I struggle every day on the issue of picking my battles and where to draw the line. Today was a great example of this struggle. I bought Shelby a Rapunzel nightgown (her first actual nightgown) today at Target (for only $4 -- this is the only reason I bought it). She couldn't wait to wear it! Before nap time, we talked about the fact that it was only for sleep times and that sometimes it would need to be washed and that at the end of nap time it would have to come off. Well, at the end of nap time, she threw a major fit when we took it off. Normally, I'll let her wear whatever the heck she wants as long as A) it's relatively clean, B) it fits, and C) it's reasonable for whatever activity we are doing. The only reason I insisted the nightgown be only for sleep is because I knew if she wore it otherwise and ripped it or blemished it with a bit of cinnamon toast, she'd be distraught. (Out damned spot!)
For Halloween, Shelby was Cinderella, and all I recalled was how much she loved her Cinderella gown. She would rub her hands down the skirt, caressing the blue taffetta with her fingers. She would twirl as she lifted the edges of the skirt. She would look in the mirror and slide her hands over the velvety bodice of the gown and whisper, "My beautiful dress." I had forgotten how after several days of wearing the Cinderella gown, we had to surreptitiously ball it into a too high drawer and then suffer through a few days of tantrums over the "lost" gown. So after her nap today, the same sort of tantrum ensued: for about 30 minutes around the house, then for the entire car ride to Harris Teeter, and then for the entire grocery shopping outing (I am not lying, she was still crying and trying to throw herself on the floor in the check out line). So now, we are stuck with this Rapunzel gown and we have two choices:
1) Purchase a few more gowns so that she will have enough gowns to always wear a gown, day and night.
2) Hide this gown with the Cinderella gown.
And then it has occurred to me that perhaps I am the problem here. Perhaps I am stifling Shelby's spirit by not recognizing and validating her personal fashion sense. Today at Target, for example, I found a perfectly adorable pair of denim overalls embroidered with little flowers. I held them up and asked, "Do you like these?"
"Yes," she replied.
"So you will actually wear them?"
"No, I wear tutus and dresses."
Case closed. So in addition to buying the gown, I bought her three sets of leggings with attached tutus and t-shirts. This afternoon, as she was hugging the Rapunzel gown to her body and I was trying to wrestle it off of her, I pointed out these three new outfits and suggested she pick one. No, she wanted the gown. Tonight at dinner, I asked her what she prefers to wear: tutus, dresses, or gowns. You guessed it, gowns. Shelby loves gowns. In fact, we read Cinderella almost every day. She doesn't think it's a book about girl and a prince. When she "reads" the book, it is a story about a girl who needs a dress and then the animals fix her mother's dress up and then her stepsisters ruin it so then her fairy godmother makes her a new one. The prince is just a subplot, and an unimportant one at that. Maybe I should just buy her a few days' and nights' worth of gowns to wear, knee length gowns day and floor length gowns for night. Why am I trying to push her into the corner of wearing day time clothes during the day? So where do we draw the line and what battles do we pick? Today, I picked the battle of the gown and won, but at what cost?
No comments:
Post a Comment