"My mother and mother in law however, both insist that the girls should be ‘trained’ for a future as a wife and mother". I thought that view died with the 1950s, but I agree with others, that you will never change their ideas. They sound like people whose view is "don't bother me with facts, I already know what I think".


However, looking at this from an engineer's viewpoint. A person who is a wife and mother needs to run the house: change fuses, replace batteries, mend the cistern, set up the X-Box (whatever that is), service and mend the bicycles. When given a child's iron, you could teach your daughters about electricity, and what fuse is necessary - and how it is different in the USA. When the present is a vacuum cleaner, teach about vacuums. Cooking is similar to chemistry: what happens if cornflour is stirred into hot milk, how to convert oven temperatures from Fahrenheit to Celsius. In the car, talk about instantaneous and average speeds. Be enthusiastic. Maybe some of your fun facts will fall on stony ground, but if you don't try you'll never know. Look at "girlie" presents with an engineer's eyes, and you'll be amazed how you can turn the tables on them. Get the girls to help with fun tasks that involve STEM topics. I'm sure your husband can give you further ideas.


I was lucky, my father (who was born in 1894) bought me my first hammer, micrometer, and so forth. He encouraged me to make things - I made my mother a book stand, a case for a loud speaker. Things like that. Before I went to school, I had put up wallpaper: my father was a journeyman house decorator.


Another thought ... aren't a lot of "girlie" presents plastic? Perhaps plastic presents could be banned as being bad for the planet???


Good Luck

Doreen

"My mother and mother in law however, both insist that the girls should be ‘trained’ for a future as a wife and mother". I thought that view died with the 1950s, but I agree with others, that you will never change their ideas. They sound like people whose view is "don't bother me with facts, I already know what I think".


However, looking at this from an engineer's viewpoint. A person who is a wife and mother needs to run the house: change fuses, replace batteries, mend the cistern, set up the X-Box (whatever that is), service and mend the bicycles. When given a child's iron, you could teach your daughters about electricity, and what fuse is necessary - and how it is different in the USA. When the present is a vacuum cleaner, teach about vacuums. Cooking is similar to chemistry: what happens if cornflour is stirred into hot milk, how to convert oven temperatures from Fahrenheit to Celsius. In the car, talk about instantaneous and average speeds. Be enthusiastic. Maybe some of your fun facts will fall on stony ground, but if you don't try you'll never know. Look at "girlie" presents with an engineer's eyes, and you'll be amazed how you can turn the tables on them. Get the girls to help with fun tasks that involve STEM topics. I'm sure your husband can give you further ideas.


I was lucky, my father (who was born in 1894) bought me my first hammer, micrometer, and so forth. He encouraged me to make things - I made my mother a book stand, a case for a loud speaker. Things like that. Before I went to school, I had put up wallpaper: my father was a journeyman house decorator.


Another thought ... aren't a lot of "girlie" presents plastic? Perhaps plastic presents could be banned as being bad for the planet???


Good Luck

Doreen