the anti-princess club

“though she be but little, she is fierce!” – shakespeare, a midsummer night’s dream

kid #2 has a thing for cinderella. the disney one who looks just as hot in a tattered apron as she does in a ball gown. the one with perfect blond hair who strives for nothing more than to wear a pretty dress to a party. the one who seems content to live in an attic bedroom singing to mice and birds.  and what is with “a dream is a wish your heart makes”? i don’t even know what that means.

the closest i ever got to being a princess fanatic as a little girl were the dozens of times i watched ‘beauty and the beast’. i identified with belle the bookworm. i could have cared less whether belle and the beast hooked up. i was just rooting for her to get that library. with the sliding ladder. that i have wanted forever.

as a kid i was painfully shy. shy to the point where i was terrified to pick up the phone. where i could not force myself to ask a stranger a question, let alone make eye contact.

books were my thing. and so was the anti-princess. i was attracted to precocious, free-spirited, mischievous little girls. like madeline.

madeline taunts tigers at the zoo. she performs dangerous feats. she roots for the underdog. she stands up for what’s right. and i’m a little bit obsessed with her. which is why kids #1 and #2 can recite the book from memory. i may have pushed the book on them a tiny bit but they’ll thank me for it later. or at least when they have their own children.

and then there is pippi longstocking who is quirky, completely unconventional, horribly behaved, and has the strength to throw pirates across the room and take on five bullies at a time. she. is. awesome. and i was desperate to live with her and her monkey, mr.nilsson, at villa villekula. forever. and on the 100th anniversary of astrid lindgren‘s birth, oxford university press put out a commemorative edition illustrated by lauren child. i adore lauren child! more on her later.

i cannot wait to introduce my kids to this book!

i also stumbled upon this lauren child inspired pippi doll at mmmcrafts. i completely covet this.

some people, that are not me, are so freakin’ talented. it always blows my mind.

moving along.

so. i became a teenager. and that was terrible. and then i grew up to be a nice, normal person and had kids of my own. in particular i gave birth to this child. kid #2.

here she is in all her cinderella glory.

and while i couldn’t wait to introduce her to my favourite picture books and characters, we also discovered some seriously awesome ferocious little girls along the way. because if madeline and pippi were to have a tea party, they’d definitely invite olivia and lola.

this is olivia the pig, created by ian falconer, illustrator for the new yorker.

she is headstrong, non-conformist, and in her newest book, ‘olivia and the fairy princesses’, she considers a career in exposing corporate malfeasance, and dances like martha graham. olivia is like no other.

as a side note, anyone who knows me knows that i LOVE david sedaris. as in, i want us to be best friends.

him and ian falconer joined forced for sedaris’ ‘squirrel seeks chipmunk’. another win win!

which brings me back to the world of lauren child and lola sonner. and this is how the story goes.

one day lauren child was riding a train in denmark when she spotted a blonde elfish-looking child chatting and chatting and chatting non-stop to her parents. lauren child found her mesmerizing and decided to base a storybook character around her. and lola and her retro-styled, collaged universe was born.

this is lola.

and lola and her big brother charlie are somewhat of a double act. just like kid #1 and kid #2. they go together well, like charlie and lola!

charlie goes to great lengths to teach lola about the world around her in the most imaginative way possible. he is also, for some reason, responsible for convincing lola to eat her dinner as well as getting to bed. charlie is somewhat parentified. i suppose it’s the same thing when i disagree with kid #1 and #2 that it is not in fact “good morning time” and send #1 off to make snacks and put a tv show on for #2 so i can be left in peace.

i’m a good mom. really.

anyway, lola makes my super-awesome-character list because of her cheekiness and her unique world-view and curiosity about the things and people around her. she has a huge imagination, is utterly non self-conscious, and completely knows who she is. also she wears weirdly put-together outfits. like kid #2.

but recently i have one more little girl to add to the list and her name is lily.

lately lily is a collaboration between author/illustrator micah player and apparel designer erin nichols. the premise of lily’s story is that she is daughter to a photographer and a writer for the ‘international exposition definitive journal of global curiosity’. lily travels on assignment with them exploring cities and terrains both urban and rural, writing and drawing in her sketchbook about what she’s been up to and what she’s learned from the people and places she’s visited.

the drawings from lily’s “sketchbook” inspire t-shirt designs each season.

currently lily is in paris, exploring the arrondissements by metro and visiting the famous sites of the city such as the tuileries on the grounds of the louvre.

