To not like any of the clothes that people but for the dc?

[Babysafari]

People are always buying clothes for the dc. It's really kind but I secretly hate most of them.

I'll admit I love buying clothes for my children. But, I'm not buying them anything expensive, branded or designer or anything like that. I always dress them comfortably and suitable for the weather and I'm not bothered if they get dirty so it's nothing like that. I'm actually a bit obsessed with them being comfortable and mostly dress my baby in cotton babygros and dungarees so he's comfy.

I do love choosing clothes but I know they're not dolls it's just one small part of things. Growing up most of my clothes are hand me downs and my parents chose hideous, old fashioned stuff. I remember my mum asking a friend if they had an old winter coat for me so maybe there's something in it.

I just never like the things other people buy, for example the tshirts from some shops always seem to have huge baggy necks that just look odd shaped or are made of sweaty or itchy material. Or fluffy suits, shoes and jeans for the baby, he doesn't need shoes and a furry suit when it's hot! People also always seem to buy things too small even though both dc are tall for their age.

I don't know whether I'm just really fussy.

YANBU. I'm a bit chosey over who I am happy to buy clothes for DCs, my sister yes definitely and although they don't I'd probably be happy for my brother to as well. My other sister, no I wouldn't she has appalling taste herself so goodness knows what she would dress a child like.

I like girls to be a bit more traditional when they are younger. DD is 5 and has some pink spotty jeans but that's it, it's all leggings and tunics or dresses or shorts and tops. I like denim pinafore dresses and the shorts ones but that's it. I hate character clothing unless it's pyjamas and I also dislike garish colours or stuff with slogans on. DS more was bought some awful stuff when he was younger. The slogans all seem to be negative too on boys stuff and stupid princessy crap on girls. MIL bought a skirt for DD once and it was unbelievabley short, I refused to put her in it as it barely covered her bum. I couldn't take it back as she got it abroad.

DD was once bought a black velvet dress. To me it just reminded me of a funeral (she was a tiny baby as well) so I never put it on her. She doesn't have anything black, neither does DS.

We they get older I'm sure they will have their own tastes (there already with DS, we shop together and have to agree on it before I'll buy it) but for now, I want them to look semi decent. Too many little girls in tiny skirts and knee boots at 3/4/5 years old and more.

Interesting, I've get a 9 week old baby and I've found the same thing with seasons/sizes. We've had several people give us beautiful summery dresses which will fit DD perfectly around December Its a shame as they're often really nice.

Are the dc old enough to have an opinion of their own? The stuff dd ended up liking was the exact opposite of what I would have liked, so she was very grateful to relatives who indulged her. She ended up wearing (and loving) 30-year-old garments which I had refused to wear as being too uncomfortable. Her ideas of comfortable were clearly not mine.

Otoh I can't remember the time I didn't loathe my mother's idea of me as a sweet feminine thing who looked good in pink (I seriously don't) and was very thankful that she did not often have time to indulge her tastes: hand-me-downs were my salvation.

I would say, once children get to the age of 3 or thereabouts, their ideas of comfortable trump yours, a balance might be maintained between your and their ideas of what looks good, and your ideas of practicality and economy trump theirs.

I took a load of stuff back and exchanged it when DS2 was born because it wasn't to my taste, I think it's normal.

What I find much more difficult is my (lovely) MIL spends weeks knitting the most hideous jumpers, in awful wool, and then I have to somehow persuade DSes to wear them for long enough that she thinks they get some use. The amount of work she puts in is so heartwarming - but what is produced, well, 80s baggy jumpers with bobbles, bizarre mint green tam o shanters, etc. I try to subtly suggest she just keeps things simple and either uses crazy colours, or crazy stitches or crazy styles, but no, she manages to find a pattern with all three......

Just return it! Sometimes easier said than done. Clothes are often bought on holiday, France, Israel. Or 3 days left to return to obscure tiny concession shop an hours bus ride away whilst heavily pregnant and you don't like the shops style anyway, not that you could afford to exchange for anything except a pair of socks because it was bought in the dregs of the sales.

YANBU - I do this and my DS is a month old! We got all sorts of awful clothes from the IL's (funnily enough not my MIL) and I have to take a photo of him in it, post it on our photo sharing app and then change him. He doesn't throw up all over his clothes very often and has trouble pooing, so I only change him maybe 3 times a day (once in the morning, once if he does do a wee on himself/is sick and once at night for bed).
Again these are people who have their own children/grandchildren so I do not know why they insist on buying such impractical outfits. Plus outfits from DP's nana stink of smoke no matter how many times I wash them!

Although regarding seasons, I was buying clothes in Next for him the other day (a few sizes bigger as we have loads of clothes from family and friends who have recently had boys), and my mum had to remind me by the time he's 6 months old it'll be winter and I'd only got t-shirts and shorts! I had to swap it all for trousers and hoodies

Cory ds1 is old enough. I do tend to just leave him to it really and he likes to wear things more because they were a gift (he's nicer than me), even if it is two sizes too small with a neck hole so big it looks like an off the shoulder number.

I'm really quite upset by some of those comments I'm afraid. I don't know anyone who would buy or make things for their grandchildren that their parents wouldn't want to put the children in.

I knit and only use baby wool in natural yarns, which is soft and comfortable. I also never make things with holes for the reasons mentioned. Sometimes I buy gift vouchers for clothes, or get them to choose things and I pay for them. If I buy things without them there, it'll be plain or striped t shirts, check shirts, jeans etc. No lace, no synthetic fabrics. I did buy my little grandson a raincoat, but he is a year old now.

