girl 101

My 10 year old daughter said the other day that she wanted to go to a real clothes store, like Gap or Old Navy. I buy not only most of my kids clothes but even most of my own clothes at WalMart and Target. Her request brought up my guilt that having missed Girl 101 myself (and not being interested in learning because of my feminist principles) I don't know how to teach her things that most girls learn about female culture. She already feels that it is going to be difficult to decide whether to shave--I told her that most women do, though I don't, and she will probably want to. At this point she seems to see it as hard to be disloyal to my example.

Sunday we stopped at an outlet center and went to the Gap and Old Navy outlets, as well as a few others. And yesterday I actually took her to the nearest real mall. I probably haven't been in a mall in 5 years. It wasn't crowded so it wasn't too bad but it wasn't inspiring. She bought one shirt but the thing she wanted most was a Beanie Baby.