#The boys have a very skewed idea of age appropriate activities

[radioactivepeasant]

Fic Prompts: Snippet Thursday

Following up from last week's poll, this week we have Prisoner Exchange AU: Jak gets in trouble (we all knew it had to happen sooner or later)

The second his boots hit the sand, Jak knew he'd screwed up. He could see Damas waiting in the vehicle pit, having what looked to be an extremely intense conversation with Sig. And Jak knew it was his fault. The idea of facing the wrath of the king was far from appealing, but he disliked the idea of Sig taking the blame for his stupidity.

"So do we face the music, or fake our deaths and flee the country?" Daxter asked morosely from behind him.

The question was answered for him when Damas looked over at them. Oh, he looked calm at first glance, but his eyes radiated fury. He pointed at them, and then to the ground beside him, and his meaning was clear:

Get your you-know-what over here. Now.

"Dun-da-dun: we're dead," Daxter announced.

"Extremely dead," Jak agreed.

Nevertheless, he ignored the way his stomach churned and twisted around his ribs, and picked his way across the sand.

Being in trouble was nothing new for Jak. In fact, most of his memories involved getting punished for one escapade or another. But this was the first time in recent memory that he could remember being anxious about getting in trouble. He'd seen Damas angry a few times before, but it had never been directed at him. In spite of everything they'd gone through, and everything they'd worked to build, Jak felt his pulse racing, and the old familiar instinct to fight for his life.

When he'd reached the men, Jak opened his mouth, intending to defend Sig. Damas beat him to it.

"What were you thinking?" he demanded.

Jak had thought that would have been obvious.

"That...I...was gonna clear out the metalpede nest?"

The glare he got in return warned him to try a different tack.

"Look, don't blame Sig. If he hadn't gone with me, I would've gone without him."

Damas did not appear to like that any more than the last statement. A muscle in his jaw twitched, and he narrowed his eyes at Jak.

"I told you not to enter the canyons until you had all three amulets."

"I'm sorry, okay? But we lost seven people to that nest!" Jak defended, flinging out an arm to gesture to the walls. "Egil's goons are already pushing past the river and winter's on the way. We can't afford to lose any more scouts!"

"I cannot afford to lose you!" Damas snapped.

Jak flinched away from his harsh tone. A mixture of confusion, nerves, and wounded pride compelled him to retort, "I'm trying to help! I live here now, remember?"

Damas closed his eyes and took a deliberately slow breath. Sig, Jak, and Daxter exchanged nervous glances. They knew full well this didn't herald anything good.

"Sig," Damas said through gritted teeth, "take the boys to their room, then wait for me in the aviary."

Sig nodded, but didn't verbally respond. He seemed to be feeling much more guilt than Jak did. He stepped to the left and put a hand on Jak’s shoulder. Before they could leave, Damas turned and cleared his throat.

"Wait. Give me your gate passes- both of you. You're all confined to the city until I decide what to do with you."

Privately, Jak thought that being deprived of his gate pass was a heavy punishment already. But Damas seemed mad enough that mentioning it might cause him to prove Jak wrong. He kept his mouth shut -- somewhat belatedly, so much for Damas’s attempts at teaching him negotiation -- and let his father take his gate pass away.

Well, this sucks, he thought, but knew better than to voice it.

When they'd walked far enough to be mostly out of earshot, Daxter remarked, "Well, that could've gone worse."

"Might still get worse," Sig sighed. He ran a hand over his head. "...Damas is right. I almost got us killed out there, cherries. He's got every right to be mad."

Jak tugged at his amulet restlessly. "You didn't want me to go along," he argued, "Doesn't that count for something? He's acting like I didn't take on a Swarm King with just Daxter and a gun!"

Sig ducked into the archway leading to the tower entrance and grimaced.

"No, he's acting like a man who lost his only son for years, and then had to deal with him recklessly risking his life on something that takes an entire team to accomplish. He-"

The big warrior stopped and blew out a frustrated breath. "You scared him, cherry. We scared him. And if anything had happened to you today, it would've been on me."

He shook his head and stomped into the lift.

"Two years I spent tearing Haven apart to find you, and then I let you waltz right back into danger. Unbelievable."

Jak settled into the corner of the lift and waited a few seconds until the silence became uncomfortable.

"Sig," he said, "You knew us before he did. In Haven, I mean. You know what we can do! You wouldn't have been able to stop me from joining the mission."

Guilt plucked at his lungs until he added, "I never meant for you to get in trouble, Sig. Usually we're the only ones who get blamed."

Sig's prosthetic eye whirred as its focus narrowed onto Jak’s face.

"Whatever was "usual" in Haven," he warned, "you're better off forgetting it. Things are different in the Wastelands, you know that!"

"I'm trying to help!" Jak argued. Why didn't anyone get that?! If he was capable of helping, he was obligated to help, wasn't he?

The lift locked into place and Sig pushed him out into the empty throne room. "You want to help?" he muttered, more to himself than to Jak or Daxter, "Maybe quit acting like it doesn't matter what happens to you as long as a job gets done."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Sig shook his head and pointed down the side corridor. "Just...go on back to your room, cherry. Precursors willing, Damas will have calmed down by the time he makes it up here. But I wouldn't be expecting that gate pass back anytime soon."

"You can't be serious," Jak groaned.

He was.

______________________________________

The room had seemed impractically large the first night the boys had been "quarantined" in the tower. Now it felt like the walls were closing in as Jak paced the circumference of the chamber for the fifth time. It had already been an hour, and there had been no sign of Damas. Somehow, that was worse than him being mad. When you knew it was coming, but they made you wait-

That was one of the most terrifying parts of the Baron’s prison.

As Jak started his sixth circuit, tracing his fingers along the wall, he passed Daxter lying on the bed.

"Huh," Daxter said aloud, wrinkling his nose.

"What?" Jak paused mid-step to look down at him.

Daxter sat up suddenly with a furrowed brow. "Say uh...you don't think Spikes was- nah, he doesn't seem that touchy-feely."

Jak thought of Damas holding him, the night he'd finally understood who he was. He thought of fierce embraces and quiet tears and kept them to himself.

"What do you mean, Dax?"

The ottsel fidgeted, and Jak recognized the emotion coloring his eyes as regret.

"It's just..."

Daxter's ears drooped.

"When you go off without me, I know you don't need my help. And I know you can take any monster that comes your way. But I worry anyway -- I can't help it! I lost ya for two years, and sometimes I get scared! Osmo, back in Haven, he called that traumatic stress."

