My youngest boy is now three and a half years old. About a year and a half ago he started to figure out that a lot of his older sisters toys were pink, whereas most of the toys he and his brother had were blue.
When he started refusing to play with "girl toys" that presented us with a little conundrum because a few of the toys that he played with were some of his sisters hand-me-downs. There was a pink Barbie flip phone, a red VW Bug with a flower on the side and several pink and pastel kitchen items.
We had a decision to make on how to handle it. Do we force him to play? Try and reason with a toddler? Been there done that, no thank you. Do we want to reinforce gender stereotypes and raise him to think that way? How will that thought process serve him in the world today? Not a very appealing option either. So we did the only thing we could do: nothing.
We didn't dignify the problem with a response. We told him, "Oh you don't want to play with that toy? Should we take it away?" For most parents they already know the answer. It should come as no surprise that he said "No!"
Eventually, by reacting that way we taught him that the color of the toy didn't matter. It was his decision to play with it or not. He got over it. Now our little chef loves to play in the kitchen and then go drive his trucks.
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