Why you Should Never Play Dolls with your Brother

This weekend, my 6-year-old daughter pulled out the doll house and asked her 8-year-old brother if he'd play with her. He was perfectly willing to play dolls with her. A cool thing about having boys and girls is that we have a variety of toys with which the kids can play. Now and then, the boys like to check out the "girl toys" and now and then the girls like to check out the "boy toys". So, yesterday the kids were playing with this doll house while I was baking (and eavesdropping on them). Here's a transcript of the conversation they had while playing:

BROOKLYN: Here, Clay, you can be the dad and the boy. I’ll be the mom and the girl.

(Clay grabbed the dolls and held the boy upside down by his feet.)

BROOKLYN: No, Clay. You have to hold him this way. (demonstrating the proper doll-holding technique that’s inherent to little girls)

CLAYTON: (acquiescing to the proper doll-holding technique) Can the boy have super-powers?

BROOKLYN: (authoritative) No.

CLAYTON: (flying the boy around the family room) He can fly! He’ll save you from eeeeevil!

BROOKLYN: (annoyed) Clayton! You’re not playing right! They’re going to have breakfast now. (in the requisite high-pitched ‘doll voice’) Come here and sit down, honey.

CLAYTON: (obligingly sitting down) Can I have ice cream?

BROOKLYN:  No, you have to have a healthy breakfast.

CLAYTON: (making crazy gulping, chomping noises) I’m done! Now it’s time to go to work. (putting his doll into the bathtub and making engine revving noises) Get out of my way! I’m driving to work!

BROOKLYN: That’s not a car! It’s a bathtub, Clayton.

CLAYTON: No, it’s a car and it shoots bullets too. (holding shower head like a gun and aiming it at Brooklyn while making shooting noises like every boy is apparently born knowing how to make)

BROOKLYN: (giving him her best ‘I am not amused’ look) Stop shooting, Clayton. That is not a gun. You have to get ready to go to the dance. (in the ‘doll voice‘) Let’s get ready, honey. Pretend like you’re putting on fancy clothes.

CLAYTON: (firing off a few more rounds with his shower head gun while speeding around the house in his bathtub) Woo Hoo!

BROOKLYN:  Clayton!

CLAYTON:  Parkour, parkour! (taking the boy doll and making him jump off the roof)

BROOKLYN:  Clayton!

At this point, Clay took off with the doll, running through the house like a gibbon on crack, and Brooklyn fired him, replacing him with Lexi, who understands the concept of talking in a ‘doll voice’ and getting ready for dances instead of shooting people with a bathtub.