| By :
Mark Etinger
I was trying to find a great gift but I did not have an arm and a leg to spend. What exactly do you buy a girl turning thirteen? It had been so long since I was that young and even then I hardly understood what girls were interested in. I was fairly certain slap bracelets and digital pocket pets were not going to cut it as gifts for a preteen in 2011. I wandered around toy stores and tween stores. There was nothing that made much sense for my cousin's birthday. What were her interests? Did I really know my cousin this little? There were television shows like iCarly and Zoe 101. I watched them hoping to find clues as to what was swirling around in her psyche. I got nothing out of them. I wondered if the Jonas Brothers were still a thing kids liked. Was I supposed to pick out an outfit for a thirteen year old? Was I just supposed to relent and get a gift card? What store do these kids even shop at?! Finally it hit me. The other day my cousin had pulled her phone out to take a quick photo of a duck who was a strange color. Before she could the duck had waddled off and swam away. The picture was blurry and she was disappointed. Like end of the world disappointed, in a way that only a thirteen year old girl can be. I went to a place with SLR cameras on sale. This was going to be perfect. Every girl tries out photography at some point. I didn't even have to get the best SLR camera, from a cellphone camera pretty much anything would be an upgrade. In the past few years there has been something like an explosion of cheap SLR digital cameras. It is as if everyone is an amateur shutterbug these days. The decision to by an SLR camera went better than expected. My cousin was thrilled to have a camera all her own. She was never going to miss a good duck photo moment ever again. She snapped photos her whole party and these days I rarely see her without also seeing that trusty digital camera by her side. I has become an extension of her arm. So if you are racking your brain for something to buy the tween in your life, consider a camera.
|
![[Valid RSS feed]](http://www.nextlevelarticles.com/images/icon_Rss.png "XML Feed For RSS"){kind=icon}
Category Rss Feed
Print This Article
Add To Favorites
