Boys Will Be Boys

Alex's new favorite toy. Thanks cousin Jamie!

So the other day, Josh asked me if I thought that never showing Abby anything that was girly (i.e. ponies, princesses, etc.) would have any effect on her. His theory is that no matter if you show the ponies to girls or the trucks to the boys, kids have a natural instinct in them to be attracted to the things their gender is most likely to love. Or I guess in the case of kids, most likely to play with. Reason for this topic of conversation all goes back to the fact that Alex has become fascinated with all things engine related. Cars, trucks, tractors, trains, fire trucks. All of them are his main focus right now. He could hear a train whistle 2 miles away and if he is outside playing will immediately go running for the tracks. (I need to finish fencing in my yard to prevent this due to fear of him running into traffic before I can catch him.) He sees a fire truck, and a little light seems to be flickering in those adorable, brown eyes of his. But the thing is, neither Josh or I have ever really pushed this on him. The first time he saw a fire truck, he was hooked. And since then, there has been no going back. We must go on our daily walks to see the train tracks and tractors around town and every time we go get the mail, (our podunk little town doesn't deliver mail so we are forced to have a p.o. box) then we have to walk up to see the fire department. And to make his life even more wonderful, his cousin, Jamie, gave him all of his outside tractors for playing in the mud/sand. More excited, this kid could not be. He even sweet-talked his daddy into letting him bring one of them in the house. One extremely dirty bathtub later, it was all cleaned up and his new favorite toy. I'm sure we somehow subconsciously give him these ideas, but who really knows. Abby is, of course, too little to be leaning towards my little ponies or princesses, but time will surely tell. Personally, I can picture the little tiny, microscopic tractors driving through the bloodstream on boys and itty-bitty unicorns dancing their way through the bloodstream of girls. It gives me a good giggle.