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Original poster

Due a baby girl in October, how to avoid a 'sea of pink'?

77 replies

DollySpartan · 01/08/2019 08:30

is there any tactful(?) way of avoiding seas of pink when havig a baby girl? already people are saying "Ohh you'll be wanting to paint their room pink/get nice pink clothes" etc

I'm not ungrateful.

but would much rather avoid pink as much as possible, for fearo f being drowned in it!

I much prefer the bright and bold patterns you see around (see examples on pictures)

how to nicely say.... no bloody pink!

Due a baby girl in October, how to avoid a 'sea of pink'?
Due a baby girl in October, how to avoid a 'sea of pink'?
OP posts:
Celebelly · 01/08/2019 13:07

We didn't get much pink stuff at all, really. A few dresses that got the obligatory wear and photo taken and then never worn again but that's just par for the course I think and I doubt you'll be able to avoid that. Now she's a bit older, people take their cues from
what I dress her in, which is usually dinosaur or space stuff! Although I am partial to the odd unicorn. She is often mistaken for a boy though Grin

Erismorn · 01/08/2019 13:19

We were open with people. I've hated pink -and the expectation to engage in stereotypically girly anything since I was old enough to express it. DH strongly dislikes the gender stereotyping of pretty much everything. Our friends and family are all aware of this. Hence DD1 had bold bright colours etc.

Now she is five and obviously allowed to pick whatever she wants, so a large amount of pink has crept in. But she also understands that she is allowed to like whatever she wants to like and that there is no such thing as boy/girl colours/toys/activities etc.

MaverickSnoopy · 01/08/2019 13:33

We have 3 girls and I can only think of one person who gave us anything pink. I'm very much like you and dislike lots of garish pink. If you are gifted anything pink then just say thanks and put it in the drawer. Babies go through things so quickly they'll have grown out of it before they've even had a chance to wear it. Unless it's a blanket or some such. Then again we had a lovely neutral blanket and dh stuck it in the wash with something else and it came out pink Shock just something to bear in mind Wink.

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Roseability18 · 01/08/2019 13:43

I’ve never been a fan of pink (would personally choose brighter stuff like you pictured) but surprised myself by finding most of the pink clothes my daughter was gifted very cute! Doesn’t need to be pink overload, can pair a pink top with blue dungarees etc and looks sweet and girly without being too much. I think most friends/family realised that I would not be a fan of too much pink and sparkly so we actually got a good range of gifts. Nice to dress LO in gifted outfits even if not to your taste, as part of thanking the giver.

whifflesqueak · 01/08/2019 13:48

Everyone was on board with avoiding pink when I had my dd. We had no pink at all.

She’s 3 now and very opinionated about her clothing. What does she demand every time? Pink.

Incidentally her big brother has chosen himself a pink blanket for his own bed.

ErrolTheDragon · 01/08/2019 13:55

But she also understands that she is allowed to like whatever she wants to like and that there is no such thing as boy/girl colours/toys/activities etc.

Yes. And of those, colour is by far the least important.

drspouse · 01/08/2019 14:05

We have a girl after a boy. We tried to get people to avoid buying her masses of pink stuff - fortunately few of our friends would do that spontaneously. The worst actually was the cards! There's ONE "baby boy" and ONE "baby girl" card I think and we had about 6 of each.

Those closest to us knew our feelings - my DM and DF, and also (our two are adopted) we visited our DD in foster care and the FC bought or handed down a few outfits and knew how we felt!

People saw how she was dressed in photos before they met her and this gave a clue.
We told everyone "oh we have LOADS of stuff from DS so no real need for much" which gave them a clue not to go pink mad too.

A couple of elderly relatives did buy things which, if massively inappropriate (stiff net skirts) went to the charity shop, or were diluted by the rest of her rather funky wardrobe.
And we got loads of bundles of hand me downs from a friend who has the same (boy then girl) but whose relatives are a bit less accommodating than ours. We checked they didn't want anything back and then just gave the unwanted items to charity.

I have not found my DD to be a "pink and frilly girl" but she has never been given much that's pink and frilly to wear (we are talking maybe 1 item in her wardrobe at any one time). So she hasn't really had the choice. I am, after all, in charge of the money still - she's only 5! On the odd occasion she gets to shop with me she will happily be steered in the direction of rainbows or dinosaurs or superheroes rather than fairies or bunnies.

drspouse · 01/08/2019 14:07

colour is by far the least important.

Colour is a HUGE signifier for children who can't read, of what they are allowed to play with and like.
It is therefore EXTREMELY important.

drspouse · 01/08/2019 14:09

Now she is five and obviously allowed to pick whatever she wants,
From where? I don't usually take my DD clothes shopping (in fact, I rarely shop in high street shops), I occasionally ask her if she likes something I've spotted online and I do make the DCs' clothes as well so I will show her a print or ask her to choose from 2.

She's definitely not in charge of budget or items bought or she'd wear wellies all year round and her summer rhino dress with no jumper in the middle of winter.

ErrolTheDragon · 01/08/2019 14:20

Colour is a HUGE signifier for children who can't read, of what they are allowed to play with and like.

Its important insofar as, because of the inculcation of stereotypes, it can affect the choice of activities and toys - not important of itself.

GrumbleBumble · 01/08/2019 14:22

Say that you would like non pink so it can be reused for any future DS? You are looking to try and limit the environmental impact of having a children so you wan to be able to reuse everything?

