Hour-a-Day April: Day Eight

There was one thing that I absolutely had to do today: Get the recyclables to the curb. I did it. No matter what else happened today, I now have four large bins less stuff on my porch. That's a solid win.

Then the wind blew over one of the bins, so I got to gather up a bunch of plastics scattered all down the street. (I actually found one of our milk jugs at the park, a block away, this afternoon, so I guess I didn't get them all. Oops.)

I had plans to get together with a friend at 10 am, but my list of things I had to accomplish first was a bit too long, especially since John Wallace decided not to go down for his morning nap and give me a spare moment until 11. But I got dinner in the crockpot, and started a load of diaper laundry, and something else I'm forgetting. Finally made it to my friend's house only 2.5 hours late.

The kids played dress-up and the moms played adult conversation. Lovely. Then I suggested puddle jumping, which quickly became puddle sitting, then puddle crawling and exploring the mysteries of mud. I allowed it with no reservations, even though I didn't have a change of clothes for Dorothy, because this, to me, is what childhood should be. Sitting in a mud puddle exploring the world with your skin.

We got home just in time to change Dorothy's clothes and grab a quick snack while waiting for Valerie's bus. I pulled a few weeds while we were waiting. Then Valerie got home, and we headed to the park with some friends who live in town. We played for about an hour, then came home so I could wrap up dinner prep. The hardest part was done - roast beef and veggies in the crockpot. I stuck some biscuits in the oven and made gravy, then got to work on kitchen cleaning. When Jeremy walked in the door from work, the table was clean and ready to set, and dinner was ready to serve. This is almost always my goal, and it almost never happens. It felt pretty good.

The cool thing about actually eating dinner on time is that there is actually a window of time between dinner and the girls' bedtime. While Jer handled the kid wrangling, I did the after-dinner kitcheny things that I usually put off. Cleaned off the table. Put away leftovers. Made Valerie's lunch. Washed every dish involved in dinner. (There are still plenty of dishes to wash, but I decided that one thing I can do for the backlog is at least not add to it.) I also made french toast for tomorrow's breakfast, and put it in the breakfast/lunch mini-fridge (which I am loving so far - I hope I can keep it up, and not just let it turn into another place leftovers go to die). Then I folded a load of clothes (Valerie helped!) and switched the diapers over to the dryer.

Then I sat down and wrote this blog post, and decided that it had been a very productive day, but my tally didn't include very many tasks outside of my routine chores, and maybe I could squeeze one more, photo-worthy project in before bed. So I left this post half-written, and tackled the front hall. I have found that clutter has the biggest psychological impact on me when I have to physically step over/around it to get anywhere. The front hall becomes an obstacle course so quickly, because everyone in the family seems to think that coats/backpacks/shoes need to be removed immediately upon entering the house, and they must not be disturbed from the place where they first fall.

Before:

After 30 minutes:

I didn't get to the catch-all table by the door, but it's less stressful, because I don't have to step over it. Maybe I'll save it for another day when I need some photo-worthy progress to make me feel like I'm accomplishing more than just treading water.

And now, I am definitely ready for bed. Eight days down, 22 to go!

Hour-a-Day April: Day Seven

You remember, at the beginning, where I said I would need to have a little extra grace with myself for HADA this year, because I've been sick, and I run out of steam so quickly? Apparently, I forgot. I was pretty down on myself for not getting enough done yesterday, for not finishing any of my projects, but I woke up this morning with renewed resolve. Not so much to get more done, but to feel better about what I DO get done. Anything is better than nothing. Everything counts for something.

Somehow, that resolve managed to coincide with John Wallace deciding to end his nap strike today. So, when he went down for his morning nap, I tackled the kitchen. Again. Yes, the kitchen. I would really like to stop hating my kitchen. (There's more to this story than just illness and neglect. It involves rats. If/when I get to my pantry, maybe you'll get to hear more of it.) But this time, I looked at the clock. Told myself, HADA or no HADA, I was going to spend an hour working on the kitchen. And I did. Progress was made. And no, I'm not done. But I'm getting there.

