Gender Stereotypes - Preschooler Edition

Feeling woozy from my 3:45am wake up with no nap and a glass of Riesling sloshing around in my belly, I was enjoying a peaceful meal thanks to a zonked out naught toddler and decided that we should tackle gender stereotypes for our dinner conversation.

That's a nice way of me saying I'm sick and tired of cooking all the meals all the time and I want to make sure my daughter understands that it's my choice to cook because if I didn't we'd be eating Lean Cuisine and pasta every night and I'd have to clean up one hell of a messy kitchen.

"Do Daddies cook meals?" I asked her.

My husband gave me the "are you seriously going to have this conversation right now with our four-year-old daughter who just tried to stick a piece of corn in her nose?" look.

"Do Daddies cook meals?" I repeated, nudging her more strongly for more than just the zoned out preschooler look.

"No!" she replied.

I chuckled.

My husband tried to remind her that he had indeed cooked dinner the night before. Of course, "cooked" meant that he seasoned the chicken.

"Well, I just want you to know that Daddies can cook too" I said, pleased that my experiment had indeed gone my way.

"How about cleaning? Do Daddies clean ?" I asked her.

"YES!" She exclaimed, joyfully.

My husband smiled.

"BUT NOT MOMMIES!"

Eh, well. It could be worse.

Comments

[CeliaLYNCH]

Cars and houses are quite expensive and not every person is able to buy it. But, credit loans are invented to help people in such hard situations.

[Linda]

AHAHAH. Yeah, mine said to me one day when I told them a friend's mom was a at work "why is SHE at work? Mommies don't work, only daddies!" Hmmmmmm.....

[Oz]

That sounds like a fantastic division of household responsibilities to me.

[Tara]

Ha!

We moved a little over two months ago and my husband went to heat up something on the stove. He just stood there for a minute, staring it at, and then I realized, "HE DOESN'T KNOW HOW TO USE THE STOVE." The same stove I made dinner on for the past 60 days, he can't even figure out how to make one of the burners come on...Geez.

[Sarah Hawley]

eh, just like them to screw with you when you think you have them on the hook.

[patois]

My husband is the cook in our family. But I do everything else. EVERYTHING! Except the yard work. Oh, and putting the clean sheets on the beds ('cause I'm disabled with a bum elbow). Oh, and making the kids' lunches when he's in town. Hmmmm, maybe my kids' daddy does do enough.

[Betty @ JustAnotherSAHM]

Mommy cooks & cleans but Daddy does all the dishes, empties the trash, vacuums (sometimes) & cuts the grass.

Works well...now if I could just get him cleaning the bathrooms I'd be set!

[Shawna]

My son recently asked me to teach him how to use the washing machine. He wants to know how to do something that Daddy doesn't.

[Josie]

That is SOOO funny!

[LSM]

My favorite one along these lines is when my niece insisted to her chef dad that she wouldn't cook like him when she grew up because, "I'm going to be a mommy, and mommies don't cook!" My sister is a lucky woman. :)

[Julie @ The Mom Slant]

What Sarah said. Around here mommies clean and daddies cook and everyone makes money. But mommies definitely bitch a lot more.

[Jennifer]

Just reading your site for the first time! LOVED it! I can relate to the cooking thing oh, so much! Thanks for sharing!

[The Other Sister-in-Law]

Oh, that's priceless. I can't cook, but I can definitely clean, so we have a clean house and a freezer full of Lean Cuisines. :) But my husband can cook, so we can have good meals too. They just don't come from me!

[Sarah @ BecomingSarah.com]

In my house, it's the opposite. My baby is going to think Daddy doesn't clean and Momma doesn't cook. Lol.

[Christina]

In this house, daddies do the cooking, unless it's just a PB&J or some Easy Mac.

And when it comes to the kitchen, daddies do the cleaning there, too, but with help from the little ones. Cordy has recently become obsessed with cleaning, wanting to help with every task.

I certainly won't stop her. Less for me to do that way.

[mommysaidwhat?]

I'm constantly worried about the example we set for our kids. I rush around the house frantically while Daddy dozes on the couch. Yet whenever something's in need of cleaning, my 3 yr old says, "Mommy, Neneth (our cleaning lady) comes on Monday, right?"

[BeanMa]

Mine is in charge of all cooking and preparing of meat. I can't stand to do it, but I'll eat it.

[Christy@thecegelskis.com]

The mommy of this house doesn't clean either...that's pretty evident as soon as you walk through the door. And I'm okay with that.

[Asianmommy]

In our household, when Daddy does the girls' hair, it's a "Daddy-do," which looks nothing like their usual hair style. :)

[Lisa]

In my house, Daddies cook, but Mommies don't think they're very good at it and micromanages it and then just outright takes over when Daddy is looking away.

[EmmieJ]

Hilarious! I guess my hubby and I are lucky in the teaching gender roles area because we both go through phases where one of us is a lazy slob and the other one does all the work. And then we switch. It's not intentional and I can't explain why it happens, but it does. We've totally failed at teaching consistency but they know that both mommies and daddies cook and clean and do laundry and mow the lawn and sit on the couch eating junk food and watching TV. Boy I can't wait until they're old enough to do all the chores.

[Marketing Mommy]

It goes both ways. I'm the breadwinner and my 4 1/2 year old daughter is convinced that only Mommies go to work.

[Mimi]

I wonder what mine would say if she could? "My parents are both slobs and the Mexican lady cleans up after their pig asses?"

[Kate]

I second the comment about the word "help". Ugh.

And why do men always want to be thanked for doing their normal responsibilities? I never get thanked for sweeping the floor, emptying the dishwasher, etc.

Why does he want to be thanked because he finally cleaned the bathroom (his one chore)... after being reminded by my oh so gentle "I'm having trouble seeing the sink through the crud and I shouldn't have to hover in my own house" remark.

[psumommy]

LOL @ Michelle...I had the same thought. :)

I'm lucky to have a hubs who likes to cook and does whenever he can. We have a rule in our house that we must thank the cook for making lunch/dinner, and our kids now say "Thank you to...uh...whoever made dinner tonight!" I think that's a good thing.

ps: I just ordered the 30 day shred video because of you! Any suggestions?

[Nico Blue]

If we want Daddy to cook in our house we have to speak his language...it's called BBQing. Thank goodness the warm weather is fast approaching!

[Naomi]

Yes, I amke sure to have thease converstaions. Sometimes my husband says to our 4 yr old. "We should help Mommy clean up the table" and that irritates me so much because it is ALL of our table and ALL of our mess and not my job alone because I am female. I prompt him to say. "we should clean up the table to take are of our own house and things"
Argghh!

[Angela]

You want to pass a little of that OCD cleaning thing your husband's got going on over here? Mine could use some!

[Rachel]

too funny

[Michelle]

So...Daddies don't clean Mommies?