To think keeping kids in clothes is so expensive??

[Namedilema123]

When they go up a size and you have to replace everything...tops, leggings, vests, socks, coats, shoes, jumpers, cardigans....it is so expensive! I often find myself on eBay or Facebook marketplace buying second hand clothes for them and feeling bad that I don't buy them new things. I have a 6 month old and twin 3 year olds and we definitely earn more than the national average, but sizing up for all 3 is really expensive. Am i missing something? Someway to have presentable kids in nice clothes without breaking the bank? How people kit their kids out in head to toe next/gap/m&s is beyond me. Maybe im being tight rather than U.

Also if you are getting new from Next, H&M, M&S, Gap, do it online and sign up for their emails in a spam catcher email account - you get tons of codes and will never pay full price for anything, you often get free delivery this way as well. Go and look at the items in store and then order online.

Another vote for out of season shopping, buying ahead, Sainsbury’s for basics at 25% off and GAP/Frugi during the sales. DD is now 11 months and I don’t think I’ve bought more than 5 items full-price for her. Same goes for little birthday presents for friends’ babies - I have a little stash ready to go.

I must confess to being gobsmacked by the idea that clothing infants is expensive. I’ve gone for second hand wherever possible with my 5 and that is only problematic when they hit the preteen stage. Infants rarely wear anything out. I’ve recycled shoes as well: someone please tell me how good quality preworn shoes are worse than poorer quality new ones...

We find that t shirts and jackets need replacing first, while bottoms fit him for much longer.
Also I don't spend a lot on clothes, supermarkets and primark are my go to places for clothes.
For trainers I look at eBay the sports shop have in the sale, or that are not too expensive.

'Presentable' and ' nice' is not synonymous with 'new' to the exclusion of 'second hand'.

We're medium earners, have a teen, a preteen and a toddler and while I do notice the cost of clothing, it isn't a major expense. I:

• Accept hand-me-downs. We have several friends with children either a bit older or a bit taller than ours or both. People are glad to pass their stuff on and there's often really nice stuff among it.
• Buy multipacks wherever feasible. Packs of M&S tops or leggings for the little one tend to be quite good value (but I often buy from the boys' section for her because their girls' stuff is very prettified. No bloody underwear without bloody bows )
• Get good brands in the sale (Boden etc.) which then tend to last. I'll also buy stuff in advance that I'll know they'll grow into if it's a good offer (I appreciate you need to have the disposable income to do this).
• Generally shop primarily in sales. Shop around. I've found really good and hardwearing stuff at great prices from Mountain Warehouse - my boys really like it. I was in H&M last week on an emergency shorts-and-t-shirt dash and got shorts for both, three T-shirts and sneaker socks for a total of 32 euro.
• Buy from selling sites (not ebay, local ones). I also sell higher-value items like dc's snowsuits.

I admit to being fortunate in that my older two don't really care about branded clothing (but tbh if they did I would be getting them to supplement the cost with their own money).

Oh, and I have always passed stuff down from child to child. It was the obvious thing to do having two boys close together. But I hung on to a lot of stuff and when dd came along after a big gap we still had plenty for her - as I generally prefer less obviously gendered clothing on both sexes, there was lots that was suitable and still is (got some lovely fleeces, cardigans, coats, tops etc waiting for her to grow into - this will obviously get more difficult as they all get older).

I can also recommend Tchibo as a source of generally tasteful and good-quality children's clothing for not much money. I assume they deliver to the UK.

I think manyparents fall into the trap of buying expensive labels when the kids don’t care less. I’m enjoying putting both the boys in clothes they can wreck while they are little knowing full well when they hit their teens it’s going to be a shit storm of Nike, Adidas and various ridiculously priced brands that don’t exist yet.

Also agree with buying clothes years ahead if they are lovely. I picked up some gorgeous stuff from the charity shop a while back that was size 8-10 years and peanuts. I thought ‘sod it’ I’ll just put it in his wardrobe and he’ll be wearing it in a few years. Sounds bonkers but we’ve got the space so I may as well utilise it.

I don't dress my ds in second hand stuff but no, I don't think dressing a child is expensive at all. But he doesn't have a large wardrobe either. Maybe 10 t shirts, 3 or 4 jumpers, 8 pairs of shorts, 6 pairs of leggings, a couple of coats and 2 or 3 pairs of shoes. You could buy all that for £50 from Primark if you tried.

Mine have a mixture of supermarket, hand me downs and a couple of nicer new things each season. Sometimes people are nervous to ask if you want hand me downs.

I find shoes more of an expense-I always buy decent school shoes and even with supermarket and sports direct the amount of shoes required adds up!

I don't really understand the guilt about buying second-hand clothes? My kids are mostly in hand-me-downs and jumble sale/FB bundles.

Whether a kid looks presentable or not has nothing to do with whether you buy new IME. It has more to do with, do you have the kind of kid who will let you dress them nicely and then keep their clothes nice, or do you have the kind who insists on picking out their own weird and hideous combination outfits and then wearing holes in everything...