Jak felt a pit in his stomach as he sank back down to sit beside Daxter on the bed.

"Oh," he said quietly.

He'd known, of course. Daxter always wore his heart on his sleeve. But he never talked about it.

"Do- do you think Spike Dad feels like that?" asked Daxter, gnawing on his lip, "cos if he does, I'm gonna feel like a heel."

Jak was silent as he contemplated that. Traumatic stress, huh? What would've set off-

Oh. He'd snuck out. Damas probably found his room empty. Did he have a flashback, like Jak did when doors were locked? Had Jak caused him to panic?

With a groan, Jak put his face in his hands.

"I suck at being a son," he grumbled.

"In our defense, only one of us has been actively parented before this," Daxter suggested, but it was half-hearted.

His ears twitched, first up, then back down again.

"Do...do you think he's gonna yell?"

"If he yells, I'll yell back," Jak answered hesitantly. "But I don't- I don't think he's going to be like Samos. I just...haven't decided if that's a good thing yet."

_________________________________________

Damas entered the chamber well over two hours later to find his son pacing like a caged caracal. By the slightly disturbed furniture, pushed away from walls here and there, it looked as if Jak had been at this for a while now. From all that Sig had told him, he could guess he was in for a fight. Considering what he'd been put through before returning to Spargus, the boy understandably did not take well to any perceived threat to his autonomy. But the moment Jak spotted him, his shoulders slumped.

"So-" Damas began, trying not to read too much into how resigned Jak looked.

"Look-" Jak interrupted, then winced slightly.

"I- We're...sorry," he said haltingly. "I...just wanted- I just wanted to help you."

He looked so earnest. Damas didn’t doubt he and Daxter had managed to talk Sig into letting them turn his scouting mission into a search-and-destroy. It was hard to argue with a face like that. Did the boy even understand what he'd done wrong?

"Oh Jak," Damas sighed.

He lowered himself to the small couch by the window and beckoned him over.

"Come. Sit with me."

Jak hesitated, but complied. The couch was small, but he tried to give Damas as much space as possible. He picked at a scar on his thumb and didn't look up.

"Why you?" Damas asked. When Jak didn't immediately answer, he prodded his shoulder. "Hmm? Why did you, specifically, have to go kill those metalpedes?"

Jak shrugged. "Because I could. Because I'm harder to kill than other people. Why risk them if I don't need to?"

From any other Spargan, those words would've been commendable. Coming from his only child, they burned Damas like brands pressed into his skin. Jak should never have been taught to see himself as expendable. He should never have suffered as he had. And yet Damas had failed to protect him.

"And you gave no thought at all to Sig’s warnings that this was a task too dangerous for one person?"

He watched his son's brows quirk as if something about the question puzzled him.

"Wh- when, um, when we were kids," Jak mumbled, "Nobody actually...cared...if we were doing something dangerous. Not unless it inconvenienced them. They expected us to do these things. To...to earn our keep."

When he looked up at last, Damas was frowning thoughtfully.

"Hmm. I...think I understand."

Damas turned that thought over in his mind. It would do no good to get angry now: Jak would just think it was directed at him. Still, it was for the best that the people of that tiny village were far, far beyond his reach.

"My son," he said, gently but firmly, "You must unlearn what your captors drilled into you. You are home now- you are free now. Those expectations do not apply."

For a moment, Jak said nothing. Then he whispered, "I don't know who I am without them."

Daxter peeked over the arm of the couch with an endearingly miserable look.

"Jak didn't mean to scare ya, and- and Sig just came along to watch our backs! Don't be mad at Sig, er, sir."

An honorific out of Daxter? Hell must have frozen over. It was this, more than anything, that told Damas that the boys truly were sorry.

"Sig didn't do wrong by going with you," he allowed, and dropped a hand over the couch arm to rest over Daxter's head. "But he did not inform me of what was happening, or give me time to form a larger team. That is what he did wrong- and what you did wrong. But we are not here to discuss Sig. We are here to decide what consequences I need to set to ensure that this does not happen again."

Both boys winced, and Damas noticed Daxter curl in on himself as though shielding himself before a blow. Jak schooled his face into an emotionless mask.

Damas regretted his promise to spare Haven for Jak's sake.

"You will be confined to the tower for six days," Damas announced, forcing himself to ignore the boys' reactions. "If you want your gate pass back, you'll have to earn it. Show me that I can trust you to make better decisions."

"And...after the week is up?" asked Daxter tentatively.

The king shifted his weight and ran a hand over his face. Alright, Sig. I'm choosing my battles.

"Before I came in here, I was going to ban you from the Arena trials until midwinter," he admitted.

Jak stiffened beside him, the protest already on his lips.

"But," Damas continued, "as you seem to have a better understanding of the gravity of the situation than I had initially thought, I offer a compromise."

Jak flexed his fingers and glanced over nervously. "O...kay?"

Damas offered a small smile in response. "You will only be barred from the Arena until you can escape me in a sparring match. How long that lasts will be up to you."

Jak sagged with relief -- and Daxter suddenly got a lot more anxious. Sure, Jak could fight metalheads the size of buildings and come out on top. But Damas had something the metalheads didn't: opposable thumbs.

This probably wasn't going to be as easy as Jak was thinking.

"Thanks. For...for not yelling," Jak said unexpectedly. "Daxter doesn't like yelling."

Damas dropped his other hand across the back of Jak's neck and squeezed affectionately, just the barest hint of pressure.

"If you have to shout to make your point, you've already lost control of the situation," he advised.

He caught the incredulous expression passing between the two boys and chose to let it go. They were still learning what it was to have a childhood. Lessons in leadership could come later.

"I know you're still getting to know me," he said hesitantly, "Perhaps the restrictions I place do not make sense to you. But they exist because I care about your safety. I fought to make this city one in which you could choose your own path. So you wouldn't have to fight for your life."

Daxter stretched up on tip-paws. "But that's why Jak fights!" he protested, "Cause he can't stand the idea of anybody goin' through what he did!"

Damas flinched, ever so slightly, and Daxter regretted bringing it up. It was fairly obvious that Damas had the same kind of survivor's guilt that he did.

"I...don't know a whole lot about dads, sure, but he's just doin' what you do, doesn't that count for somethin?"

Damas shook his head, but he didn't appear to be disagreeing. He only whispered, "I should have been there."

Daxter knew what he meant.

After a moment's hesitation, he climbed up onto the arm of the couch and tentatively patted Damas’s shoulder.