her parisienne explorations culminated in lately lily‘s newest season of apparel for babies and kids.

in past seasons lily has fished peruvian waters while learning about the area’s people, culture, and history.

she has also had a stopover in iceland,

china,

london,

and of course, the USA.

lily encourages girls to explore the world, think for themselves, and be an original.

she believes that women can do ANYTHING!

and teaches girls to support each other. lily is the anti-frenemy.

she was there last year when sarah attar became the first woman in saudi arabia to compete in the olympics.

and to celebrate the life of astronaut sally ride, the first american woman to be launched into space.

i encourage you and your daughters (and sons) to pack your very own suitcase, and follow the traveling girl.

oh, and ps, lily’s now got her very own iPad app available for download on iTunes.

that’s it for today folks!

happy travels…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

on paris

this is andoni. and although andoni is made by fournier in bolivia, he is desperate to go to paris. poor poor andoni.

but it happens that i know someone else who longs to go to paris, and that is my mother.

what can i say about that woman who gave birth to me? if it were possible to hang a banner across the eiffel tower that read YOU ARE AWESOME! i would. except that she wouldn’t see it because she is not in paris. but she should be. i could list the reasons for her known attraction to the city (glamour, cuisine, culture, architecture) but that’s not what this post is about.

my last post was about walking to starbucks with my children and telling stories. it was just a glimpse of what life with kids #1, 2, and 3 is like. when i re-read it the next day i realized that while what i had written was both funny and utterly true (and featured a great product) it was also a little love letter to my children. in its true form it read “you are ridiculous and you annoy me but i will always put your priorities ahead of my mine because i love you so”.

so this paris themed post will be a little love letter to my mom who always put me first even when i didn’t realize or appreciate it at the time. and i have more than a sneaking suspicion that she hasn’t yet gotten to paris because she’s been too occupied with being there for everyone else. but we dream of paris for her and one day we will take her there. but until then, let’s play pretend!

as an adult it is not fun to pretend things. it is not fun to pretend you’ve just won the lottery when there is a stack of bills on the counter. it is not fun to pretend that your dishwasher is going to fix itself when clearly it’s not. it is not fun to pretend that you might actually get to sleep in. being an adult is not awesome sometimes. 

but when you’re a kid the whole world could be right here if you want it to be. whenever you want it to be. for instance, kid #1 spends his time creating new series for lego. also he lives in a video game and is a super qualified sniper. kid #2 lives for birthday parties. for her last birthday we got her melissa & doug‘s birthday party cake set. and now it is always my birthday. or her birthday. or her brother’s birthday. whatever. the point is that if by the end of the day my kids can say they’ve killed enemies while being employed by lego and attended numerous birthday parties then why can’t they have traveled to paris?

actually in their favor they do know quite a lot about the city of lights. they’ve grown up on madeline, and kid #1 can school anyone about paris’ most notable artists. but what’s absolutely needed is a copy of miroslav sasek‘s ‘this is paris’.

this incredibly beautiful book is a kid-friendly introduction to the travel guide and features watercolour paintings of beloved parisian landscapes. there’s the notre dame, pont de neuf, the louvre, and of course the eiffel tower. the book also teaches kids some basic historical facts about the city as well as displays what everyday life might look like there.  and what would a book on paris for kids be without people walking with baguettes and french poodles?

the ‘this is’ series is available featuring many other cities and countries as well as the moon! i want them all.

so now we’ve got our guide book. but what else…?

in this house we are well prepared for many pretend culinary delights. we have sets of cookies, all manner of slice-able fruits and vegetables, and wooden representations of just about any basic grocery item anywhere. a pretend bottle of olive oil? done. cheese crackers? try me.  ice cubes? right again. we even have a small grocery cart. but what we don’t have is a grocery cart full of french fare.

aha! but with the purchase of moulin roty‘s beautifully designed french groceries, we have all we need!

here’s monday’s version,

i don’t actually understand the english tea but we’ll just set that one aside and use it on the day we decide we take a pretend jaunt to london to visit prince george.

and this is friday’s version

#2 will want to dress up for the affair because everything in #2’s life is a dress-up event. even when we bake she must wear her ‘cooking hat’. wings to the beach. a butterfly costume to watch tv. her cinderella dress everywhere. she considers herself extremely fancy. obviously, her paris trip will involve this outfit

my day in paris has seriously exhausted me. how about a non-pretend glass of wine?

and one day we’ll take you there mom. i promise.