Real Men Wear Pink

My son Jack is 18 months old, has adorable curly blond hair, blue-green eyes and the sweetest disposition (most of the time). And, oh yeah, he LOVES Dora the Explorer. Most of you remember my son Aiden's obsession with Lightning McQueen? Well, Dora is Jack's Lightning.

I don't have a problem with this, but I DO have a problem with the whole marketing team for Dora. Why is everything PINK? Why is everything Dora aimed at little girls? The show itself is not "just for girls", I mean little boys benefit from all of her little adventures and Spanish lessons, too. And yeah, I know there's Diego but Jack doesn't like Diego. He likes Dora. I feel like they are just advancing the whole girls vs. boys stereotype - you can't like Dora...you're a boy! Ugghh. It makes it really difficult when Jack's Dora Radar goes off in the store - and trust me that kid can spot Dora from a mile away - and I have to tell him, "sorry kid, but that's a dress."

I'm not going to dress my son in pink t-shirts, but I have made a few concessions. A Dora blanket that by some miracle is mostly yellow. Dora band-aids that both the boys think are "body art", a small plastic Dora doll (excuse me - action figure), and of course, lots of Dora movies that work wonders in the car.

When I was in Colorado earlier this month visiting my family, my Mom, Jack and I went to Target. I love the Dollar Aisle at Target, great deals. There is a whole bin of little kid socks for a dollar each. We find some Batman socks for Aiden (remind me to tell you THAT whole story later...), and Jack spots the inevitable Dora socks. They are pink. Jack doesn't care, he wants them, and he wants them now. Grandma snickers and gives in, saying something about how it's so great being the Grandma.

So now...we have pink Dora socks. Jack loves them so much that he literally will go and get them out of the dirty laundry and insist on wearing them again. Gross, I know. I was going to take a picture of him wearing them for you, but they are, surprise surprise, in the laundry. I had to bury them under several dirty towels so that he couldn't find them and bring them to me.

It's okay, he's just very secure in his masculinity...he can pull off pink with no problem. :-)