"Aw, look. Jak, uh...Jak has always been pretty fearless about runnin' into danger. Even before things went sideways! He used to wade out to the sandbar to save stranded Lurker Hounds, even though he knew they were gonna try and bite him! He uh, he had to learn that from somewhere, right?"

Jak raised his head and blinked. He'd sort of figured he'd learned it from his own elder self in an eternal loop. But...could Daxter be right? Was that wild, fearless, reckless little kid simply acting like a normal Wastelander?

"Maybe you fought so he wouldn't have to," Daxter suggested, merely thinking out loud, "But maybe he decided to be just like you? I mean have you met him? The kid's got a head like a rock!"

"Dude, really?" Jak glared at him.

Damas’s smile was bittersweet at best. "It is...a nice thought, Daxter," he admitted, "Admittedly, Jak...was quite stubborn when he was Mar."

Impulsively, he swung his arms close, dragging both boys into an impromptu embrace.

"However, you are still grounded."

"Darnit!" Daxter fumed.

[rpbetter]

"writes dubcon therefore is a freak who should be bullied off the site" ho boy i'm fed up with people acting as if consenting adults writing [insert "problematic" fictional thing here] is the worst thing in the world. seen way too many people justifying harrassment of REAL PEOPLE by "they write thing that triggers me". ok, and? mute the tags or don't follow! "it triggers someone" is not a valid reason to ban a topic. piano music triggers me yet i don't go around demanding everyone stop playing the piano.

Anon, not only is everything you said absolutely valid, but also, thank you for demonstrating that triggers are incredibly varied and as such, we cannot predict everyone's triggers. Making the entire "point" of banning for possible triggers invalidated as hell.

We should be aware of things like the most commonly occurring phobias (things like arachnophobia and coulrophobia that are, additionally, easily triggered by imagery) and tag them. We should be aware of very obvious triggers, that are, again, easily set off by imagery, like blood, eye trauma, and depictions of domestic violence. And we should always read and be aware of our writing partners' stated triggers so that we can tag them appropriately or even decide that it isn't going to work because our muse, canon story, or interests are going to present an unfair situation in this partnership.

But triggers can be highly unusual, as well as activated differently (even at different times) for everyone. I'm not triggered by seeing hotel rooms in pictures or movies, I'm not triggered by writing scenes that take place in them, but I'm triggered to some degree by being in one. It's outrageous oversimplification to act like all triggers are the same, they all display the same way, they're all going to trigger someone on the same basis, everyone's going to react the same to their triggers. There is absolutely no way to prevent 100% of possible triggers for 100% of the population, 100% of the time.

Add to this that way too many people trivialize triggers by throwing around that term to justify the banning of something that makes them uncomfortable or that they take a personal, moral issue with. "I don't like this" and "I'm grossed out by this" and "this makes me feel uncomfortable" is not being triggered. It's just a good way to weaponize the better nature of other people so that they comply.

Most people legitimately do not want to trigger someone, especially if they have triggers and know what it's like. Just like no one wants to be accused of cruelty towards trauma survivors in general, or be designated a pedo, rape apologist, or fascist. They're all things to weaponize in order to isolate, shame, and control. And that's really fucking gross. These are serious, real things that have no business being trivialized to police content, win internet arguments, or garner popularity.

The potential for someone to be triggered isn't a reason to ban anything; we have tags, we have blacklist.

While I'll be the first to say that tumblr's blacklisting can be as shitty as everything else on the site, the primary issue with running into content you don't want to see comes down to two factors: no one tagging/tagging correctly and actively exposing yourself to that content. Going through people's properly done tags and blog warnings about their content in order to "call it out" is actively exposing yourself by choice. You actual walnuts.

Calling people on on their "problematic" content is bringing those topics to the attention of other people. That's the whole point of this gross behavior: look at the freak pedo abuse apologist I found, they write dubcon!! Don't look if you'll be triggered uwu

Buddy, pal, my guy...you just put that on blast for anyone to run across. Maybe their blacklist catches those words in your callout post, maybe it doesn't. Maybe they think you're a safe space because you promote yourself that way, so they click it anyway. Point is, you just willfully and irresponsibly exposed people because it's more important to you to demonize a rando on tumblr RPing something you take issue with. Good job!

Furthermore, dubcon itself is such a hilarious issue to take. Do they realize that isn't always sexual, or? Not? I'm thinking not. Funnily enough, one of the oldest posts I've been working on for this blog is about exactly this topic, the myriad situations that are dubious consent. That doesn't have to be sexual, and neither does it have to be intentionally predatory. You can come up with some amazing character development with a lot of muses in the RPC with dubcon because almost everyone's muse has some manner of trauma that might negate their perception of their own consent...and what do you do then? Is it removing more agency from that muse to shut them down, or is that always the better option? Can you separate your opinion as the mun from your muse's natural reactions? How does this impact the muses involved not just that moment but the next year?

Point is, dubcon isn't always some rapey situation. Even if it was, even if someone is writing it that way, it's literally not your business or your problem.

There's one mutual-in-law on my RP blog that really bothers me. They write things that I find fetishizing, incredibly rapey, all around shit that bothers me. I don't want to see it, some of the things they write makes my damn skin crawl. This person doesn't know it, we certainly don't speak and I don't think they like me very much, but I've repeatedly defended their right, specifically their right as a person with some long-term callouts on them, to write what they want to. I have them blocked and their urls blacklisted so I never have to see my mutual reblogging their threads. It's not a problem because I don't click "show anyway." Why would I, if it genuinely bothers me so much?

That's how you handle things that bother you; you use the tools available to not interact even by accident. Not by launching a morality crusade.

If any of us want to write what we enjoy, we have to allow others that same freedom. It's always a matter of time before this policing grows to include more and more topics, it's been used multiple times to get well-meaning people who don't fall into the general demographics to police queer, BIPOC, and other marginalized groups off of platforms. We've been fortunate in most of the RPC that it implodes on itself before it gets all the way there, but even so, you can see it.

It starts with things that produce a visceral reaction in the great majority of people, positions this with a repeatedly condemned idea presented as solid fact that fiction is reality, and you've got the start of something awful. Today it's something you don't like, maybe even something that triggers you, so you either support it or you quietly allow it to happen. Who needs to write that "freak shit" anyway, can't they just be gross privately? Six months from now, it's something "problematic" that you enjoy like violence that's canon-typical for your muse, or your OTP because they're gay and that's fetishizing, they're cis male and female but one or both is bi and that's bad representation, or they canonically have a rocky relationship so that's romanticizing toxic/abusive relationships.