Once John Wallace woke up from his nap, it was a bit harder to make progress, but I am tired of plucking beads and bits of fluff and stickers and dice and miscellaneous crumbs from his mouth, so I was determined to vacuum the living room floor. I gave up on getting a completely clean floor, and just worked on smaller zones, clearing up a few square feet, then vacuuming that section quickly before it became re-cluttered again the second I turned my back. That took roughly an hour and a half, with many interruptions. And, looking back over the living room now, you would never know it was ever clean. *sigh*

Then, a miracle happened. I got both kids down for simultaneous naps! Amazing!

My "must-do" HADA project today was the side porch. One of the first things I let slide when I'm not feeling well is trash/recyclables. I've missed roughly a month of pick-ups, and after a while, it just devolved into me opening the door of the porch and throwing things out there, planning to deal with it later, and trusting the cold weather to keep it from stinking too much. I'm a bit embarrassed to show this "before" photo, but here goes:

The saddest thing about this mess? It only took 20 minutes to organize. Here's the "after". It doesn't look that much better, yet, but it's all organized, and half of it will go to the curb tomorrow, and the rest will go to the curb on Thursday, and then I will be able to walk through my porch again!

Then I put in another 15 minutes putting away craft supplies and other random stuff that I had swept up into a pile on the kitchen floor.

And now I am spent. I am going to allow myself some down time, and hopefully I will manage to rally myself in time to make something tasty for dinner. I'll hold off on posting this for now, just in case. (Okay, managed dinner, but that's it. I'm calling it a night.)

One week down, 23 days to go!

Hour-a-Day April: Days Five and Six

Day Five: Jeremy's grandparents are visiting his parents right now, so we spent the morning/afternoon there. Then we came home and I just barely had time to pull together dinner and outfits for the Girl Scout Daddy Daughter dance. No HADA projects accomplished, so I'm calling this my day off for the week. But look how cute she is, wearing one of the flower girl dresses from our wedding (12 years ago!)

Day Six: Church in the morning, followed by a church potluck, followed by an hour of mandatory nap/quiet time for everyone in the family. All wonderful/necessary things, but it didn't leave a lot of time for HADA. But I found some motivation somewhere to tackle the kitchen. Ugh, the kitchen. So backlogged, so depressing. I did manage to completely clean off the table, and ran a dishwasher load, and filled the dish drainer at least twice. I swept the floor, too. And I brought the bar fridge up from the basement, cleaned it off, and set it up beside the regular fridge to use as a prepared breakfast/lunch fridge. Then I pulled the 13 pounds of chicken I got on sale out of the fridge, and divided them up into smaller packages of strips and chunks to freeze and use later. I made fajitas for dinner, which is not what was on the menu for the night, but it was the easiest thing to do simultaneously while I was prepping the chicken. The fajitas were actually a big hit with the kids. Yay!

I didn't feel like any of that really counted towards my hour, though, since it was all daily upkeep that I just happen to be way behind on. Actually, I take that back. Moving the bar fridge totally counted. But it didn't take an hour. So I asked myself, "What things should I do now, that I normally would just leave until later, because I feel like I already did enough today?" The first thing that came to mind was cleaning the table. When I have to clean the table before dinner, I find it extra hard to motivate myself to clean it again an hour later, after dinner. So I cleaned the table. And while I was putting away the leftovers, I made Jer a lunch (which I don't do as often as I would like). Then, since I was on a lunch-roll, I made Valerie's lunch (which I usually scramble to make while she's eating breakfast in the morning). Then, for good measure, I started a load of laundry. Still not sure if I had managed to get in an hour (you know that "set a timer" thing I said to do? I never remember to do it), I started working on my prep/shopping list for Passover. I think that brought me up to at least an hour. Especially if I count some of the kitchen cleaning or chicken prep. I had more things that I wanted to do, but my motivation was spent, so I just went to bed early. It seemed like the best use of my time.

