I hope to break the cycle that society has created, I have a 3 month old girl who I have taken to placing a toy jeep in her play ring. Of course the wife keeps taking it away but I will persist.
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Mark..
I have two daughters ..a year apart...
When they started university I bought them both cars..
The oldest girl has exceptional mathematical and memory retention skills and speed reads a computer screen as fast as you can hold down the scroll button..It is amazing to watch..
Her mechanical skills are not noteable...but she does look after her cars by having them serviced when required..
My other daughter is a mechanical wizzard..Has been very familiar with my great roll around tool box and any other mechanical devise I own ...The first car I bought her was a '83 Honda Civic..semi automatic ,from an older lady that never drove it...I had 50,000 KM at 15 years of age..
Anyway It needed brake service one summer day so we started at it..I showed her how to jack it up,install the jack stands ,pull the wheels,strip the brakes(Discs front..shoes back) and repack the wheel bearings..and then put it all back together..I not only explained the proceedure but why I did what I did...
I did the drivers side,front and back..and let the car down and she did the passenger side ,by herself,with me hovering and watching ,but not telling her what to do but offering guidance when she asked..I had only to stop her a few times when she was going astray,but only to give her a verbal hand..
It took us most of the day but I was in no hurry and Becky was as pleased as punch when she and I took it for a test drive..
When it worked so well ,she was really pleased with her self...
For me it was one of the highlights of my life ,to spend quality time with my kids..
Another time in Montreal (she was driving a Toyota that sometimes wouldn't fire when it was damp or raining...)..
She jumped in the car,fired it up and it wouldn't start..She knew that if it didn't start right away,it was wet and wouldn't start with out a dose of ignition spray..So she jumped out grabbed her screw driver out of her glove box and her trusty can of ignition spray..popped the hood , pulled the distributor cap off the dist..gave it a spray ..put it back together ..closed the hood ..jumped back in the car and fired it up..
This all happened in about 3-4 minutes..
She was late for work and she said ""dad..when I fired up the old Toyota and took off the crowd that gathered on the side walk were so shocked they cheered!!"
The moral of the story is children can be what ever they want to be ,with enough encouragement from the old folks...
It has paid off for me..My girls are my pride and joy..