If you can't care for any other reason, you really should care about how it is going to impact you sooner or later. In an environment like this, you can stay in your space, put warnings on your blog, and tag properly and you're still going to get a callout if the wrong person finds your blog. Just takes a single person with more time, energy, and skewed ideas of justice than they have reading comprehension or common sense.

Again, I cannot encourage people enough to give warnings, but it's difficult to ignore why those warnings are slipping; they're a way to be found, designated as a Problem, and called out. Look, it's another reason why callouts actually make things worse, not better! People put that shit in their rules so you can avoid content, they're being responsible and interested in promoting a safe RPC. Let them do it, damn.

You can't tag everything, and if you've never experienced what a giant series of repetitive tags is like on a screenreader you probably should before you tag seven paragraphs of possible issues. You can tag for visuals, you can tag for the obvious things, and you can tag for what's in the rules you agreed to when you followed/followed back. But you should also warn people that you write "dark topics" on the tin, and expand on that in your rules for specific things like graphic violence, toxic relationships, dubon, and addiction.

That's how responsible adults, not over-aged children, make better decisions about their mental health and general comfort. Not by appointing themselves the watchdogs of the damn RPC, here to protect you whether you want to be or not, find that incredibly insulting or not when you're in one of their categories of people who must be protected, by forcibly banning Problematic Everything. Problematic, of course, being entirely in the eye of the content police.

It's fiction. No one and nothing real was harmed. It's great that you are so invested in the fictional world and people that make you happy, but take a fucking big step back into reality. The real people you're harming with your bullshit had every right to peaceably exist. If what they're writing is triggering to you, stay. away. from. it.

Without any coincidence whatsoever, that's how you get from the base-point of Problematic Material to Problematic Mun. Yeah, it's just fiction, it's just RP, but I also took something out of context OOC or was upset by their tone on their own blog or couldn't exercise the minimal adult logic to remove myself from their presence OOC as well. So, now, you've got OOC behavior being added to the callout, if it wasn't already. Everyone is now ableist, transphobic, racist, and a misogynist because it lends that visceral reaction to the callout and ups the game from just being "y'all so gross you aged up a cartoon character to ship" to "this is REAL and it won't be tolerated! OP is actually a pedophile, they told a sexual joke in a discord server with a minor present and I have the receipts!"

What are the most storied callouts in the entire RPC? I'm absolutely certain the same names came to mind no matter what fandoms you're in, and one of them was "Matt." Another was probably "Ares/Snow". They're all successful and keep being brought up out of the closet anytime people are bored enough because their primary punch is the mun themselves being a predatory threat to the community. The mun is verified to be a bad person. Well, of course, that's got to be repeated, it worked. (Even if it did not, at all, work and only made it harder for people to avoid any of these muns.)

Are there people in the RPC who are legitimately a problem? Absolutely, yes. We're all supposed to be adults, however. Part of being an adult is having and acting upon one's agency. If someone is coercing you into things you are not comfortable with, shut it down. If you have difficulties being certain of those situations, run it by a trusted, honest friend or available, impartial source in the RPC for a second opinion. If you can't handle any manner of confrontation, there really are situations in which it's perfectly alright to block someone without any discussion. It's just the internet, you're in control of your space. Own it.

Minors are a whole other can of fucked up worms I'm not even getting into right now except to say that because a minor exists in a space they were told to stay out of does not mean we ban all topics inappropriate for their consumption.

tl;dr: banning shit doesn't work anyway, the whole idea is predicated upon some incredibly problematic takes IRL, and no, there's no justification for it outside of intense personal problems with one's own importance. That energy would be infinitely better spent volunteering one's time to help real people in crisis or after surviving one, or even oneself in developing some healthier approaches and thought patterns.

[oxfordeliterp]

CONGRATULATIONS, RO!

You have been accepted to play the role of NICHOLAS MERCER with the faceclaim of DOUGLAS BOOTH. Please create your account and send it to the main in the next 24 hours. I am well aware of your first choice, but trust me when I say that I would have done you a great injustice not giving you the role of Nick. The twists you have picked for him, the paragraph sample you have masterfully done, every tweak and change and elaboration convinced me that you are the perfect player for him. You understand a character that I have always found tricky and have captured him to the last detail. A simple compliment regarding the twist on his relationship with Lucas wouldn’t suffice, for it is a detail that deserves endless praise. You are an incredibly good writer and, it seems, one of the friendliest people on this site  — and I cannot wait to see more of both you and Nicholas. Thank you for your cooperation and dedication, and know that they did not go unnoticed.

Name and pronouns: Ro - He/Him

Age: 26

Time-zone: PST

Activity level: I am a film student in third year, about to head into the summer. I tend to be very busy, but I’ve also been committed to RP as a part of my regular life and creative outlet for upwards of ten years. I should always make activity (and I’ll always contact you if I run into any issues) and I’d likely be doing replies a couple times a week. I try to lurk on the daily, but if I work in the industry again this summer, the hours are insane so I tend to be on the most on the weekends!

Triggers: removed for privacy

IN CHARACTER INFORMATION

Desired character: Nicholas Mercer - Nick is a very enthralling character to me. I’m drawn to the way he is at war with himself - the distaste and discomfort he feels when he looks in the mirror and can hardly meet his own gaze. I’m drawn to the compulsion he has to keep up this act and web of lies, despite the growing shame he feels at his own actions, because the shame he feels by his own roots is worse. I love that he’s a charmer, and has always been praised for his looks and brains and potential, and yet his smiles and confidence are in many ways an act carefully designed to hide the deep seeded insecurity and uncertainty underneath.

Gender and pronouns of the character: Male, He/Him

Changes: FCs: Man, this is hard to choose. Douglas Booth (I didn’t know he was in the film actually, haha, I’d never seen it) he’s a good fit with appropriate charm in his gifs, Daniel Sharman, who would maybe be my first pick, were it easier to find smiley-charmy gifs of him, and Zayn Malik - a less stereotyped approach, but I kind of like that and he’s got great gifs for it. If i get this role you may have to help me choose LOL. I’m unsure who’s best. I keep flip-flopping. At first I thought Douglas was the best bet but now I’m not sure.

Traits: Nicholas grew up believing that his value lied in how unlike the rest of the world he was. He was praised for his looks and his sharp, surprising mind. His teachers, classmates and parents spoke of little other than what a spectacle he was; how he stood out from the crowd, how his shine would make so many envy him. He was taught that these were the things that mattered because these were the things those who were meant to care for him seemed to value most about him. These were the things they were proud of.