Six days down, 24 to go!

Hour-a-Day April: Days Three and Four

I am very tired, so I'll make this short.

Day Three: Rough night, mom's group in the morning, spent all afternoon trying (and failing) to get a break. Finished fixing the printer. Managed to do a few dishes, ran a load of laundry, washed diapers. Finished my menu planning and made my grocery list. (Geeky aside: I used Google Drive to make my grocery list, and it worked out really well. I made a spreadsheet, and went through my menu, top to bottom, and just listed everything I would need in column a. If I came to a repeat item (like chicken breasts for a second recipe), I would go back up and change the quantity rather than adding another line item. Then, in column b, I put a single-letter code for each item - a (aisles), b (bakery), p (produce), f (freezer), d (dairy), m (meat). Then, when I was all done, I clicked on column b and sorted alphabetically, which then grouped all of the items together by section. Nerd win!) Pretty sure I got in my hour.

Day Four: Rough night, rough morning. Plans to clean the living room during John Wallace's morning nap thwarted by his stuffy nose and resulting refusal to nap. Finally threw in the towel and went shopping instead. Acquired all the groceries for my monthly menu, made a tasty dinner, only 45 minutes late. Re-sized the clean diapers for my growing boy, stuffed, folded and put them away (which is actually a big deal, since I usually just leave them in the dryer until I need it for something else, then dump them unceremoniously in the drawer and stuff them on demand). Definitely got in my hour.

Four days down, 26 to go!

Hour-a-Day April: Day Two

Well, this morning didn't start out too great. The battery on my phone died while I was sleeping, so my alarm didn't go off in the morning. I had been up with the baby in the middle of the night, so once I managed to get to sleep, I didn't budge until I looked at the clock and saw 8:00. Yikes! Valerie's bus comes at 8:15. Fortunately, she had another half day today, so I didn't have to pack her a lunch. Still, not a very relaxing morning. She did make it to the bus, however.

I did make my tea and sit and take a few minutes to ease into my day. And once I got John Wallace down for his morning nap, I tackled the kitchen. It's really the last thing in the entire house that I want to be doing, which is why I forced myself to do it today. There is nothing more depressing than a seriously backlogged kitchen. But I plugged away for an hour, and managed to find the surface of my stove, which I then scrubbed clean. I still have a long way to go on the kitchen, but at least progress is being made.

I also did some laundry, and washed some the "less necessary" items, like throw blankets and pullovers.

Then we headed to Longwood Gardens for a few hours of fresh air and flowers. That place is truly awesome. PopPop had the day off today, so he joined us. I took lots of pictures.

Jer had to work some overtime tonight, so I took the kids to Chic-fil-A for dinner and some indoor playground time. There was some kind of fundraiser going on, so we got to meet the cow suit guy, and we won a free drink and milkshake. We stayed so long that Jeremy actually beat us home. It was a lot of fun!

My HADA goal for today (in addition to the dishes, which shouldn't really count, since I should have done them anyhow) was to make a menu for the month so I can go grocery shopping and have one less thing to worry about every day. I put together my list (with a little help from my Facebook friends), and I am almost done sorting it all into days, but I am getting very tired, and I think the rest of that task will have to wait until tomorrow.

Two days down, 28 to go. Woohoo!

Hour-a-Day April: Day One

I managed to hit the ground running on April 1. One of my goals right now (in life, generally, not just HADA) is to build a stronger routine into our daily life. I'm a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants kinda girl, but I have discovered that life runs more smoothly, and we have more fun, if we have some kind of structure holding our days together. It's going to be a struggle for me to keep up a schedule once school lets out in June, so I'm working on it, now. So, before tackling anything HADA-related, I made myself a cup of tea, and gave myself a few minutes to sit and gather my thoughts before diving into the day. John Wallace rewarded me for my patience by going down for his morning nap relatively early, and staying asleep for a good, long stretch. I don't know if I will be quite so lucky every day this month, but it was a good start to the first day.

