More Than A Princess

The Snow White Cookery School

For a really long time the twins have been in “The Princess Stage”. It was a bit of a surprise as though my eldest liked the movies and occasionally dressed up as a princess she didn’t really go into it with the commitment of the twins. Rose was crying yesterday because she had to get changed out of her Sleeping Beauty costume to go to a party and said “It’s no fun wearing normal clothes. Normal clothes are boring. I want to dress like Aurora all the time.”

Now I don’t have a huge problem with it. The stories are stimulating to their imaginations and tit encourages so much role play and talk. My problem comes in the fact that some of the princesses are terrible role models. All they do is simper and get into problems and look pretty. At least the modern Disney films have strong female characters who can save the day and hit people with frying pans, have magic powers and don’t need a man to save them. So anyway, while not wanting to stop them I want their favourite game to have a more aspirational element. I like to talk about what happens next in the stories – what jobs do they have, what do they do so that the girls aspire to being more than a princess.

I’ve been setting up some role play for the girls so that they can be their favourite princesses but doing something a bit more empowering. They wanted to start with Snow White. Her career path is fairly predictable. Of course she would start up a cookery school, and teach everyone how to make the perfect apple pie. So many successful women are turning their hobbies and creative talents into successful businesses – why not Snow White? As long as she takes a bit more care with the ole’ Health and Safety and learns to recognise poisoned apples, I think she will be incredibly successful. She also has the people skills and gentle art of persuasion which would make her a good teacher.