Monday, November 11, 2013

Epbot Exemplars: Thor in a Tutu, Brony Love, & The Best Big Brother Ever

Exemplars are geeks who know what they love, and show it with pride. I keep it mostly girl-centric here at Epbot, but I always reserve the right to feature anyone who helps inspire me to be a better me.


Meet Sabrina's niece, the mighty Zola:


Zola lived in an orphanage in the Congo until she was two and a half, when Sabrina's sister and her husband traveled there to adopt her.  During the journey Zola's new mom nearly lost her arm due to an infectious mosquito bite, and then she caught malaria and nearly died. (EEK!) Happily the three of them are home and healthy now, though, and taking fabulous family portraits like this:

 YESSS.

Sabrina writes,

 "Zola has been such an amazing joy in our lives, and as you can see from the pictures, she’s adjusting to life in the U.S just fine, and all 3 of them are doing fantastic! In September she turned 3 and had the MOST Amazing (Girly) Dinosaur Party. And for Halloween she [was] Thor.  I think she makes a GREAT Thor… Don’t you?


Why yes, yes I do. :D

***

Abbie N. has 3 boys and a girl, and writes:

"My oldest also has Autism, and SPD...and he's a hardcore Brony. He's gotten teased a bit, but has handled it SO well, and I couldn't be more proud. Now, if we could only get more MLP shirts for boys!! I can find them for men, but not so much for boys, [so] I had this one made:"

"Yeah...he was just a teeeeeeensy bit excited."

Look at that smile! Haha! I love it!

Abby tells me her daughter Judy, on the other hand, is completely in love with Voltron and all things superhero:

 "She wanted to be called 'Miss Captain America'... until I told her that girls can be captains, too!"

Aw yeeeeah. Way to raise 'em right, Abby!

 ***

Cynthia wrote to tell me about her daughter Brianna, dressed here at her Karate studio as Xena, Warrior Princess:


Cynthia made the costume out of a thrifted leather jacket - how cool is that? And these photos are actually a couple of years old, so get this: Brianna is a black belt now. She's a real live warrior princess, y'all! SO COOL.

***

And finally, you guys simply HAVE to read this exchange Gabrielle R. sent me:

"My 10 year old son Colin was horrified to learn that his 5 year old sister Alyssa wanted to be Wolverine for Halloween. Not the girl version with the tutu... the straight from the boys section muscle-bound Wolverine. He was convinced somehow that his sister dressing up like a boy hero was going to be the most embarrassing thing ever.

"Now, my daughter has her own opinions about what she does and doesn't like, but when it comes to her brother, she is usually quite the follower... so I was interested to hear what she'd say when he told her he didn't want her to dress up like a boy for Halloween.

"Her response?

"'Colin, people need to understand that it's okay for girls to like heroes too.'

"Well he thought about it for a minute, and then took her into his room. 10 minutes later, they came out dressed like this:"


Dang it, who started cutting invisible onions in here?

So many invisible onions...  [sniffle]

Oh, and as a bonus geeky grin, Gabrielle sent along this photo of the same brother and sister, five years earlier:
 
D'awww.

Speaking as a sister who also has a geeky older brother - and one who let me play Star Wars and Laser Tag with him, at that, this makes me ridiculously happy.

I hope today's Exemplars inspired you, guys! As always, feel free to share your own stories and photos (just don't forget everyone's names!) either on the Epbot Facebook page or by e-mail.

25 comments:

  1. AWWWH how cute!! I clutched my face and squealed in joy - what cuties, all of them!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Dang ninja onions are invading my house too! All amazing stories, and I have to agree with Abby- they need to make more shirts that either a boy or girl can wear when it comes to this stuff. My daughter has shopped in the boy's and now men's department for her favorite tees. I've never understood why they can't make dinosaur stuff for girls- just about everyone loves dinosaurs!

