As I sat down to write, I was thinking about how thrilled I was to have only boys.

After being witness to a "have you bought her first bra?" conversation, I am not so secretly smiling that I don't have to go there. Sure, I'll have my share of other areas to tackle. But for some reason, the girl thing seems a bit more daunting.

Which got me thinking. Lately, I have noticed that if you only have children of the same gender, there's a line in the sand. And whether or not we admit it, the moms of boys are on one side; the moms of girls are on the other.

The mothers of both boys and girls get to live in a balanced universe. They learn how to live with both make up and mud. Dolls and dirt. Sports bras and cups. They can walk through the mall recognizing all of the store names.  They actually know what Justice sells.

For those of us with just boys, we quickly get used to stinky socks, burps, farts and talk of balls, butts and boogers. As gross as it is, we couldn't imagine it any other way.

We are grateful for not having to brush out long hair filled with tangles, make pig tails in the morning or worry about dresses, tutus and a variety of shoe options.  Instead, we admire outfits that actually match and painted toenails from a safe distance.

We're thankful that we don't need styling products on hand or have to worry about a particular brand of jeans.  We live for cheap athletic shorts and hand me down t-shirts. For nondescript boxer shorts and the occasional splurge on a cool pair of sneakers.

We've learned to embrace the sweaty heads, odorous sticky clothes and flushed faces that come with play. And if we're paying money for a sport, we expect it. We get that our voices serve as the alarm clock for shower time, as without our reminder our boys would surely go to bed dirty.

We're used to short conversations and even shorter explanations, for we've gained insight as to how the male mind works. Thanks, husbands, for the years of practice.

Although my mother tells me that I'll miss not having a daughter later in life, I never wonder if I am missing out. And there may be a bonus in store for me. I've been told that in their teenage years, boys are easier. Maybe it's payback for the times we've watch them scale furniture, bang their heads against the wall and run wild as little ones.

So I've been sitting back, waiting for easy street to come and find me. Ready to coast through the upcoming years, feeling pretty confident that I didn't get the short end of the stick. That is, until I read a story about a Colorado middle school that banned girls from wearing jelly bracelets for they actually represented sexual messages.

Suddenly, boys don't seem that easy. For even though the girls are the ones wearing the bracelets, the boys are the ones responding. The ones that will take advantage of the situation.

Suddenly, the line in the sand separating the mother of boys and the mother of girls goes away. We're all on the same side, trying to raise kids with a good conscious. A moral compass. And whether we're bringing up boys or girls, no one ends up on easy street. 

Illyse appears Thursdays on TriangleMom2Mom.