And so growing up he developed followers and admirers, but not friends. He grew up having to protect these material and shallow things about himself because they were the only things his parents seemed truly invested in. Money and admiration were what he needed to be somebody. To matter and to make a mark, to not disappear into irrelevance. In short, he is deeply insecure and has a skewed sense of self worth. He only values in himself what he believes others have valued in him, and has become obsessed with protecting that ‘It-boy’ image in order to maintain his reason to be seen.

Headcanons/plot ideas:

Nick is a hard one to pinpoint, and I could go a few different ways for what he’s studying. Currently I’m thinking Law or Social Anthropology.

Nick is gay. I think it says something remarkable (and remarkably sad) about his determination to marry for money and status, and it speaks loads about his self-image. It makes me absolutely ache, how trapped he feels, how desperate and how self-loathing, and that’s the real reason he can’t look himself in the eye when he looks in a mirror. He’s ashamed on one level, for being ‘poor’ and not good enough, and ashamed on a whole other level, for being fraudulent, a liar, a deceiver and a coward. His levels of self-loathing and pain are bone deep and twisted around his ribs in a way that truly inspires me as a character driven writer. I could explore him endlessly. He has so much potential and I love him so much!

I’m interested in looking at his relationship with Lucas. I don’t want to rush any decisions until I get my feet wet and explore him a little and let the character show me how he feels, but I could see his relationship with Lucas as being one potentially unrequited of feelings Nick may be keeping tucked under his tongue. With everything else he’s feeling and hiding, and the fact that Lucas is one of the few people he feels really connected to at school, I could see that as being something he struggles with or something that develops. Either way, however, it’s a complicated and precious dynamic I’m excited about.

PARA SAMPLE

Scholarship.

The word felt filthy on the edges of his tongue. Before it even left his throat, stuck there at the wall of his too-white teeth. It felt like a betrayal. It felt like a confession that would tumble him apart. It felt like a truth so ugly it made all his lies feel like beautiful, caressing companions.

Scholarship. He lived in fear of the way the word exposed him, and as he stood in the men’s room, palms gripping the edge of the damp, marble counters, he hoped to God it never came up with his date sitting across the table from him. Hoped she hadn’t heard, somehow, through a furiously whispered rumour that he sometimes felt certain was ghosting at his tailcoat as he strutted through the corridors of Oxford. He was haunted by any remnants of his past still surface enough to peer through the veil of glass and sand he’d tried to bury it with.

He’s spent years perfecting his walk, his talk, his privileged smile and he’s so good at it now that he at times can even convince himself. Some days, he’s almost reinvented the truth. Has become so familiar with the lies that they’ve made him a nest in a safe, new reality.

But the rest of the time he lived in constant fear of that other shoe dropping.

The back splash tiles of the bathroom sink were pitch black and so shiny he could see himself in them. It was like even the room was laughing at him, and his reluctancy to look himself in the mirror with any kind of conviction. Too cowardly to face the twisted boy that Oxford had mangled him into. It was easier to blame the school. Easier to say that the pressure of the Riot Club and the prestige he was so constantly cloaked in, was responsible for his poorly justified choices, for his backburner-ing of integrity. His pride was forged in the cold grey slate of his artifice, and if you looked too closely you could see the places it was chipped.

The echoing sound of the door opening, of cutlery and chatter swooping into the space before the door slid shut again, shook him from his reverie and he twisted ornate taps with hurried fingers, running his palms under the flow as the sound of fine-Italian soles clacked behind his back and stopped at a urinal.

He breathed. Exhaled the breath he’d been holding, actually, and cupped cool water into his hands to splash it over his face. He didn’t always lose his cool. In fact, in company, he rarely did. The fact that he’d gotten so God damn good at this was half the reason guilt feasted on him as savagely as it did. He didn’t crack with an audience, but the pressure to perform so consistently made his solitude more of a place of unwanted reflection than of refuge. The silence gave him time to stop and think and hate and regret; all things he neither needed nor had the energy for. What he needed was to be kept busy. Moving constantly, his performance uninterrupted, so that in doing so he might forget everything it was he was running from. Everything he was covering up.

It was all Lana’s fault. He’d been holding the door open for his date (a pretty blonde thing with jewels around her neck worth the same dollar value as the tits sitting too-high and too-solid on her narrow ribcage to be natural) when Lana Chambers had strolled passed clutching her handbag and ducking under the umbrella of whatever current company she was in. And he’d seen it in her eyes—the nugget of truth she wielded, a weapon that could so easily destroy him. He’d seen the shadow of knowledge flick across her raven’s wings eyes as she’d glanced at him, then at his date.

He hated the way she looked at him—regardless of what she was thinking, he could’t shake the feeling she knew what he was up to. Knew all his darkest secrets, all the workings of his seduction on these women who would stabilize his status as top-tier. Couldn’t help but fear she would find a way to air his dirty laundry for the world to see—even if she hadn’t been privy to much of it. There was no way she could know the things he’d never told a soul. No way she could know how deeply his seduction of these women was a lie. No way she could know the way he looked at Lucas.

She couldn’t know. But his best friend was the only thing in his world among the elite that felt genuine and he couldn’t help but fear she’d find a way to take that from him. She was the only one with the power to.

So fragile, he was, for such a God among mortals. So tenuous was his falsified confidence, his calculated swagger. He could be taken apart so easily by a woman who knew too much. One thread was all it would take to unravel his web of lies. How long until he cracked under the heavy choke of his sacrifices? What he was giving up in order to obtain the one thing that he could count on making him memorable? Maintaining his significance.

And there was nothing worse he could think of, in this world of material, power and prestige, than being rendered insignificant.

[gaiatheorist]

#WhyDidntIReport

TW: Rape/sexual abuse

That’s a hateful thing to be called to justify retrospectively. I formally reported one of my abusers, to stop him damaging anyone else. It worked, in a way, he didn’t touch another small girl once I set the legal wheels in motion. What happened afterwards is the biggest factor in why I didn’t report any of the subsequent assaults by other people. The physical, mental and emotional damage to me had already been done, there’s no un-doing it, however much people tell me “That wasn’t your fault.” or “That was a very brave thing to do.” Systems and processes have changed in the almost 30 years since then, but the way the processes didn’t work, and the over-arching reporting and general-public opinion on people who report abuse and assault still linger.

