Ah the memories. :) I bought my dd the Venus brand. They have regular ones as well as disposables. Satin Care Shaving Gel too. She's since switched to the Schick Intuition brand that has the gel in a built in cartridge. (I like that myself when travelling) My dd started shaving at 8 years old. Dark hair and swims. Kids today start earlier than when I was growing up. Good luck to you!

The Venus brand is very good. Because of the rounded outer part, it works well on small or bumpy places like knees or armpits.
When I was a teen and used cheapie razors, I went through a razor a week and was always covered in cuts... When I was 19 and I switched to Venus, it dropped to a razor a month (so the cost roughly evened out) and I suddenly stopped hacking my legs to bits!

I recall that it was very hard for me to keep track of where I had and hadn't shaved when I was first learning, so I'd suggest a fairly thick shave cream and that she start by shaving in the tub. She'll be safer than standing on one leg in the shower and the cream won't wash away before she can keep track of where she's shaved. It will be much easier for her to learn.
Once she's an old pro, then one-legged shower hopping without any cream is entirely acceptable :)

Thanks girls. Ceph you made me laugh thinking of teh one-legged shower hop. I ended up buying her a Schick Intuition for easiness. Then I had her stand in the tub with shorts on and I helped her shave one leg and let her do the other. She did good and then went and took her shower. I will see how quickly she goes through the intuition blades and if it is too quickly then I am going to try buying her the Venus and some shaving cream. It was funny when she got her pj's on and excitedly came to tell me how smooth her legs felt. I forgot how different that feels the first time you go from hairy to no hair. It was funny.

My niece was a preemie and also 1/4 hsipanic and 1/4 Italian. Consequently, she's had very dark hair on her legs, arms and back since she was born. My sister uses the Veet system on her. That way she doesn't have to do it so often. And since your SD hasn't shaved yet, the hair will still be soft so it should come off pretty easily.

My Daughter's SM has her shaving her very light blonde legs at age 9! She's used veet and doesn't like it anymore, I had her use the one with the big soap all around the blades for a while (Think it's called intuition) so she wouldn't cut herself, now she's using the venus.

Not to be inappropriate or gross, but this summer we had an issue with bikini line hair....any tips out there? She's 13 now and embarrassed to wear a swimsuit without shorts.

Mom of 2.5 - I wear a teeny bikini and have sensitive skin, so I'll chime in on this one.
Those little personal trimmer things (sort of like mini electric clippers) are good for bikini area. They fairly safely trim hair to very short so that there are no "curlies" peeking out of the swimsuit... Then she could *carefully* and with lots of shave foam touch up the edges where the swimsuit doesn't quite cover... Advise her to shave WITH the direction of hair growth though, or she may get monster razor burn.
Veet would work on the edges of the "triangle" area up top, but no where near any "pink bits"!!! If she has sensitive skin, she may get a rash from it, so I'd advise Veeting a good week before she planned to wear a swimsuit.
Or, if she just has a few little stragglers outside the swimsuit once she was all trimmed, a pair of tweezers works nicely, although slightly painfully.

If she has a bathroom drawer, I think I would just buy her a personal trimmer, and put it in there with a note saying "This is for trimming your bikini area before you wear a swimsuit. Be very careful so that you don't cut yourself! And come to me if you have any questions!" At 13, I bet if you provide her the "equipment" she'll figure it out on her own.

Some may not agree with me, but we recently had a situation with this at our home. It was actually kind of a special moment for me. Last year when my SD was 12, she came in with a note and asked me to read it after she left the room. It said "I would like to start shaving my legs. Can you help me?" I felt very special having her come to me with this...

Our solution was this: SD is kind of accident prone so a razor to her sensitive little legs scared us...we decided to go with the super sensitive skin Sally Hansen hair remover. I spoke with the pharmacist about it and she felt that if we went for the kind that was designed for super sensitive skin and did it no more than once per week it would be just fine for her. She has been using this for a year now with no irritation, no bumps and best of all (in her opinion) no hairy legs!

She's been doing this

Awe, Momof5angels! That's so special! I probably would've cried if it was me!

we started SD with an electric razor last year at Christmas and moved to a Venus this summer after she got the motion of it down. Not a cut yet - I'm so impressed. I was also the one she came to when she thought she was ready to start, and the one bent over the tub with her and a bottle of shaving cream. It was a moment I'll always remember.