    ReplyDelete
  3. I'm not sure how much kids clothes normally cost, but RedBubble is a great place for all sorts of geeky (and drop dead gorgeous) artwork on shirts - they have LOADS of MLP stuff, and pretty much anything else you can imagine as well. They do seem a little expensive to me, because they're only about $10 less than the adult versions, but I really don't know how to judge, and it is an option :)

    http://www.redbubble.com/shop/my+little+pony+kids-clothes

    I have nothing to do with the company - I just like their shirts :D

    ReplyDelete
  4. I am so happy you featured a boy venturing into so-called girly territory. I have a girl and as much as I am delighted by all the sites, programs and things geared towards empowering and respecting women, I don't want my daughter to forget that equality means the same rules for everyone. If she can like 'boy' things, its okay for boys to like 'girly' things. :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I agree! I was very much into all things empowering women/girls until I had my son, and realized how important it is to make sure it works both ways. It was a good reminder that "feminism" means equality for BOTH genders!

      Delete
  5. I helped out at my daughter's Halloween party at school, and totally should have taken and sent pictures of two little girls in the costume parade. One was dressed as a ninja turtle (Michelangelo, if memory serves) and the other was dressed as Sub-Zero from the Mortal Kombat games. She was excited that I recognized her costume, because NOBODY ELSE GOT IT and it was really frustrating for her.

    ReplyDelete
  6. love love love. Your Exemplars were one of the reasons I was looking forward to Halloween!

    ReplyDelete
  7. nothing like a good happy cry session at work!

    ReplyDelete
  8. I cannot tell you how widely I smiled when I opened up my gmail (I'm a subscriber) to see "the mighty Zola." She and all the other Exemplars are, well, exemplary!

    This is one of my favorite features, Jen! I love seeing all the Exemplars!

    ReplyDelete
  9. These are just fantastic in every possible way.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Invisible onions everywhere...

    ReplyDelete
  11. A little girl came to to our Trunk or Treat as a Werewolf. I asked if she was Professor Lupin in transformation and I was told, "She wasn't, but she is now!" I really thought she'd be a Doctor. However, my 14-yr old daughter was the 11th Doctor and we saw a girl in a home-made red Dalek that was so cool!

    ReplyDelete
  12. This post really made my day! I have only embraced being a geek over the past few years (as an adult). I am so glad to see these kids loving what they love and not caring about ridiculous sterotypes!

    ReplyDelete
  13. Darn those invisible onions! *sniff*

    ReplyDelete
  14. My face is leaking...stupid onions...

    *sniffle*

    ReplyDelete
  15. The Exemplars have got to be my favorite posts on here. I've got two awesome boys and a whole passel of nieces and nephews to whom I try to teach geeky tolerance and diversity. It gives me all kinds of warm fuzzier to see the neat kiddos here. :)

    ReplyDelete
  16. I LOVE these kiddos...they give me hope for the future.

    Darn invisible ninjas and their invisible onions.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Holy smokes, those are my kids! The ones at the bottom... they're so cute :) Thanks for featuring them Jen!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Parenting done right, right there!! Way to go, momma!!

      Delete
  18. Could you imagine getting all these awesome kids together for some sort of epic party!?

    ReplyDelete
  19. Dammit Jen, this is too early in the morning to be having these feels! >_<
    That "5 years earlier," picture totally got to me. They're so frelling cute, ALL OF THEM! Damn these feels! *shakes fist*

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Woo! Farscape!

      (Sorry, just had to point out that totally grabbed my attention! :D )

      Delete
  20. Jen, this is my first time commenting, but I had to come out of "lurkdom" to say how much I love this post! These were awesome and there were definitely ninjas cutting onions somewhere close while I was reading this! Thanks for all your hard work!

    ReplyDelete
  21. YES! More Xena fans! :D Love it!!

    ReplyDelete
  22. Thank you for posting the picture of the boy who loves My Little Pony. My 6 yr old son is just getting into MLP and sure enough one of his friends laughed at him. I told him it was ok to like MLP and it doesn't matter what other people think. And then I walk him over to the computer and showed him your post and specifically that picture. He had a big smile and it made him feel better. Thank you and thank you to other parents for knowing that MLP, Thor, Captain America,Voltron, Superman, etc are for anyone who likes them.

    ReplyDelete

Please be respectful when commenting; dissenting opinions are great, but personal attacks or hateful remarks will be removed. Also, including a link? Then here's your html cheat sheet: <a href="LINK ADDRESS">YOUR TEXT</a>