“Why didn’t you say something at the time?”, in my opinion, will always come down to either a power imbalance, or a skewed sense of shame. I haven’t read too deeply into the hashtag, for self-preservation reasons, but “Nobody will believe you.” and “It will harm your family.” cropped up as often as “They were my boss/teacher/priest.” I can’t chronologically pinpoint exactly when I made my disclosure, because the whole time was so emotionally messy, possibly 1989 or 1990, guessing, on the ages of my half-sister and female cousin, so I would have been 12 or 13 at the time. I said something then, and I rode out the disjointed and distressing process. The process caused more emotional trauma than the abuse itself. The abuse, I can file neatly away in an imaginary box marked “He knew that what he was doing was wrong, I was a child.”, the process, and the aftermath were harder to deal with.

I disclosed when I did to protect those other small girls. I have a vague recollection of the time-frame being around the same point as a child abuse scandal in the news, it might have been Cleveland, or I may have mis-remembered that. I do remember the news playing on the ‘hysterical contagion’ idea, that victims and survivors were coming forward because others had started the ball rolling, and that inference that some of the accounts were fabricated for attention. 1990-ish, ‘The News’ was on TV at fixed times each day, and ‘The Internet’ was, by and large, a computer in the school library, where you could connect to another computer, in another school. The world wasn’t as 24/7 as it is now, it took longer for ‘The News’ to hit the screen, or the front page, enough time for the reports to be pruned and phrased to suggest that not all of the children were honest, that some of them had exhibited other unsafe behaviours. Why did you go there? Why did you go alone? If it didn’t feel right, why did you allow it to continue? Grown-up questions, aimed at children. The same questions that are still asked by the press, and the internet. 

My initial case was very straightforward. I scare people with how matter-of-fact I am about it, the detachment is a clinically evidenced trauma-response. Members of my family colluded to place a small girl in the bed of a known paedophile, and wider family had deeply ingrained religious beliefs including a degree of body-shaming, and victim-blaming. “Don’t touch there, it’s dirty.”, and “Nice girls don’t...” I didn’t disclose the first time because I’d been raised to accept that grown-ups sometimes did unpleasant things to children. They washed out cuts with stinging TCP, they made us eat cabbage, they hit us when we did something wrong. What he did was absorbed into a long list of things I didn’t like, that I assumed were ‘normal.’ By the time I realised that what he was doing was NOT normal, it had been happening for years, and the strange-blame element crept in, that I’d allowed it to continue. “Why didn’t you say something at the time?” 

He never actually told me not to tell, he didn’t have to. Sexual predators choose their victims very carefully. He didn’t have to tell me that nobody would believe me, the news was telling me that already. He didn’t have to infer that I had never said ‘No.’, and must therefore have enjoyed it. He was a grown-up, children didn’t say ‘No.’ to grown-ups. The danger was strangers in dirty raincoats who might offer us sweeties in a park, and we were to scream and kick and make a fuss and get away. It was “OK to say No.” to strangers. He wasn’t a stranger. He had a broken little girl delivered to his bed most weekends, who eventually took to self-harming, and saying countless Hail Marys, once she realised how wrong it was, internalising shame that was never hers to bear. (Bit of detachment, there, I still don’t really see child-me as me.) 

Through the glass door, separating my mother’s ‘living room’ from her ‘front room’, I learned that he’d done the same to her, and that he HAD told her not to tell. She’d confided in her own mother, and there had been a discussion that she wouldn’t be believed, but that disclosure would lead to ‘breaking the family’, that she and her siblings would be ‘taken away.’ There was a hushed, pained disclosure from her throat raw from crying, that she’d kicked him when he tried to touch her younger sister. Shame she didn’t stand up for her own daughter, and left that damaged child to protect her younger sister differently. In the late 1960s, or early 1970s, she chose not to disclose. However many other girls he abused between then and my disclosure aren’t my burden, I can’t change the past, only the future.

I did ‘break the family’, but it wasn’t much of a family to start with. He fled the area for his own physical safety. One of my mother’s siblings sided with him, couldn’t believe the accusation, the other was detached-neutral. My mother’s world imploded, and she was the one answering the phone to friends of his, who would be verbally abusive, calling me a liar. She was the one getting the dead-eye from people in the village who couldn’t believe me, because they saw him as an upstanding community member, and me as a scruffy, skinny little ‘nothing’, who was probably only saying things for attention.  

I wasn’t ‘dragged through court’, I gave one verbal statement, and was examined by one police doctor. I was referred to a child psychologist, and my mother withdrew me from that, saying it wasn’t working. During the course of the verbal statement I was asked if I’d had boyfriends, and whether I’d engaged in any sexual activities. I said I hadn’t, and pushed the games of ‘dare’ with the older boy to the back of my mind. Linear-linguistics, he wasn’t my ‘boyfriend’, and that was what I’d been asked. I also pushed-under the other older boy, a friend of the first, who had taken me into unfamiliar woods, to show me a den he’d built, and shoved his penis into my mouth so forcefully that I vomited on him. That one held a pen-knife to my throat on the way back, and told me not to tell, because everyone would just say I was a slag. They know how to pick us, and they know how to scare us silent. As well as not-telling about the older boys, I only disclosed about half of the things the family member had done to me. The police officers had allowed my mother to be present when they took my statement, I was embarrassed about describing some of the things he’d done, with my mother staring at me, I imagine there were inconsistencies in the level of abuse I reported against what she reported, because I wasn’t staring at her when she gave her statement. 

The practical and emotional implications of my disclosure were vast, I’m not sure my mother liked me all that much before I disclosed, and, after, it became very evident that she wasn’t overly fond of me. I’d destroyed her world. Quid pro quo. 

That process, those questions, the ‘accept nothing, question everything’ is why I never reported anything else. I kept myself away from the older boys, because I knew what they wanted, and I didn’t want to have to explain to another police officer why I’d gone back ‘there’, when ‘that’ had happened the first time. There is more education on informed consent now, and I’m hoping that the ‘age appropriate sexual experimentation’ brush-off from social care is less widely-used, post-Rotherham. Some victims stay perpetual victims, because they feel they have no other option. A warm house, a bag of chips, someone who pays attention to you, they’re very powerful pull-factors, when the alternative is often worse. The Rotherham children were carefully selected, the abusers knew that their chaotic backgrounds, and the initial grooming would place them in the ‘unreliable witness’ category. If a ‘nice’ girl had come forward, their statement would have been given more credence, and different action would have been taken. The abusers didn’t pick nice girls, they picked children who already had issues, and the systems and processes around those children didn’t join the dots, or explore the underlying causes of the behaviours. They effectively damned those children disposable, through the “Why didn’t you say something at the time?” lines. Grooming and coercive control, that’s why. The attention and shows of affection pulled the children in, to have ‘something’, when you’ve only ever had nothing is a powerful draw, then the threats, once you’re ‘in’ keep you there. 