I love decathalon for trainers. I was totally sceptical that something so cheap could be any good but mil brought dc some and they have outlasted brand names plus hey wash brilliantly

Primark tracksuit bottoms wash so well

YABU - it has never been as cheap to clothe a child (or an adult) as it is now.

I had 3 kids and money was tight. My Mum told me the '3 outfit' rule - 1 to wear, 1 to wash, 1 to dry, that's how we grew up (when kids clothes were pretty expensive). I upped it to 4, so they all had 4 outfits for the winter, 4 for the summer, plus their school uniform. Same rule for me, incidentally.
I'm sure all the usual places have already been mentioned - primark, seconds shop, sports direct, supermarkets, hand me downs, gifts from grandparents, etc. This worked really well until they were teenagers, when they started wanting labels, so they got more expensive clothes for Christmas and birthday presents, or from money they earned themselves in the case of my eldest.
When my kids were little I used to get compliments on how well turned out they were so I don't think you need to spend loads of money on kids clothes.

I manage to buy most stuff in end of season sales. Plus buy tops and coats big.

Also I did notice I overbought in terms of numbers of outfits so over time I learned to buy less so it's just enough. Especially as family would then come along with new things at Chrismas and birthdays.

Plus yes to second hand.

When my kids were wee, I always shopped in sales, especially for expensive items like jackets etc. Clarks outlets for shoes. Supermarkets/ Primark in sales for everyday clothes. Bought nicer stuff on ebay/sales/ carboots etc. Bought next size up in bits and pieces.
I also passed down stuff, but was lucky enough to have 3 girls.
Teenagers...now thats a different animal, although online is great.

I find it really expensive.

I think its relative to family income though isnt it. A precious poster said its cheap as they can get clothes for under 300. Well x2 is 600, thats a grand of your salary pretax just on clothes . When theres little disposable income thats a lot! We struggle.

Similary - "its cheap we just kit from m and s for school , it lasts a year.' M and S is really really expensive for school clothes. I do a mix of sainsburys and asda and it lasts a school year (or more for pinafores) but cant afford M and S.

Weve just done school shoes. 42quid each and thats not including trainers for pe home trainers, wellies.

When you sit down and add it up it really is expensive for us. If youve got a higher income then its just part of your outgoings and no big deal.

Im v happy with second hand but we dont really get passed down things.

No I have three and don’t find this

I buy during the sales so at the end of the summer o buy up all the cheap summer stuff and visa Versa I also don’t dress my kids the same that costs loads

If somthing is not stained or damaged then it gets handed down 3 year gap between the two youngest

Also I don’t buy a whole knew school uniform like a lot of people do

And the last thing is I sew and that helps just starting to turn a too small dress into a skirt

I also hem up joggers and jeans to make shorts ect

Can be done

Two the same sex close in age means I can just weed stuff out of one wardrobe straight into the other one (I add in a few new things so she's not just constantly in cast offs and tend to alternate which child I'm buying stuff for).

We've just been caught out by DD1 who has absolutely shot up in height so half her clothes are suddenly too small - to be honest - mum likes a good bargain rummage and excuse to shop for anything cute - so she tends to stock her up a lot.

Charity shop and second hand pickings seem to get slimmer as they get older and stay in a clothes size longer so clothes actually DO get worn long enough to get worn out and stained. I have got a bunch of fab winter coats for the next couple of winters out of ours though.

It's not so much income that stops me buying bargains ahead these days - it's storage space to put the stuff in this house. My mum tends to squirrel away bargains and pass them to me when the kids hit the right clothes size.

We do OK for getting wear out of things - the stuff that's hitting the charity shop bag now is stuff that we've had about 3 years out of across both kids (supermarket stuff and it's still very wearable - TU Sainsburys t-shirts and long sleeve tops I've found stay as good as the Boden ones we've got in terms of condition after a few years of laundry abuse).

It's just DD1's endless bloody legs that we struggle to keep in clothing! They go on forever and ever lucky bugger and she doesn't get that from me the jeans we bought at the end of spring are now flapping around her calves!

Kids are expensive.

Shoes are the worst expense for us as we seem to have awkward feet and of course that's not so unusual. One coat fits most and can worn big and when getting snug.

Family did help us a lot with hand me downs and gifts.

It is more time consuming to look for bargains than to go to one shop and buy all. I'm more likely to do that now as our income has risen.

I buy everything in the sales for the next size up. One of the reasons I buy from Next / Gap / M&S, is that you can often get things in the sales for the same price as supermarket clothes, but they still have a resale value to sell on.

For example, a pair of boys trousers that I bought in the Next sale for £4, sold on eBay for £2:99 plus p&p.

If I had bought the trousers from Asda, I doubt they would have sold.

Ebay has saved us so much money, buying bundles when the kids were small and even now I just got joggers, 2 shirts and a long sleeve t-shirt for a 6-7 yr old for £6.50 inc postage.
We do use hand me downs as I have a 3 yr age gap and just stashed bags of stuff in the back of the cupboard till the smaller one grew into it. Especially trainers and welllies!
Tesco and Asda, saisnburys when the 25% off sale is on.
Big tip is not to buy too many clothes. Be realistic with what they need, especially once at school and in uniform for a large proportion of the time.