To ask what your best advice for surviving the Tweenage years - particularly for girls?

[tweenagedreams]

I have twin DDs just about to leave year 6 - very different from each other but both just quite earnest/keen still and not very worldly.
Other Y6 girls have Stanley cups and designer backpacks and have skincare etc - just somehow seem more put together than my DDs.
I am starting to worry that they will be eaten alive when they go to their secondary school...
They listen to pop music but I haven't taken them to gigs or anything yet - how do parents even know how to be a "cool mom" (for a y6/y7 ??

Not all the girls in Y7 will be into the same things, so they might fall in with the Stanley cup crowd or they might not! My DD has just finished Y7, and now she is a little more into skincare and makeup than last year, but still not to an excessive extent. She bought a Stanley cup - the small one - with her Christmas money, but says they are going out of style at her school, so she wasn’t even that bothered. There are “cool and preppy” girls at her school, but also plenty of girls who aren’t into that aesthetic at all, and she has lots of friends, some of whom are and some of whom aren’t “cool”, so she picks and chooses what she likes. You can let your DDs find their own thing at their own pace.

I am not trying to be a cool mom. I will never be. My OP was badly worded - I'm wondering how those who are make it look so effortless.
I am encouraging my DDs to be themselves and like the things they do but with the time spent with these people in the last half of term with the end of term concert and a leavers BBQ etc I have been made aware more of the gaps.

I tried posting earlier but it didn’t seem to work (stupid MN app): it was to say that as pp have now already mentioned, most of this stuff is inconsequential. BUT that it can feel big at the time. I looked at what kids were wearing at activities. In our area a pair of Nike pro shorts and some Brazilian bum bum scent will win points for girls. For boys branded white t shirts, combat trousers and checked shirt/jackets are useful. DD has a Lululemon backpack or a Longchamp pliage bag, DS a nice underarmour rucksack. Branded trainers also seem to win points - like Nike dunks etc.. but tbh none of this seems essential and as my children have grown in confidence they have bothered less about having the same as others. Eg they are happy with non branded air pods. My mum was militantly against me having anything that conformed. That was quite hard. Good luck to your girls