Do you worry about how your kids look?

[TruffleMonkey]

My daughter is 3.5 and always chooses her own outfits which usually results in some odd choices, but I don't really worry about it (as I'm no fashionista myself 😂)

I'm lucky if I can persuade her to let me brush her hair let alone do anything fancy with it.

Was speaking to a newish friend today who told me they don't like their child wearing certain colours, so they spend quite a bit on outfits for them. They also have designated clothes for 'play'. E.g they wouldn't let them go to Grandma's or out for lunch in those clothes, or something mismatched or mucky.

Just wondering people's thoughts really as I'm bored on a Sunday night and want to know if I'm being secretly judged for not minding how my kid is turned out😂

I worry what my eldest boy looks like. He is autistic and his behaviours don't always fit social norms. His hair is often dry and ratty due to low iron. He's often grubby as he makes such a mess with food. He sometimes struggles with hygiene.

He is so well loved and so well looked after but I worry that his behaviours combined with his general unkempt look will lead my parenting to be judged

I'm in your camp OP, it was hard enough getting DD to wear something weather appropriate nevermind a matching set in neutrals I'd picked out to coordinate with the rest of the family. We did eventually have some nursery vs home clothes, but nothing fancy specifically bought for either, just anything with stains that wouldn't come out would become nursery pile as it was only going to get dirty straight away again anyway.

My friend had a daughter the same age who was always very well dressed with designer gear, she didn't go to nursery and was watched by Grandparents when parents worked. All of the adults were very particular about how they dressed and whilst lovely people who didn't seem to judge, they did spend a lot of their time wiping down muddy trainers/fixing a bow detail etc on themselves and DD which just isn't worth wasting your life over for me. Fair play if it matters to them and they are happy though.

Nope! Comfort is key for us. But I come from a household (and an area that I live in) where people do obsess over their kids being in names or dressed so neutral.

Personally think kids should be comfortable and happy in what they’re wearing. I also love a bit of Disney so when my child asks to have Minnie Mouse on she gets it!😂

also kids get soooo mucky so easily! Unless you have unlimited (or near enough) money why would you spend £50+ on a. Tshirt alone?

It needs to be appropriate to the activity e.g. don't wear the tutu to the muddy park, but it doesn't need to match. I only insist for very special occasions e.g. weddings. DS regularly wears DDs hand me downs, including the flowery leggings and tutu along with a dinosaur t-shirt. I do remember a friend of mine commenting that she insisted 2yos clothes matched, whilst my DD was wearing every print going!

I had such wonderful ideas about how I would dress DD when she was a baby. She is now 8 and looks like she lives in the jungle most of the time. She can get dirty within seconds and hates clothes from the girl sections. Frills, bows, glitter, anything cropped, anything hard like jeans, anything with a cut out or strange sleeves, is a big no no! I used to be a bit upset about it, but now I just roll with it.

Oh not in that sense no. I low-level worry every day about if they’re getting fat though (so far so good!) but I have Issues. Mainly just that I don’t want them to go through the same struggle I have.

I probably wouldn't let mine go to visit relatives or go out for lunch in something mismatched or mucky. They would wear something different from their everyday clothes for those occasions or if we went into town etc. Definitely not dresses and bows maybe just nice jeans and a sweatshirt.
I certainly wouldn't judge whatever a child is wearing though, before becoming a parent I didn't realise how much effort goes in to presenting a relatively clean and dressed child to the world.

I did give them some choice but did step in when at 4dd1 wanted to dress like Bianca in Eastenders (obviously she didn’t make the connection but the leopard print leggings and silver puffer jacket she liked were a hard no from me 😂🙈

My DC are older (10 and 14) so I have little say over their wardrobes now.

Day-to-day they can wear pretty much what they want. But for certain occasions they need to be dressed appropriately i.e.out for a meal, family event, theatre trip. Joggers and sportswear would be their first choice but that's not always appropriate, I'll compromise at jeans/chinos and a polo shirt.

When they were younger I hated them in character clothing and football strips, but did eventually give in to that as it's what they liked. Again not for smarter occasions though.

It's important for children to learn how to dress for different settings and expectations.

Yeah I care. I don’t think my little girl who is fair skinned looks good in black or colours like nude, beige, tan, camel etc so I avoid those. She had a party today, three girls were in thin, cotton summer dresses, with bare arms and legs in a freezing church hall in January. I thought it looked poor. I know those girls are completely loved and looked after but I couldn’t help but think they looked completely inappropriately dressed. My daughter wore a vest, tights, dress and boots and a furry coat.