I picked a task for my first day that has been bugging me for months: The bathroom. I've been doing basic upkeep cleaning, but it's been a long time since I dug in and scrubbed the shower walls or mopped the floor. The girls have some bathtub crayons that are relatively easy to clean off - if you clean them off right away. But that has not been happening, so it took quite a bit of elbow grease. But I got all the crayon off, and scrubbed the crud off of the bath mat and hair trap. Then, since the baby was still napping, I hopped in the shower myself. While I was in there, just for fun, I grabbed the Comet and scrubbed the bottom of the shower curtain liner. It worked pretty well, but then I decided to unhook the whole thing and just throw it in the wash. I won't say it's as good as new, but it's much, much better than it was!

The bathroom took the full hour, but since the baby was cooperating so well, I decided to keep going. I begrudgingly tackled the kitchen, instead of the many HADA tasks that I would rather be doing, because, well, we need clean dishes if we want to eat.

Where is my 3.5-year-old in all this? Good question. I thought she was watching TV, but the show just ended, and she isn't there to start another one. Oh, there she is. Sitting in the middle of the garden digging in the dirt. Good thing I hadn't planted anything yet! But she's having fun, and getting some vitamin D, so I let her play. (Until she stripped down naked, and peed in the garden. Then I brought her, and her muddy footprints, into my clean bathroom and gave her a bath.)

Meanwhile, my oldest daughter arrived home from school (she has half days this week for some reason). I wasn't able to get much more done from that point on, but I did make some progress on normal tasks like dishes and laundry. On a whim, I made a tray of brown E's out of construction paper, since my daughter pranked me pretty good when she got home from school, and I thought it was only fair to return the favor. (Her analysis: "Mom, please don't fool about food. Because we really wanted brownies.") (Don't worry, I made real brownies for dessert.)

After the girls were in bed, I tackled our broken printer. I still can't get the feed tray to work properly, but I can by-pass it by using the envelope tray, so I guess I'll call it a win, for now. At least I have the ability to print again. I managed to squeeze in a few of those "been meaning to get to that" tasks, too, like rinsing out the humidifier so I can pack it away for the season.

All in all, I am pleased with my progress on day one. (I can already tell you that day two will not be quite so productive, since it started with us all oversleeping by an hour because the battery on my phone died overnight, and we are planning to go to Longwood Gardens this afternoon.) One day down, 29 to go!

Hour-a-Day April 2014

It's been a long winter.

A year ago, we packed up our home and moved an hour away, to a small town in the middle of Amish country where we didn't know anyone. It's a lovely place, and exactly what we wanted, but it's been a long, lonely year. Our van died, we had a baby, Valerie started kindergarten, Dorothy turned three (which, any parent will tell you, is so much worse than two). And then: the. longest. winter. ever.

I've lived in the greater Philadelphia area for about 8 years, now, and in that time, there have been about 5 snowfalls that have stayed on the ground long enough for Canadian-born me to drag out a sled and play like it's a real winter. But this winter, even cold-loving, winter-fun-having Jule Ann shouted, "Enough!" 11 snow days (or was it 12? I lost count.) Snow past my knees. And days on end when I never saw a single ray of sunshine, literally or figuratively.

Meanwhile, my normal housework roller coaster was getting wilder than usual. I would start to get caught up on things, then someone would get sick (usually me), or something would break, or I would just run out of steam, and it would all pile up again. A few days later, I would start to get a handle on things again, feel optimistic again, bake some bread, then it would all fall apart again. I was diagnosed with depression, and have seen some progress with SSRIs, but nothing has broken the cycle. I feel like I spend 2/3 of my time in survival mode, and the remaining 1/3 of the time is not enough to catch up, let alone get ahead.