I wasn’t gang-groomed. I was raped on a family holiday at the age of 15. I didn’t report that one because I knew I’d be asked “Why did you place yourself in that position?” I didn’t, my mother and step-father insisted I go to the skanky disco with a man technically old enough to be my father. You don’t say ‘No.’ to grown-ups, remember? I was ‘ruining their holiday’, and ‘being miserable’, and they harangued and pressured me into going off with that man, despite two whole evenings of me insisting I didn’t want to. He wasn’t violent, he didn’t have to be, he’d chosen his location miles from anywhere that anyone would hear me scream if I did, which I didn’t. “Fight back, make a noise, get their skin under your fingernails.” Yes, OK, but I’m in the middle of nowhere, I don’t know my way back, and he’s bigger and physically stronger than me, I can endure discomfort, but I don’t want to die. I did try to push him off me, and I think I did say ‘No.’, but he just carried on. I detached, ragdoll-limp, knowing from experience that it wouldn’t hurt so much if my muscles were relaxed. 

The next one was a boy I’d known since I was 7. Wrong place, at the wrong time. I was 16 or 17, and he offered to walk me home from the pub. That’s GOOD, isn’t it? Women walking home from pubs alone are ‘at risk’ from the stranger-danger. (Side-rage, that, even when I was 18, my mother still wanted me home at 10pm, there were lots of walking-home-alone nights, because everyone else stayed out until last orders.) He ‘knew a short cut’, and, by the time I realised he was taking me out of the way, we were already well out of the way. Again, he was much bigger and stronger than I was, again, far enough out of the way that nobody would hear me if I did scream. Oral rape, I’d make a wise-crack about “What is it about my mouth?”, but what it is is that some people find it attractive.

The one after that, probably the holiday-rape when I was 17. Why ‘probably’? Did I have so many sexual encounters that I can’t count? Am I just a slag after all? No, it’s the normalisation of ‘putting up with it’, as per Germaine Greer and co. There were ‘handsy’ boys, and lecherous men in-between, all absorbed into the sludge of “Boys will be boys”, and “Why were you there in the first place?” He wasn’t a boy, he was a man, and why I was there was that my parents had, again, insisted I go with him, because my long face was spoiling their fun. I’d tried to take my brother with me, a bit of back-up, if the bar-owner REALLY only wanted to show me his cousin’s bar, surely he wouldn’t mind showing my brother as well? That didn’t work out, because he bought my brother a lot of drinks, and had to take him back to the first bar when he fell asleep. (I do hope he wasn’t spiked, I’d hate to think I inadvertently caused him harm, in my attempt to protect myself.) Slack rag-doll again. Why didn’t I report it? The first question would have been “Why did you get into his car?”

The only one I can conclusively tie to an abuse-of-power was when the manager of a restaurant I was working in locked me in the premises after everyone else had left. Nowhere to run, and no point in screaming. I would have physically fought off that one, I was taller than him, though probably not stronger, I would have tried, but I didn’t need to, he gave up easily enough. He’d ‘only’ asked me to show him my breasts. I refused. No harm done. To me, anyway, I don’t know if he trapped any of the other waitresses. Germaine Greer defence, there, I didn’t report it because ‘nothing happened.’

Two things happened after saying ‘No.’ to that one man. I became the superficially rock-hard bitch that I am now, because I didn’t want to be seen as an easy target, and I had a brief interlude of saying ‘Yes’ a bit too much. (My judgement, nobody else’s I had a handful of sexual experiences just because I could, some more regrettable than others.) “There, your honour, she can’t possibly be telling the truth, because she once had sexual relations with three different partners in one 24-hour period.”

The thing with the ex was sludgier, more difficult to distinguish the times I’d had too much to drink and was incapable of consent from the times I’d wake up to find him already having sex with me. The times he’d force me face-down into a succession of rancid rugs, and watch pornography over the back of me are clearer, as are the times he carried out acts he knew I found unpleasant. Bad sex is not rape. His family had a deeply unfunny in-joke, where they’d refer to sexual intercourse as ‘duty.’ Obligated-sex is not rape, except when it is. Some of it was, after years of hissing ‘No!’ at him, and pushing him off me, I took to sleeping in my clothes, to avoid the ‘No!’ waking our son. Aside from pushing, there wasn’t much violence, and the slack rag-doll reflex meant he never caused much damage. Until he did. Why didn’t I report that? Well, surely if I’d consented on Tuesday, it must be OK on Thursday as well? We were married-ish, living together, sharing a bed, if I’d found his attentions so abhorrent, surely I’d have left? With a young son, and nowhere else to go. I understand that some people do break free from abusive relationships, I did, eventually.

It’s all so messy, between the way abusers choose-and-groom their victims, and the slut-shaming slant the media tends to take, some of us are damned if we do, and damned if we don’t. To raise our voices raises risk for us, whether reputational harm of every-other-encounter being raked over during a court case, or the physical and psychological harm that can be threatened or enacted by the perpetrator and their supporters. Some of us just want to forget about it, and move on, at the time, and in the moment, that sometimes seems the most straightforward route, to pretend it didn’t happen, and then be wracked with guilt that it could happen to someone else. What were we wearing? Why were we there? Have we had a previous sexual history? Is there anything else in our past that might make us vulnerable to being declared unreliable? (Not looking at WHY some survivors of some abuses choose some coping mechanisms, just pointing out that we’ve had tattoos, or been drunk, or whatever.) 

The systems might be better, and more supportive now, as opposed to almost 30 years ago, I don’t know, because the initial experience put me off subsequent reports. The skew is still there, though, why didn’t the victim try harder? I don’t believe it’s up to us to ‘try harder’, my rag-doll response won’t be unique, some of us end up in situations we can’t see a clear way out of, and freeze as a self-preservation tactic. I hope the systems are kinder now, but the slut-shaming wider perception hasn’t gone away, it’s still a rumbling undercurrent that influences a lot of my choices and behaviours to this day. I don’t want someone in a courtroom to ever have cause to say I made myself available, so, in this aesthetic-focused nonsense of a world, I ‘tut’ at the targeted adverts for beauty products that pop up online. Women are somehow supposed to make themselves attractive just-so, but then called into question when they do. Madonna/Whore. Now, I’m out of the loop, I’m not available, and have no desire to be seen as so, I cover my body, and don’t wear make-up, or ‘do’ anything with my hair that might look like I’ve made an effort. I try to make myself invisible/unavailable so there’s less risk of me having to report anything, and have every other decision I’ve made at every other point in my life raked-over in public. 

