4 year old son has asked for fairy wings and wand for Christmas

[Jenb1993]

Our 4 year old son has asked for a fairy wand and purple fairy wings for Christmas. My husband is not impressed and has said we need to stop him watching ‘Ben and Holly’s kingdom’ as this is clearly where he has got the idea from and we can not get him this for Christmas.

He has asked for three things this Christmas. A fairy wand, fairy wings and a police car. He wakes up in the morning telling me how excited he is for Santa to come and how he has been dreaming about getting a wand and fairy wings.

My husband tried to tell him that girls are only fairy’s and he should ask for dragon wings but our son doesn’t understand and desperately wants fairy wings.

I personally don’t have a problem with this, I love his imagination and I know that it’s just a phase. He really thinks this is what Santa will be getting him.

Just wanting some opinions and advice on how I should approach this with my husband.

I'm pretty sure male fairies exist, Oberon for example

Another man frightened his son my catch gay.

Tell him that toxic masculinity is exactly the sort of thing that creates the Andrew Tates of this world and your son is getting wings, end of.

This.

Get the wand and fairy beings and get your dh and pair too. He clearly missed out as a child

Get the wings.

Mimi and Lula have some lovely ones that are a bit more neutral, gold and shimmery, and 20% off at the mo.

@IDontHateRainbows correct! Puck, Oberon, Peaseblossom, Cobweb, can't recall the rest.

@Jenb1993 tell your husband you're getting your child ready for when they study Shakespeare!

My three year year old DS has asked for an Elsa frozen dress up costume for Xmas so we've got it for him, he already has a Ben and holly wand and various princess toys and dress up costumes, he loves anything to do with princesses. He has other toys too, but these are his favourite, I have no problem with it, its just what he likes.

I'm glad there's a broad consensus to just get him the damn wings, but I'm not a huge fan of the "my DS used to wear a tutu but now he plays rugby" narrative as it suggests that to be interested in anything that is not traditionally masculine is just a silly childish thing and that they'll "turn out OK" in the end.

Maybe he'll grow out of it and love rugby
Maybe he'll always love sparkles and magic
Maybe he'll love sparkles and magic AND rugby

Who can say - but they're all equally valid choices.

Why should OP have to dial down to make it nice for her husband though? Her son wants purple wings so that’s what I’d get him. The glitziest pair of them too.

And no to a Harry Potter wand, get him a fairies wand. I’m sure next year the son will be back to wanting Marvel Avengers boy stuff by then.

Plus don’t forget the Angel Gabriel and probably a few other biblical angels are male. Gabriel is definitely male.

I would have objections if there was more serious exploration of identifying with the opposite sex. That's not to say the best reaction is to suppress it, but you could make an argument for not encouraging it or being party to it

Four year olds don't have serious explorations of identifying as the opposite sex. Adults who believe in gender ideology impose that onto children. Just let him dress and play as he wishes. He may grow up to like rugby and guns. He may grow up to be an effeminate gay man. These outcomes will happen regardless of your H 'allowing' him to have fairy wings or not. And both of these outcomes are as good as the other.

Get the fairy wings and say he's King Thistle, the Fairy King.

Gabriel is a man's name, so the Angel is supposed to be a man.

Ben and Holly is hilarious and in some ways can be educational.

I have been working in a nursery recently and the boys there love the sparkly, sequin bangles, shoes, bags, dresses and will happily play with the prams and the baby dolls with the girls, who will also happily play with the cars and the construction stuff.

Tell your dh he's being a prick and you can't catch the girly cooties from some toy wings.

At that age my son went into preschool for a couple of wings and changed straight into a daily costume which he wore all day!! I would just get them and tell your husband that he is being silly little boys playing with 'girl toys' makes no difference. My son is now 7 and firmly into Pokémon and Minecraft and I miss the simplicity of the fairy days!!

My ds wore his sister's fairy outfit with wings and had a dolls pushchair too .
When I told my macho work colleagues I made cupcakes with sprinkles with my dad and D's they commented he would end up being gay.
He is and I'm 100 💯 sure non of the above contributed to it.

One of my favourite pictures of ds is when he was at nursery.

He was wearing a policeman's helmet, a high vis vest, had a hammer in his hand and high heels on 😂😂

Kids have great imagination and don't care about gender (which is gray).

Great (not gray!)

Tell your DH not to be so ridiculous. Gender stereotypes are, sadly, still at large. A pair of fairy wings aren't going to turn your DS into a girl.

Two examples for your DH. Godson aged 2 chose a kitchen to borrow from a toy library. Dad said godson mum and I had forced it on him (we hadn't). Godson is now 35, a father and a research scientist. My DD aged 2's favourite toy was a garage. She is in her final year of modern languages at uni, wears dresses as well as trousers, and has a boyfriend.

Crikey my now strapping 21 year old lad, wanted a doll and pram for his 3rd Christmas, his dad was not happy but it's what he wanted so he got it. He also loved having his nails done until he was about 9 and also loved his sister's dress up clothes. I let him do all those things, because I also let my daughters have trucks and dinosaurs. Would he want to do those things now, no probably not, but it didn't hurt him at the time. Kids should be allowed to explore, there is nothing wrong in that.

@GoneWithTheWindIsMyFart

Hubby is being unreasonable but let's not repeat homophobic myths . No actual physical evidenced studies have proven the cause of being gay or trans FFS! Not giving your child the toys they want is unreasonable but wouldn't cause trauma I don't think. Otherwise we would all be fucked. Most of us didn't get Mr Frosty after all!
Good Lord I don't believe that. I'm suggesting that's what the dh thinks. So use his ignorance against him by telling him he'll traumatise his ds if he refuses his whims now. I was saying this with my tongue rather firmly in my cheek

I see. Apologies, I think I misread your intent there. In think that's a good idea exactly.

OP if your dh thinks there are no male fairies ask him who the females are having sex with 😂

Ask your husband what it is about a fairy wand and wings that he doesn’t like. Sometimes I find actually making them verbalise their sexism makes them think twice. Hopefully it’s just a historic innate way of thinking passed down from his sexist father and once he stops and thinks about it he’ll see sense!

Get the kid his wings and buy dad a matching pair, twatbag.

Yeah I find this, don’t know if it’s conscious or not, but you get a lot of the “don’t worry, mine turned out normal in the end” posts on here.

My 3 year old boy is dressed as Elsa most days..