I had originally tried making my own bow using elastic purloined from Mum's sewing kit. Alas, it wasn't very successful. Part of the problem, I later realised, was that my "sticks" were actually dried dock plants, after they'd set seed and turned brown.
It's very different days.
I was a PT in a Scottish high school. By the time I retired, girls were coming in wearing what I would have termed full evening make-up. Gel nails seem to be de rigueur. (I actually had girls telling me they needed a scribe because they couldn't "waste their nails". Eh?!)
No wonder that the girls who just want to come into school and get on with things feel that they're different from the rest.
One of my colleagues gave her first year class wee presents at the end of term - pencils and rubbers.
One girl started complaining because her rubber had a dinosaur on it and "that's only for boys". I could weep.