Then, last weekend, I choked on a sip of my drink, and got sick again, and was worried enough to go to the doctor this time. They ran some blood work, and apparently my Vitamin D levels were very low, so I am taking ridiculously high doses of prescription vitamin D until my levels come back up again. In retrospect, it all makes sense. The low energy, the depression, the frequent illnesses - all symptoms of Vitamin D deficiency. It's been a dark, dreary winter, and we've been cooped up inside far too much. We drink raw milk, which is not fortified like the grocery store kind, and I don't eat fish, which is the only really good dietary source of Vitamin D. Unfortunately, all of the symptoms of vitamin D deficiency also look a lot like the symptoms of just-had-your-third-baby-and-moved-to-a-new-town, so it never occurred to me that I might have a physically treatable problem.

Which brings us, in a very roundabout way, to Hour-a-Day April. My house is a mess. I need to do dishes and laundry. I have a newly-mobile baby who gets into everything. I have lots of creative/organizational/fun projects floating around in my head. I could do so much with an extra hour of productivity squeezed into every day for the next month. But I'm going to need to give myself a lot of grace, too, because I run out of steam so quickly these days. My commitment for Hour-a-Day April this year is to at least START every day. I want to do the hour, I will try to do the hour, but if I can't do the hour, I'm at least going to start. Even a few minutes of progress is better than no progress.

If you don't know what Hour-a-Day April is, it's a productivity project I created a few years ago. For the month of April, you make it a goal, every day, to spend one hour doing something that you normally have a hard time finding time for. My original post is here, but I will post the updated "Rules" for 2014 below as well. Who will be joining me this year?

Hour-a-Day April 2014 Rules

1. Think of something that you normally have a hard time finding time for. Sewing, cleaning, painting, organizing, playing basketball, crossing things off your honey-do list, it's up to you! It can be one big project, or a bunch of little projects. For me, it's going to be mostly sorting/organizing, deep cleaning, and planning. Those are the things I never seem to get to, because any motivation I have gets used up on the surface stuff before I get to it.
2. Spend an hour every day working on your chosen project(s). Set a timer and stick to it. Kids need your attention? Stop the timer and give them your attention. You have all day to squeeze in that hour, and if your kids are anything like mine, it might happen five or ten minutes at a time. But by the end of the day, make sure you've clocked that hour. Know yourself. If the best way for you to get in your hour is to get up early, get up early. If you clean best after everyone else goes to bed, skip CSI. It's only for a month.
3. Take one day off a week. If you're religious, you may already have a set sabbath, if not, just pick a day to be your "break" day. Or don't pick a day, and let it be a floating day off, so if you miss a day, you can just say, "Oh well, that was my day off." (I tend to do this last one.)
4. Keep others updated on your progress. Comment on this blog. Blog about it yourself, and send me the link. Join our HADA Facebook group, and come chat about what you're working on. Phone up your mom. Put a gold star on a chart.
5. Don't give up. Missed a day? Just brush it off and get back on the proverbial horse the next day. Even if you only do half the days, that's still 15 hours more productivity than your April would have otherwise had.
6. Don't let HADA set you back on all the stuff you normally do find time for. If you're having a hard time keeping up with the daily stuff, count some of it towards your hour (but not all of it, or the point of HADA is lost).
7. Don't let anyone or anything steal your joy and sense of accomplishment for the things you have done. HADA isn't about becoming perfect, it's about deliberately spending an hour every day tackling the projects you rarely get to. If you did your hour today, YOU WIN. Period. It doesn't matter if someone else did two hours, or if the sink is still full of dirty dishes, or if there are still 17 more hours of organizing to do. If you managed to squeeze a whole extra hour of blood from the stone of your already-busy day, be proud of yourself.
8. Celebrate when it's all over! If you live near me, let's go out to dinner together and order gooey chocolatey desserts. If you live far away, have your own celebration and tell me about it. Go ahead and splurge, you've earned it!

