Queen bees and wannabes

I've always wanted to read this book, as it offers concrete strategies to help you empower your daughter to be socially competent and treat herself with dignity. What mother of girls wouldn't want a little help and insight with this topic. However I'll have to rely on my thoughts based off of the movie instead as I haven't gotten it off of my "to-read" list just yet. (Unfortunately, if you've met Emma, the book "Parenting the Strong Willed Child" must come first.) The movie adaptation of "Queen Bees and Wannabes" is called Mean Girls, and I find it to be a hilarious, yet relatively accurate, view on pre-teen/teen drama.

So, why when my children are 5 and under am I thinking about this book?! As I sat with Norah watching the girls play at the park yesterday, I was struck by 2 re-occuring thoughts.

1. Where has this beautiful weather been all summer and condolences to my fellow co-workers who started back to work yesterday and...

2. Who is this child that is bossing my daughter around on the playground, making her march behind her and sit in time outs in the woodchips...and why is my daughter obeying?!

Grace met a new "5 minute" friend at the park yesterday. She has always been fairly quick to make friends and will introduce herself to any girl who appears to be her size at the park so we have deemed these as her "5 minute" friends since we never see them again and she rarely can even remember the name of the new friend she met. She was playing with 2 adorable girls yesterday who were friends and adopted her as a third. However, roles were quickly set in place. It was obvious who the leader was and she continued to boss around the other 2 girls and belittle them. I wasn't surprised that she did this to Grace as she was a "new girl" and was the third wheel, but she also bossed around her other friend who came to the park with her. I was curious if her mother was watching this (she was) and if she was okay with this (she was).

I couldn't help but wonder where Grace will fall in the queen bees and wannabes categories. I don't foresee her being a queen bee and truthfully, I would be appalled if that is where she ended up. But, I don't want her to be a wannabe either, which is where her current status falls. I like to think she is just an obedient kid who likes to please others...but when all you do is worry about pleasing others, sooner or later you can't handle the pressure and blow up. I have seen these blow ups with Grace already. I hate to think that I am thinking so far ahead when she is just entering kindergarten where everyone carries the same "social status" in the eyes of each other, but time flies...and my mind is better geared for adolesence since I've had 10 years of practice with that teaching high school and only 5 years of practice with my kiddos!

Any queen bees or wannabes out there want to fess up?! I know I fell into more of the wannabe category as I always complained how my friends got to do WAY more cool stuff than I did, but I also don't ever remember feeling like I wanted to BE them either. I just wanted to get away and do my own thing...something that I really hope my girls can do. As far as the queen bee in me...I practiced my queen bee qualities on my little sister, bossing her around every chance I got.