My daughter who is 7 is very vocal about what she wears but I HAVE to step in, otherwise she’d be walking round Sainsbury’s looking like something of Ru Paul’s drag race.

My now-30s DD always selected her own clothes, the brighter the better, though always clean and in good repair. I remember a nursery worker saying: "Here comes mini-echt in her mad clothes".

Her cousin was always very chic in greys, navy, etc. I remarked on this with a tinge of envy and her mother said with great good humour: "X is absolutely supine about clothes choice".

Before I became a parent I would have probably judged a mother who dressed her daughter like mine. Ie dresses every day, mainly pink, sparkles and rainbows and feathery ornaments galore. What I know now (that I didn't then) is that children will dress how they want and some, like mine, absolutely love the girly to the max look... Also that we'd inherit huge amounts of those types of clothes from kind reletives and friends (so it's not like I had to buy them, or at least many!)... And finally that seeing your kid happy is the most important thing in the world so if that's a full sequin jacket, satin pink dress and sparkly shoes to grub around in the mud then she can do it! (and also that she is still totally kick ass, tough, brave and awesome while sporting her sparkle princess look).

Age and weather appropriate as much as I can make them now they're older but not too much beyond that. DD wants clothes that IMO are too old for her (she's 8) so I do veto crop tops and the like.

I did dream of them looking like they were all out of a Boden catalogue when they were younger and I managed it with DS1 but then my budget could only stretch so far and his siblings had stronger wills....

I care about my kids looking clean. Clean clothes, brushed & neat hair, clean faces without breakfast around their mouths, clean teeth. My daughter never liked girly clothes and so she wears more ‘sporty’ clothes. I’ve never cared about them looking ‘stylish’ as long as they look presentable. I think it’s a good habit to get into.

I do take pleasure in what dd wears. She luckily does not care yet (3yo). When I was newly pp and the ppd was the worst one of the things that kept me going on the other side of the long rough nights was to lay out a cute outfit for her the night before. I gave me great pleasure to dress her in the morning, knowing I'd got through another night. Now, we don't ah e the sleepless nights but I love seeing her all dressed up and lovely looking. Even on "comfy"days she wears matching tracksuits etc so she looks coordinated. If she decides to start dressing herself then so be it, but for now I'm enjoying it still!

I was always allowed to pick my own. I think that’s right but I do wish my mum had helped me a bit more as a teen to identify what looked good. I felt quite behind my peers on that stuff and had some embarrassing moments with my outfit choices. Nothing nasty, just that sudden awareness that I’d got it a bit wrong.

No. I am lazy and DH had always been happy getting the dcs up and dressed in the morning, so I leave the clothes choices to him. And most of the clothes weren't bought by me, my DSis passes on my niece's old clothes so I have no input into it. DH mostly does pretty well, except he has no concept of being cold and puts them in a layer less than I would have.

We go out to the theatre a lot and to big venues like Royal Albert Hall and Royal Opera House, but we don't always dress up for it. London has always been fairly relaxed about that sort of thing (for adults and kids), because it's often just done casually after work or weekend activities, and it's not a big deal.

Since he was able to, I've always let DS choose his clothes and pick his outfits for the day. I've had to step in before and force him to wear something weather appropriate but otherwise he's the boss of his look. The only thing I won't let him do now is dye his hair or shave it completely off. He is OBSESSED with football so only wears strips and often fixates on certain hairstyles.

That said, if we were going somewhere where we had to make an effort I would have to put my foot down and say no to football strips.

Yes I care, but then again I only have one toddler to cater for. I wouldn’t dress him in the same type of clothes that we go for lunch in that we would wear to go the park for example. Always bathed every night, hair is neat and clean face. But it’s definitely an each to their own type of thing, probably a confidence thing too.

No, I think there is such a small window when kids can actually experiment without judgement that I let them choose. I also think if you don't get to experiment you don't get to learn about clothes.

Mine love choosing their own outfits. Sometimes they pull off amazingly coordinated looks and sometimes it's a jumbled mix of clashing prints and sequins.

As long as it is vaguely weather and activity appropriate I'm not too fussed. If you can't wear clashing colours when you're a kid then when can you.

We had separate clothes for school /church/going out, and clothes for the farm, for our children.

Clothes for the farm were old, mismatched hand me downs , with wellies, that can have horse hair and goat muck on them.
Nice clothes were simply that, although they chose what to wear, so there times of wearing dresses over jeans, or a dinosaur sweater every day for a week

I do tend to buy nice things for them, well imo! One is just becoming aware of brands which is annoying.

My DD9 is normally well dressed and is really getting into trends etc, if we're going to the playground etc then she has older/marked clothes for that. She also has different shoes and coats for messy and best etc