When I was a little girl, I loved teen magazines. It started out in my tween years (we were called pre-teens back in those days) with Teen Beat and Tiger Beat. I then moved on to such gems as Teen, Seventeen, and YM.
How I loved those magazines! I had piles of them that I would organize chronologically. I would tear out the little insert books, and I would organize them separately. To this day, you could show me a magazine cover from the 1990s, and I could tell you if I owned it. I have them memorized.
I loved all aspects of the magazines, honestly, from the fashion pages to the embarrassing moments stories to the beauty routines. But my favorite part was always the “get to know yourself” quiz. I was sure those things were the secret to getting to know the deepest parts of myself. And at 13, I was sure that I had deep parts.
I thought when I had a daughter that I would excitedly buy them subscriptions to those magazines so they could share in the excitement I did.
But then God gave me four daughters and turned 1995 into 2018 and turned the challenging culture of the 1990s into the… more than challenging one of the 2010s. Put that all together, and there’s no way I’m letting my girls around those magazines. Too much has changed.
That’s a foregone conclusion. My girls have never broached the subject of tween magazines, but if they did, there would be no deliberation. The answer would be no.
But I would be sad giving that answer because I wish they could enjoy the things I did in my youth. I wish culture hadn’t deteriorated to such a place where that is just not possible these days.
So it was with that mindset that I jumped at the chance to review Be Yourself!: A Journal for Catholic Girls by Amy Brooks. It’s a book all about and all for tween girls. And it’s Catholic.
I messaged back and forth with the author, and I stalked my mailbox waiting or it to come in because I was so excited to share it with Magoo. I wasn’t disappointed when it did come in.
The book is part devotional, part personal journal, part saint story. And it’s all very loved by my Magoo.
She took to the book instantly and didn’t put it down for days. She actually slept with it by her side for days. She said her favorite parts are the saint quotes. She collects quotes like I did in my youth. Looking at what she has filled out, it appears she also liked the sections where she could write about herself and answer questions in an attempt to get to know her developing self better.
To be honest, this book has been such a blessing to us.
Over the years, TJ and I have struggled to find out how we are going to pass the faith on to our girls in a way that will stick and in a way that will be life affirming. We want them to develop a personal faith that is steady and strong and authentic. We want it to be meaningful and directional. We want them to find joy and comfort and inspiration in their faith.
We want them to experience their faith as the greatest gift we passed on to them.
That’s all great, but how do we do that?
I don’t have any great answers to that. The best that we came up with is that we have to make the faith joyful. It has to be comforting. It doesn’t have to be cool, but it does have to be relevant to their lives. It has to be embedded in some of their fondest memories.
I think books like that do that and do it so well. Many tween girls love writing. They love getting to know themselves better. They like to think of themselves as cool. They love pretty quotes and beautiful pages. And this book gives them all of that. And most importantly, it does it in a way that will enrich their lives and help them love themselves better. Those are two things that girls will not find in the popular magazines of today.
We all want what is best for our kids. We want them to be excited about what everyone else is excited about. But we have to be careful because young hears are fragile hearts and young minds are impressionable minds.
I’m hopefully going to get more sleep in the coming decade than I did in the previous one, but I don’t think the parenting job is going to get any easier. I’ll have to say no to things that have bigger stakes. I’ll have to be even more careful about what we allow into our home via screens, radios, and the printed word. I’ll have to be more diligent.
That’s a tall task, and to be honest, I’m not sure I’m up to it. But I do find a glimmer of hope when I come across a gem like this.
If you would like to purchase the book, you can do so here. You can download free printable coloring pages for tweens as well there. These will give you an idea of what the pages look like.
Legal Disclaimer
While I did receive a copy of this book for free, I did not receive compensation for this review. All ideas are my own, and I would not recommend a product that I do not personally love.