In Defense of "Voluntourism" (Sorta)

Sometimes it takes me a while to gather my thoughts, and by the time I have figured out what I want to say, everyone on Facebook has already forgotten about whatever it is I was responding to.

Anyhow, try to think back, WAAAAY back, to a couple of days ago, when everyone was sharing this link, and nodding wisely, and saying, "How true!"

I kinda half agree. I get what she's saying. Short-term missions and volunteer trips have lots of problems. And, yeah, getting a bunch of high school kids to do skilled labor poorly is probably not the best allocation of resources. And the perpetuation of the "white savior" myth is dangerous. But look at what the author is doing now: She is using her skills to run a camp in the DR, recruiting and enabling native leaders to do work that is actually worthwhile. And she claims that her first trip to the DR was a flop, but if she had never gone on that first trip, do you think she would have that kind of passion for the Dominican people? It's one thing to see pictures on TV or in promotional materials, telling you that there is a hurting world outside of your comfort zone, but it's another thing entirely to actually GO there and LIVE amongst those hurting people for a little while.

I think the word "voluntourism" is meant to be derogatory, but I actually like it. When you travel as a tourist, your focus is on yourself, and on what you are getting out of the experience. You usually see a sanitized and commercialized version of the culture you are visiting, polished and packaged to make your experience enjoyable. When you travel as a volunteer, your focus is on the people you are going to help, their needs, their situation, their struggles. And, while you might come back from a vacation relaxed and refreshed, you almost always come back from a short-term mission trip CHANGED. And that is what makes the world a better place: Not the actual work that "voluntourists" do while they are abroad, but the changed people who come home from those trips, a little less selfish, and a little more aware that the world is much bigger than their first world problems.

As with so many things in life, I find myself wanting to find a nice, middle ground. Some way to encourage people to travel to third world countries and expand their worldview without doing more harm than good while they are there. But it's not like we can send them to just hide in the bushes and spy on orphans - we need to give them something to do while they are there, some way of engaging and interacting. I know that this is something that greater minds than mine are working on, so I'm not trying to solve this problem myself. I'm just suggesting that maybe we shouldn't look down on voluntourists quite so much. At least they care. And if their concern is genuine, it can be redirected more effectively.

Consignment Sales

Spring consignment sale season starts next week!

It's been a while since I made a consignment sale list, but it looks like I don't need to feel guilty anymore, because someone else is doing a fabulous job. PlaygroundBuzz.com has an extremely detailed list of local consignment sales. Check them out!

Also: The mommy group that I have been attending is hosting a consignment sale this spring, too. I'm a bit nervous, but I think I'm going to dive and participate on the consignor side of things this year. Yikes! Wish me luck! I'm hoping to make a dent in the "hand-me-down room", so that it can actually be used as a "guest room", like it was supposed to be!

Some Thoughts on the "Gender Neutrality" of Legos

I've been thinking about this whole "Lego for Girls" controversy for a long time, but I haven't said much about it. I felt a bit like I was being pulled in two directions on the issue, and I couldn't quite put my finger on why. But something finally clicked for me today, and now I want to say something about it.

This is the 1981 Lego ad that everyone is talking about. That little girl could have been me. Classic 1980s tomboy, building with Legos instead of playing with dolls. It's classic 1980s power-suit feminism. The kind of feminism that said, "Women are allowed to fill men's roles in a man's world... As long as they dress/act/behave like men." The message of that ad, to me, was that little girls can play with boy's toys, too... as long as they are tomboys.

I don't have a problem with tomboys. I was one myself. (Sortof - more on that later.) But what if your daughters want to embrace their femininity? To me, modern feminism is not about telling women that they are just like men. It's about telling women that what they are is just as good as what men are. It's a subtle difference, but an important distinction to make. We need to show our daughters that we don't just value classically masculine skills; that they don't need to fight their natural skills and abilities to be valued in our society.

