I have never been good at being a girl. I am not that feminine. I hate to shop. I don’t get excited over ruffled clothes and high heels. Ulta overwhelms me. I don’t care if my make-up is on fleek. My hair is typically in a messy mom bun and dressed up is jeans and my good boots. I’ve spent my life doing all the things girls aren’t supposed to do, all the boy things. Then, I became a mom.
At 18 weeks into my first pregnancy, we found out we were expecting a bouncing baby girl. A girl. Seriously? What was I going to do with a girl? I barely knew how to act like a girl myself and now I was going to have to raise one! Surely they were wrong and the baby was a boy. I mean that happens all the time! Not this time. The baby shower was a sea of pink and ruffles. Bows and patent leather shoes. As panic set in, my mother assured me I’d be okay. I could raise her the way I was raised. She’d be just like me.
Wrong. This kid came out crying crystals and sweating glitter. She was born to shine. Baby dolls and ponies, pageants and cheerleading, she was everything I never was. We had nothing in common. Regardless of her wishes, chores still had to be done. She had to hang out at the barn when the horses needed tended. That’s where it happened. Our connection. My way into my daughters life.
We bonded in a new way in the barn and it opened the door for me to introduce her to so much more. She harvested her first deer at age 6. She’s a competitive NASP archer. For Christmas, she asked for her first HOYT compound bow, She’s a great little angler. This year she earned her KY OUTDOORSWOMAN patch at Camp Robert Webb conservation camp. She’s on her way to great things and I am so blessed to be along for the ride. I want her to have every opportunity to explore this life and I am working hard to make it happen. I will support her from the sidelines no matter what she chooses to do. But when she asks to go fishing or hunting, a little voice inside me squeals like a schoolgirl with joy.
Blog and Post by:
Marketing Director
Erin Bingham-Stump