That’s the crux for some, but not all of us, the harm that protecting ourselves and others close to us could do, balanced against the need to protect unknown-others against a predator. We do build our walls high, and sometimes we slip, or toxicity slips in through a crack we hadn’t noticed, then we’re left to make a judgement as to whether a group or individual presents a greater risk of harm to others than they did to us. I didn’t ‘have to’ write any of this, these reasons are mine, and won’t cohesively-universally apply to every person who didn’t report something. The ‘why’ will be similar, the ‘I’ completely unique to the individual. For outsiders to situations, “Why didn’t you report it at the time?” is a question for authorities with power to investigate, not for the media, or outsiders to the situation on social media.

[wellpersonsblog]

Toddler Gift Ideas {Ages 1-3}

These Toddler Gift Ideas make perfect birthday presents, Christmas gifts or everyday surprises. Grab one for your son or daughter or one of their friends!

Hi Friends!

I’ve been meaning to write this post forever. Like…for the past year or so and considering Squish will be 3 years old in just 3 months (WHAT?!) I figured it was time to just buckle down and do it.

I get asked a lot about some of the toys and things people see in my photos and Instagram stories so I wanted to round up some of the stuff Squish has been loving for the past year or two and share it with you. Not everything in this post will be appropriate for every child between the ages of one and three but many of them will be.

Toys can be a bit overwhelming and it’s crazy to me how much kid stuff we’ve accumulated in just the past few years. One thing I did a while ago was clean out a lot of toys and really try to focus on keeping things that have multiple uses and encourage imagination. Things like blocks, trains, play kitchen etc that he can use every day but use in different ways! I love when he gets into his own little world talking and playing by himself and I can just sit back and quietly watch and listen.

So, if you have a toddler of your own or are looking for gift ideas, I hope this post is helpful! A lot of these ideas are great for boys and girls, but I do have a boy so some might be skewed a little more stereotypically “boy”.  I did my best to break the ideas down into categories and link to specific products in many cases, although some ideas are just general and I didn’t provide a link. (Note- all the links below are Amazon affiliate links which means I make a small amount of money if you purchase using them, at no additional cost to you.)

  Arts & Crafts

I’m a huge fan of having a robust arts and crafts station. Use Pinterest to find some fun, simple project ideas or just take a bunch of stuff out and let them go to town!

Pipe cleaners

Clothespins

Straws

Pom poms

Washable paint

Balloons

Popsicle sticks

Paint Brushes  

Kwik Stixs Solid Tempera Paints – perfect for when you need something bolder than a marker but want it to dry quicker than regular paint

Do A Dot Art! Markers

Glue Sticks – I like the disappearing purple ones because they can easily see where they’ve spread the glue

Markers

Crayons

Butcher Paper – for me this is so much easier than single sheets of paper because you can tear off as much or as little as you want each time

Construction paper

Scissors

Hole punches

Hot Glue Gun – to be used by parents of course

Stamps

Physical Activity

Little Bopper Bounce House (on sale for $170 right now) – great for hot summer days or long winters indoors

Radio Flyer Tricycle – they also have a 4-in-1 model that they can start using even younger

Strider Balance Bike

Little Tikes Trampoline 

Styrofoam Glider Plane – Squish will run and retrieve this time after time after time

Wod Toys Barbell

Balls

Bubble mower

Traffic cones – great for obstacle courses, races, etc

Imagination

Monster Hunting Kit {Net +Flashlight + Spray Bottle}

Sensory Table – use for water, sand, dirt, etc

Play Kitchen – buy play food, a mini grocery cart, save product packages and make your own grocery store!

Camera – Save your old digital cameras you don’t use anymore. Also check garage sales, etc!

Chalk

Tools – we have about 3 different sets!

Doctor Kit – this one I’m linking to didn’t come with a doctor bag so i bought one separately but there are many sets that do

Dinosaurs

Baby dolls/stuffed animals/baby stroller – my girlfriends with girls say any sort of baby dolls and doll accessories (carseats, strollers etc are a hit)

Cars/Trucks/Fire engines – Squish especially likes dump trucks and garbage trucks that he can put other smaller toys into the back of

Guitar/Keyboard – anything that encourages music is fun (drums, maracas…)

Trains

Trains get their own separate category because they’re such an obsession in our house

Brio Train Track Pack   – we set these up on the floor usually but also have a train table. Get a crane! Squish’s fav train accessory.

Train table – look for these tables and train sets secondhand on fb selling groups, garage sales etc.

Wooden Trains  – you can never have too many

GeoTrax Remote Control Trains – we got a giant set of these secondhand from a friend. Then I went on ebay and bought a couple extra engines with remote controllers

Motor Skills

Wooden Blocks

MegaBloks

Alphabet Lacing Beads

Playdough

Water Wow Activity Books

Mr. Potato Head

Magna-Tiles – these are definitely for the older end of the age range. They can be a bit a little tricky to get to stick together so I think one year olds might get a bit frustrated

Remote control car

Puzzles

Other

Hiccapop Foam Bed Bumpers – if they’re transitioning to a big kid bed soon, we love these instead of the big tall bed rails

Pottery Barn Kids Sheets – there are plenty of places to get sheets but they have some of the cutest ones!

Reusable Sticker Pads

Water Bottle – toddlers love anything that’s “specifically theirs” so their very own watter bottle, lunchbox, backpack etc are always a hit

Backpack

Books – When in doubt, get books. There are SO many good ones out there!

If you’re looking for something more branded, here are some TV shows that are popular with toddlers. Any merchandise, games, etc featuring these characters would probably be a hit as well:

Mickey Mouse Clubhouse

Doc McStuffins

PJ Masks

Paw Patrol

Anything on PBS – Curious George, Nature Cat, Daniel Tiger, etc

Whew! Ok well hopefully this gave you some fun new ideas. If your toddlers or toddlers you know have other favorites, let me know in the comments and i’ll add them to the list!

Looking for some toddler gift ideas? Check these out for birthdays, holidays and more!Click To Tweet

If you’re looking for baby gift ideas, check out by Baby’s First Year Gift Guide!

And if you’re a toddler parent looking for new ways to keep them entertained, be sure to check out this post full of Indoor Activities for Toddlers.

Enjoy! –Lindsay–

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First found here: Toddler Gift Ideas {Ages 1-3}