Erismorn · 01/08/2019 14:54

@drspouse I have visions of DD striding down the highstreet with Prada bags, clicking her fingers at me imperiously...😂

No, I mean that when we identify something for her that she either needs or we want to get, we give her some say in the matter. DH bought her a new bike last week, he decided budget and a range of models he was happy with and then let her choose which she wanted. Same with clothes, we decided where we are shopping for her and what she actually needs, then give the option to choose the colours/style etc. A lot of this is done online, or sometimes we take her to the shops (H&M mostly as she is long and skinny and their sizing works well on her).

She dresses herself, we'll just provide some direction where needed an entirely polyester pirate dress up on the hottest day of the year got the parental veto

Erismorn · 01/08/2019 14:59

@ErrolTheDragon absolutely agree that colour is of less importance than being told she can't be or do something, but as a PP mentioned at this age it is a massive signifier for them. She was adamant that she couldn't draw blue flowers or a blue dress as "that's a boy colour". Turns out a fellow classmate had made a comment in colouring club, querying why she wasn't using girly pretty colours. DH was all for launching into the "do you need a penis to operate this crayon?" discussion but we managed to explain that anyone can like or use any colour.

LadyCassandra · 01/08/2019 15:11

I was quite blunt about it. I hate pink. We have 2 boys first so when people launched into the whole “oh its so great you got a girl” spiel Hmm I would say something then.
Most of DDs clothes are hand me downs and we live overseas so family don’t really send stuff. My friends know me well and the only pink stuff we got was from the ladies at church.
She looks really good in red. I actually don’t mind the pink too much but the frills, they infuriate me! Not sure if this is an Australian thing?

CurbsideProphet · 01/08/2019 15:17

My sibling received so many clothes for their first born (and second come to think of it) that 95% wasn't worn and just went to the charity shop / Home Start.
When I have mine I will have the excuse of "we have so many hand me downs we don't need anything" to hopefully avoid all the pink / blue and slogans Grin

Original poster
DollySpartan · 01/08/2019 15:22

just to be clear. I don't 'object' to pink, and am under no illusions that generisation occurs and that she may well choose pink in the. I would just would rather not be drowning in it, where possible iyswim?

I think, i will go for the approaches of:

Showing people the type of clothes I like/have bought - eg on wish lists or showing them stuff I already have
Telling if asked
accepting gifts of pink politely!

and then see what comes of it all :)

@ifeellikeanidiot - "Noone ever suggested I paint dds room pink Hmm" ...okay... great? I'm not sure why the Hmm was there?

OP posts:
MmmBlowholes · 01/08/2019 15:29

I thought this for blue when I was pregnant but when the clothes get covered in baby sick, poo and wee you really won't care. Baby will wear 10 different outfits a day for about 2 days then they'll need the next size up for about a week and so on so you'll get through all the pink. (obviously being extreme, but they do grow out of them fast!)

CoffeeWithMyOxygen · 01/08/2019 16:31

Honestly? It’s very hard to avoid. As a sort of experiment we deliberately didn’t buy DS any blue clothes. He’s now 10 weeks old and his wardrobe is probably 70% blue purely because of all the clothes people gave us as presents and hand me downs. He wears them anyway because I don’t want to be wasteful and blue is a perfectly nice colour, but it’s been a real eye-opener into how many people still see pink and blue as gendered colours.

Chocolatedaim · 01/08/2019 23:27

It’s not just the colours though it’s the prints also, girls get bunnies and flowers on their tops, boys get dinosaurs and cars.

My 4yr old loves bats and minibeasts at the moment (as well as unicorns of course) but unless we shop in boys section, you can’t find any of these animals on the girls clothes.

I do find the scandi brand Polarn O Pyret to be reasonably gender neutral, but they are also a slightly higher price point and sometimes A bit out of our budget.

I do find high street clothes for kids very poor sometimes.

cardamoncoffee · 01/08/2019 23:46

I think nowadays it's unlikely you will get 'a sea of pink' because everything is grey. When I had my dd the new colour in was biege which I hated. I'm not a big pink person but would have loved pink over biege corduroy.

Honestly OP if yo u don't like the presents just send them to the charity shop. Don't be too het up over avoiding certain colours, I know two families who are were gender neutral fanatics and both of their dd's adore pink!

ErrolTheDragon · 01/08/2019 23:52

Don't be too het up over avoiding certain colours

The photos at the top of the thread show the OP is no such thing, fortunately.

cardamoncoffee · 01/08/2019 23:56

Errol the OP said "no bloody pink!". I took from that that she wants to avoid pink.

ErrolTheDragon · 02/08/2019 00:04

Given the pink stripes in the dress, I think we can take that as a bit of hyperbole.Grin

Triskaidekaphilia · 02/08/2019 00:18

That's the sort of thing we liked. Whenever the topic came up I just told people that we liked brights and neutrals rather than girly stuff. We've only ended up with 2 pink things and loads of stuff we really like. We have way too much stuff in 0-3 though imo Grin

SadOtter · 02/08/2019 01:49

I just told people that I don't like pink, we got a few bits but mixed in with so many other colours it was fine.

She did go through a pink phase age 5/6 though, because she told everyone she wanted pink sparkly stuff when they asked what she wanted for birthdays and Christmas.

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