him and I take that pretty seriously.
From the time Mac was a tiny 5 lb 13 oz newborn baby sleeping in our bed, he’s always had a nightlight and some type of noise for bedtime. I have to credit Paul for Mac’s love of the “sky animals” that would dance around high up on the ceiling, reliably night after night. The inexpensive projector nightlight that Paul chose from Amazon had proven it’s worth, that’s for sure!
Sadly, earlier this week while Paul and Mac were rough housing, the nightlight got bumped and I suppose decided to call it quits because it would not turn back on… As a quick fix at bedtime, I turned the TV on to our favorite Tractor/Farm YouTube channel that will literally play for 14 hours straight (so I don’t have to worry about a video popping up next that might be inappropriate for little eyes and ears). Mac was OK with the TV for bedtime since it was giving off light, but he still struggled to rest and drift off to sleep.
While I was home trying to convince my toddler he could in fact still go to sleep without the dancing lights of the “sky animals”, Paul went into town quick and found a cheap similar nightlight at Wal-Mart.
The new nightlight got set up right after Paul got it home and I actually think Mac has been sleeping more soundly since! Although the new one doesn’t showcase cute safari animals on the ceiling, it does project very interesting colors that look like waves and dots moving around slowly and calmly. We now have colorful “sky waves” that light up his room at bedtime.
Last night, after I had finally made it home with the kiddos, Mac walked himself back to his room like a big boy (pluggy and sippy cup in hand, of course) and got snuggled into his big boy car bed. I turned on the “sky waves”, sound machine and air purifier as per our nightly routine.
We soon finished prayers with a loud “AMEN!” and a few “I love you, God. Thank you, God” & “love you, Jesus. Thank you, Jesus!” lines.
As I was starting to walk out and close the door behind my usual “I love you, see you in the morning!”, Mac points to the sky waves and says he wants a different color. White, actually.
Sooooo I don’t know what all the special buttons are for on this nightlight but I figured the botton with the sun symbol was the most likely one to get me to a different color. Turns out, the next color setting was fairly white with some faint rainbow colors mixed in. Mac thought this was pretty but guess not quite his cup of tea because he soon requested green. I rotated through the colors until green popped up.
We were happy. 5 seconds later, Mac wanted the color blue.
I confirmed with him that he was going to SLEEP with the color blue if I changed it… he told me yes so back to the button I went, in search of the infamous blue “sky waves”. The part of our conversation that surprised me comes just after the blue color pops up.
Mac: “Blue! Daddy is blue.”
Mama: “Oh is he?”
Mac: “Daddy is blue. Mac is blue. Mommy is pink.”
Mama: “Oh I get pink?!”
Mac: “Yeah! Mommy is pink. Lyla is pink. Daddy is blue, Mac is blue.”
(Lyla is a girl friend that Mac plays with at daycare).
Mama: “Mac, you are SO smart. How did you get so smart?”
***HUG***
Mama: “Good job, buddy – you’ve got it figured out, huh…”
So, if you’re tracking things here, my two-year-old toddler son just accurately categorized himself and his daddy as part of the blue (BOY) group and categorized his girl friend and mama as part of the pink (GIRL) group. See, it’s actually that simple. Even my little buddy understands that, biologically, people belong to one of only two categories depending on their physical body.
There are boys and there are girls – which God made out of each other to compliment and complete the other.
Mac really is a very smart cookie so our little family values/ways/examples probably can’t take all the credit for him understanding the differences between the two. I haven’t been doing this mom thing very long but it’s extremely apparent so far that our sweet babies NEED our firm guidance. If we leave them to their own devices to grow and mature, they won’t have a strong solid core of morals and faith onto which they can comfortably grow into who God truly made them to be.
We have to try our hardest to raise them up by guiding them in right and wrong so the confusion of the world does not get to them first and weigh them down. Let your home and family and community (your chosen village) fill them up so full with faithful and kind values that they just don’t have any more room to soak up any wickedness.
That’s my goal, at least, mamas. Let’s not hesitate to raise these precious babies with our Christian values and beliefs above all else. Teach them still to be kind & spread love, because everyone needs love. Let’s keep life simple for these babies.