Same problem here. Me and DH had a talk with our families as we got lots of clothes after my cousins baby boy and didn't need all this extra and often too small or unsuitable cloths. Now they usually ask us what do we need if they wanna buy clothes, otherwise they know it's better to buy nappies, formula or other stuff like that. It's a win win situation - we get what we need and they are happy to see DS wearing the clothes. I should probably add that we are very close with both families so we had no issues talking to them about that. To other we just say "thank u" very nicely and give the clothes to someone else who's baby those clothes will fit.

Choc Oh the knitting, sob. MIL can't knit, she thinks she can. Also a prolific knitter. No tension at all whilst knitting so everything is twice as wide as it should be, sleeves start at elbows and hang down too knees. She drops stitches, sews buttons on upside down, fudges mistakes, etc. All in my hated shiny, cheap white. We picked wool together for DS1, next visit she told me how she'd knitted a lovely cardi for some random girl with it. Maroon is a girls colour apparently.

Scaredy - I feel your pain.

MIL can knit, really nicely - it's just the patterns she finds are terrible, and it is knitted with love, which of course I appreciate Foxy - I have the baby blanket she knitted folded and packed carefully for instance.

foxy but some people don't think and many people have very different tastes. I know from what I put my DD in that I am vastly different to what most other parents put on their girls, alough this is changing a bit more as she gets older. I realised when DD was about 20 months and she had a yellow and white dress on from Pumpkin Patch, frilly socks and white sandals and 2 old women spoke to her and commented to each other how nice it was to see a girl dressed like "a proper little girl." I suppose she was dressed like a grandmothers dream and that's what I liked for her at that age. I wouldn't have appreciated sparkly blue jeans with embroidered butterflies and T shirts. Plus MIL bought an outfit when DS was born. Nothing wrong with the outfit but it was thick and padded like a quilt and fleecy as well. He would have fitted into it in July to September, and we had a really hot summer that year. No thought whatsoever to the fact it was a very winter outfit that would fit in the middle of summer!

I do love nicely hand knitted cardigans on little ones though.

I don't know anyone who would buy or make things for their grandchildren that their parents wouldn't want to put the children in.

That's the problem, foxy - my MIL, for instance, loved the sight of a two-month-old baby in an 'outfit' consisting of stiff jeans, a button up mini-lumberjack shirt, little shoes and a baseball hat. She genuinely thinks these are lovely outfits, and cannot understand why anyone wouldn't think they were beautiful.

We went to a friend's festival-style summer wedding in a field when DS was just turned three, and MIL was most put out that the photos didn't show him wearing the miniature tuxedo, complete with bow tie, waistcoat and shiny shoes that she had sent!

Oh yes to the knitted stuff scaredy and choc. DS's two great nan's (in their 70s) knit him stuff but in the most awful colours/patterns (snot green & shit brown stripes anyone?). I take him to the park, and when there's nobody around I whip a jumper out my bag, make him wear it, take a photo on a slide/swing then take it off, put in bag and then pack it away back at home. Then there's a photo of him in it, it looks like he's worn it loads and out in public, but it's all a show. I feel awful for the effort that's put into them but they are just not my or anyone's taste!

YANBU i have drawers full of stuff that DD (now 5 months) was gifted at birth but some of it is truly ugly, and other things she will never wear, because it's winter coats that will fit in August, or shortie rompers that will fit in the middle of winter. Unfortunately the family that sent this stuff live abroad so we can't exchange anything, and I've had no luck selling stuff on as the brands (which are mostly v expensive) are unknown here.

Oh, and don't get me started on the knitting! MIL knits well and has good patterns, but every single thing she's made for ds or dd has been far too short in the body with a bizarrely small neckhole.

miaow my MIL buys matching socks for every outfit she buys. My DS had about 30 pairs of newborn size socks which he never wore because he was always in babygros with feet.

I'm very fussy with my baby's clothes and comfort. I only buy good quality cotton, usually from M&S, Debenhams, Toby Tiger, John Lewis, Monsoon, Kite etc. I bought some things from Boots and GAP recently, the quality is horrible and they seem cheaply finished with loose threads, itchy seams etc. I always run my hand inside the seams. A baby can't tell you if they feel itchy!

I get most of it in Sales, buying a size or two ahead for the next season.

I also loathe stiff non-stretchy clothes or anything that's hard to get on and off, or with unnecessary zips/buttons/buckles.

I rarely use clothes other people give as gifts. I just take a few photos for them, then it gets shoved into a cupboard or sent to charity

YANBU I hate most of what people buy for my Dd especially when it's from a certain shop that is cheaply made and really doesn't wash well at all. I end up saying thank you, stick it in the wardrobe for a couple of months and then take it to a charity shop.
Feel like a right ungrateful cow sometimes, but Myself and Dp have mentioned a number of times how we don't buy clothes from there as don't wash well so is a waste of money etc, but seems to fall on death ears! So if they won't listen then it's their look out I suppose.

It's interesting as a non-parent to read this thread, I try to think about the kind of thing I see the children in my life in when I buy clothes for them, that way I'm more likely to get their parents' style right but I have definitely been guilty of buying cute little hooded cardigans. No raincoats though...

This is why I've learnt to knit. I've had some lovely items in awful yarns or in the case of MIL, the item as wide as it is tall

I knit with nice yarns in nice colours, and always do a tension square so it's the right size.