Ethan has just celebrated his second birthday; my little baby is turning into a little boy!

A few months ago, we started to gather a little list of things he liked ready to pick them up when we saw them on offer for his birthday. The list contained football goals, diggers, cars, trains, dinosaurs. You see the trend here?!

That got me thinking though, are we too gender specific with toys and the colours of them these days? Don’t get me wrong, everything on the list is things that Ethan loves. He does play with his sister’s kitchen at times and has even been known to push her dolly round in the buggy, but he just prefers to play with his cars and dinosaurs more.

When I was growing up, toys were just toys. There was never the option to buy a pink kettle or blue kettle – they were just yellow or red, gender neutral. However, today it seems it’s a completely different story.

If you go to buy anything you have the colour choice, mainly, of pink or blue. Which I suppose can be lovely and easy when you have the same sex children, however when you have one (or more) of the opposite sex like I do, it makes it awkward and expensive! I remember looking at getting some little bits for the kitchen that Kayleigh got for Christmas a few years ago. However, I couldn’t find anything that was neutral colours – they were all pink or blue. This then caused arguments as Kayleigh wanted the pink and Ethan wanted the blue! So I had the choice, either buy one of each or nothing at all to save the hassle of an argument.

Also why should we only have the choice of just a couple of colours? When can’t we have a little bit more of a selection across the board to brighten up toys?

Am I just getting old and grumpy now or is there a rise in gender specific toys and colours? Plus is it really necessary? Why do we need to stereo type children?