Kiwanja, now almost 4 1/2, is showing an increasing interest in the commercialized "princess" concept and merchandise so prevalent today. Her friends get together and try on different fancy costumes and pretend to be princesses in a Disney/Barbie-esque sense. And when she got her very own money as a present from grandparents at Christmas, she chose with great excitement to spend it on a sparkly pink princess dress and all the equally sparkly accompaniments - purse, wand, shoes, tiara, necklace, bracelet, earrings, hat with veil. A wonderful experience of empowerment and interesting for me to see what she chose to buy.
On the way home from the store, Kiwanja asked "What's the difference between ballerinas and princesses?" and the follow-up question "What do princesses do?" This flashed a lightbulb in my head as I realized that real-life princesses actually do quite a lot of service projects to help people in their countries and around the world. I thought, why not learn about REAL princesses and how they live, covering geography, service, fanciness, travel, public relations, cultural differences etc. Once again, turn a commercially-implanted interest into a real-world learning experience.
It's still a nascent idea, so I'll see if Kiwanja is interested in pursuing it. If she is, we can dive in, learning about princesses around the world, probably mainly through online resources that I can research and we can explore together. I love those lightbulb moments.
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