I have always wanted to be a mother, ever since I was a little girl. When I was in kindergarten, I wanted to be a teacher. But I had one problem: I was smart. I was streamed into the gifted/enrichment program in fourth grade. Everyone expected more of me. I remember telling a classmate in middle school that I wanted to be a mother, and he said, "What a waste!" Not everyone was so explicit in their judgment of my ambitions, but I felt it on every side. Smart girls should do more.

So, I dreamed bigger. Went to college and majored in Communication, intending to go to law school after graduation. My advisor tried to talk me out of it. He encouraged me to pursue a Master's degree in Communication and go into higher education. I politely declined, and went to law school. I trudged through, barely survived my articling year, and then retired from law the day after I got my call to the bar. It's funny, because now, looking back, I think I would have made an excellent teacher or professor. Too bad I tried to do "more".

I loved Legos as a kid. I loved building with blocks. I loved sledding and climbing trees. But I wasn't very athletic. I didn't really do sports. And I secretly loved playing with dolls. Mostly, I loved brushing and styling their hair. I still do. Maybe I should have become a hairdresser. I didn't fit very well into either "gender" category. But that's okay. Most people I know don't. It's kinda more of a spectrum.

When I found out that I was pregnant with my first child, I registered for Duplo before I even thought about cribs. I couldn't wait to play Legos with my kids! But they never really got into it. They chewed on the pieces when they were babies, but that was it. I was very sad. I tried very hard to raise liberated little girls, but they defied me and decided to love everything frilly pink fairy princess. I fought it for a long time. Tried to buy them gender-neutral clothing and toys. But it didn't work. They only wanted to wear dresses and play with dolls. Then I had a light bulb moment one day: Isn't the whole point of feminism that girls can be whatever they want to be? So, if my girls love frilly dresses, why not embrace that, and let them wear frilly dresses?

One day, I was at the Dollar Store with my girls, and I told them they could each pick out one thing as a treat. Valerie picked out a golf set. First, I did a double take - My girly-girl picked a golf set? But then I saw the reason: It was pink. That's when I got on the pink Lego train. Before the pink golf club, I looked at pink toys and said, "Why do they have to make it pink? Girls can play with a brown football! That's so sexist!" After the pink golf club, I looked at pink toys and said, "Yes! Finally a chemistry set that my pink-loving girls will play with! Score one for feminism!"

When we tell our children that they can or can't do something for no reason other than the sexual organs they were born with, that's sexism. When we tell our children that they can be/do/love whatever they want to, regardless of their sexual organs, that's feminism. So, if the message of pink Lego is, "No, sweetie, don't play with those, those are BOY Legos," then I completely disagree. But if the message is, "Oh, you like pink? Look, this cool toy is also available in your favorite color!" then count me in. (Why and how girls are groomed to like pink in our culture is a whole different sexism discussion for another day. But taken as a given that MY girls DO like pink, I'm not addressing it today.)

I do have some issues with the new Lego Friends line. My biggest complaint is that the Friends mini-figs are not standard mini-figs. I think they would have done better to just make more female mini-figs. But I am glad to see Lego branching out and trying to include all girls, not just tomboys. That it's okay to like pink. That it's okay to want to be a ballerina or a teacher. Yeah, they have a long way to go. Female reporters could have better news stories than the "World's Best Cake". But it's a start.

So, my daughter got Lego for her fifth birthday. Pink Lego. And she loves it. She plays with it every day. And, when I back off and let her do her thing, she plays differently than I did. Rather than building and rebuilding essentially the same thing over and over, tweaking the design after each tear-down (how I used to play), she keeps the same basic structure intact, and makes subtle changes, for aesthetic or play reasons. She keeps it, fully-assembled, on a shelf, like a shrine. There is no "wrong" way to play with Lego, and however she uses it, she is learning, and growing, and developing problem-solving skills, and improving her coordination and fine motor skills. And that will serve her well in the future, whether she becomes an artist or an actress or a teacher or a doctor or a lawyer or a brick-layer or a hairdresser or a clown. Or a mother.