{"id":13059,"date":"2013-12-19T10:51:49","date_gmt":"2013-12-19T16:51:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/?p=13059"},"modified":"2013-12-19T10:51:49","modified_gmt":"2013-12-19T16:51:49","slug":"am-i-pretty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/am-i-pretty\/","title":{"rendered":"Am I Pretty?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Am<\/a><\/p>\n

I saw a post in my personal Facebook stream about a friend of mine’s wife who wrote “Am I Pretty?” a book to help her daughter and other girls as they come to terms with who they are and what to value. Before I even bought\u00a0 the book, I knew this would be a great resource for so many moms and daughters out there struggling with the same issues.<\/p>\n

And I knew I had to share it with you, my readers, who are also moms looking to do the best you can for your own kids. Please read on and then share some of your own tips and favorite resources you have enjoyed with your daughter.<\/p>\n

Guest post by Lindsey Jensen Burke<\/em><\/p>\n

I thought raising my children through the toddler and preschool years would be relatively easy.\u00a0 I studied child development in college and taught preschool for many years.\u00a0 Oh, I knew that it would be exhausting, relentless, frustrating, maddening\u2014and beautiful all at the same time.\u00a0 I just expected to have the answers to their simple social problems: share with your friends, take turns, use your words, etc.\u00a0 I was completely surprised and overwhelmed when my four year old daughter started asking me if she was pretty.\u00a0 This was preschool!\u00a0 I had thought we were years away from such questions about self-esteem and self-confidence.<\/p>\n

Julia has always had an unusual style: matching shorts with sweaters, wearing bandanas on her head, and attaching cat tails to her outfits.\u00a0 So when the focus on her appearance seemed to be externally motivated, I started asking questions.\u00a0 I realized that she was being told she needed to wear a certain color or accessorize a particular way to play with the other girls in class.\u00a0 Her focus continued to be on whether or not she was pretty.<\/p>\n

I was never the type of mother who focused attention on her daughter\u2019s appearance.\u00a0 There were so many other qualities to comment on or compliment that the phrase \u201cyou are so pretty\u201d seemed vain and put too much emphasis on something I didn\u2019t want her to care about.<\/p>\n

When asked this question over and over, I tried the old standard \u201cit doesn\u2019t matter what you look like.\u00a0 It is what\u2019s in your heart that matters.\u201d\u00a0 Julia challenged me with \u201cwhy can\u2019t I be pretty on the inside and outside?\u201d\u00a0 My bag of tricks was empty.\u00a0 I was stumped.\u00a0 I\u2019d love to say that knowledge is simply from the media.\u00a0 But the truth is she knows when her dad and I go out at night, I put a little makeup on and wear a dress. \u00a0I couldn\u2019t continue the false story line that looks don\u2019t matter at all.\u00a0 After trying to avoid the answer, I knew I had to discuss issues of self-esteem, beauty, bullying, body image and empowerment.<\/p>\n

I talked with friends and realized they were all dealing with this in one way or another with their daughters.\u00a0 We brainstormed how to deal with it and what type of message we want to send our girls.\u00a0 We looked for books on the topic \u2013 both parenting books and children\u2019s books \u2013 and came up empty handed.\u00a0 One friend forwarded a poem by Kate Makkai to me.\u00a0 This was the first time I heard something about appearance that I wanted Julia to understand.\u00a0 The poem is for adults and kept thinking about ways I could explain it to her in a meaningful way.<\/p>\n

One night I woke up at 3:00 am and decided to take this message and turn it into a children\u2019s book.\u00a0 I figured if Julia could benefit from her words, other girls could too.\u00a0 What I really want children to understand is that, yes, appearance is a small part of who they are.\u00a0 But they need to focus on the other more important parts \u2013 such as social, intellectual, and spiritual health.\u00a0 We all need to examine what role and how important looks are to us \u2013 and how and what messages we send to our kids.\u00a0 Like Julia, I want our daughters to know that they are pretty smart, pretty kind, pretty brave, pretty strong, and pretty amazing.\u00a0 But pretty is too small a word to describe them.\u00a0 They will always be so much more than pretty.<\/p>\n

The book serves as a visual tool to spark the conversation and address issues of self-confidence, bullying, self-esteem and cultural obsession with appearance.<\/p>\n

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Interested? Click over to Amazon to get your own copy of “Am I Pretty?”<\/a>\"\" (I just ordered a copy to share with my daughter today. With Amazon Prime it will be here just in time for Christmas!)
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