I Wanna Be In The Room Where It Happens

Posted: March 21, 2016 | Author: | Filed under: family, kids, parenting | Tags: , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Princess, who is now ten years old, has been asking for an African American “Ken” doll for a couple of weeks now. When I asked why she needed another Ken doll at all, she said that it was so she can “pretend that he’s Aaron Burr.”

Yes, I know that Aaron Burr was a white man, but she thinks he’s black because Leslie Odom, Jr. plays him on Broadway.

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I don’t know whether to feel super proud of her for further diversifying her Barbie collection or to have some kind of white lady guilt for not already having a African American Ken doll.

Anyway, African American Ken dolls do not just materialize for no reason. Maybe she will find one in her Easter basket, or as a reward for having blood drawn, which she needs to do this month.

Yesterday she told me that while she’s waiting for the doll, she’s just going to “pretend Leslie Odom, Jr. is sick,” and the Ken doll she has “is his understudy”.

I think my induction into the Theater Mom Hall of Fame might be imminent

Scenes from imagination at play

Posted: February 9, 2012 | Author: | Filed under: family, parenting | Tags: , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Sometimes, I like to go down into the basement where the kids keep most of their toys. It’s fun to come across abandoned scenes of play and try to figure out what was going on before the kids were called up to dinner or chores or bedtime.

Examples:

Apparently, Darth Maul has a much, much lighter side.

And also, in The Princess’s version of The Phantom Menace, he and Quai-Gon have what looks like an entirely different relationship dynamic going on:

Then, here, you really have to wonder what Aladdin and The Beast (that’s Beast without the fur) were saying to Jasmine. They look like they are trying to convince her to come see the matinee performance of Zeigfield and Roy.