To have handed these clothes back?

[CymaticPrincess88]

Basically the other day school phoned me to inform me that my DD had a stain on her top, I was aware, it had been washed. It was a rather stubborn stain but it seems a shame to chuck it away when it still has use?

Anyway she offered to give DD a spare top to wear and asked if this was okay to do so. I said if it was an issue then to carry on (in a much politer way than that of course)

Anyway later on that day DD arrives home still in the clearly cursed stained top. Has no idea about any spare tops. the following day she is sent home with a shirt she is told she can keep. I'm a bit at this point, but think no more of it.

Yesterday, she comes home with a bag of uniform bits. It seems that the teachers now think we are some sort of charity case who can't dress their kids. The joke of it is even if I did need these clothes, they're too small.

I'm more upset about the fact that my daughter was handed this bag of clothes in front of the whole class. No subtlety involved at all.

I seethed all night about it and then took them back this morning and handed them over to one of the staff, explaining my reasons above especially being handed them in front of the whole class and I'm now answering questions an 8 year old shouldn't be asking really, or shouldn't have to be asking, such as "Are we poor, mommy?"

Was I unreasonable to hand them back?

You weren't being unreasonable. I wouldn't hand it like that I would ask first as we have masses of un-named lost property.
We are just glad that kids turn up in uniform lots of them have stains on.

To the mums that think they can get them out. I have a pair of trousers with a great yellow paint stain down the back of the leg where one of our little treasures drop a box he was painting as I was going past I have tried everything. They were brand new. I have tried everything.I wear them for gardening now

And I’m not buying a £2 polo from Sainsbury’s either. I don’t agree with fast fashion when there’s essentially nothing wrong with the item you’re replacing, and at that price, I’d worry a child in Pakistan or Indonesia had made it instead of being at school. Accuse me of virtue-signalling all you like.

How ridiculous! I find it hard to believe this happened. Not that I'm doubting you OP - I just imagine a parent at my children's primary school ever being phoned over a stained top or being loaned/given another one.

I'm sure my children have gone to school with eg ink stains on their shirts on more than one occasion. As have many, many other children. Absolutely categorically not poor. Just don't really want to waste time and resources on something as unimportant as making sure there is a stock of spare, pristine white tops at all times.

Don't school have anything more important to worry about? And potentially rather embarrassing for your child.

So yes, returns clothes with a "thanks but no thanks" and walk away (rolling your eyes discreetly at the silliness of it all). I guess you will have to be a bit more careful about stained tops in the future to avoid awkwardness. But really it is very silly.

I sent my younger son to primary school in stained uniform because I really didn't care and neither did he. He rolled in the mud, ended up with biro and food stains every day and ruined every new top within weeks.
In the end I really, really didn't give a monkeys about the stains. The clothes were clean when he went to school and that was enough for me.
I was not going to faff around with bleach, stain remover and supposedly marvellous remedies when it simply doesn't matter.

The school have dealt with this quite tactlessly @CymaticPrincess88. If I threw out the dc's t shirts every time they got an indelible stain on them, I'd be replacing t-shirts every week.

As long as the t shirt is otherwise clean, I think school have overstepped here. And you can tell if a t shirt is stained but clean or is worn all week. I wonder if your dd had accidentally put on a t shirt which she should have put in the laundry - my boys are terrible for putting worn clothes in their wardrobe to tidy them away instead of putting dirty ones in the laundry hamper. I can easily see them picking up a dirty t shirt and putting it on instead of the clean ones. Once they've put a jumper over it, you wouldn't necessarily spot it so the teacher might notice when they took their jumper off at school.

I think you've done the right thing by returning the clothes. But I would also be asking to speak to the person who called you and establishing exactly what is going on to have given them the idea that you might be struggling.

Blimey if I was going to send DD to school without any stains she’d be going in naked! Her clothes come home from school covered in all sorts of marks, a lot of which won’t come out. The school WBU and rude. YANBU to take the clothes back (and tell them where to stick them).

@StarlingsInSummer

And I’m not buying a £2 polo from Sainsbury’s either. I don’t agree with fast fashion when there’s essentially nothing wrong with the item you’re replacing, and at that price, I’d worry a child in Pakistan or Indonesia had made it instead of being at school. Accuse me of virtue-signalling all you like.

That’s very refreshing that you think like that. It’s not virtue signalling at all.

Get it outside, on the line. Hopefully the UV light will bleach it a bit.
Even in rain

soak in COLD water scrub with (or washing up liquid) detergent in cold water than put in cold prewash followed by hot - if the blighter doesn't shift die it the same colour as tome sauce my ds use to go through the knees of trousers, initially I carefully patched & sewed them - after the first year - well if he was going to come home with a hole in the knee he could jolly well wear them. I use to buy 3 new (cheapest possible) trousers a term - fortunately he was skinny so they use to fit. (expensive ones still tore - he was an active boy)

If your child was the only one handed a bag of spare uniform, op, then she is clearly wearing a disproportionately large number of stained clothes.
A 10p sized stain on a shirt worn once (but it can’t have been only once, can it?) if she is otherwise pristinely presented would not have resulted in a phone call home and the donation of a bag of clean clothes.

Nope, there's more to this

A few years ago DD's class did those night sky silhouette pictures in art. They all got the black paint on their pastel candy-striped uniform dresses. It didn't wash out - there was some very strategic juggling around before the school photo to hide the mess their uniforms were in.

My old school (no longer in existence) used to have smocks for art lessons as part of the uniform, in boiler-suit blue. Stylish. I wonder what happened to that idea?

Gosh I can't believe what I'm reading.

How wasteful to just throw stained clothes away.

Ime children will stain clothes, mud, grass, paint, food, suncream.

Our primary school warned us that children's uniform will come home very mucky and that it's a sign they've had a good day.

Not the same as an adult going to work in a stained top.

That’s batshit. By the summer term everything looks like a ragbag, despite bucketloads of vanish. Reception was the worst with everything covered in that bloody whiteboard marker pen.

last year i sent my youngest to school in jumpers that are stained with pen or paint because he has to wear a school logoed jumper that are £16 a go. it’d cost me a fortune to replace his jumpers every time he got a stain on one! luckily, so far anyway, this year we’ve managed two months without any stains.

DS's white polo shirts stay white for half a term before being covered in paint. From this point on I give no shits about them and bung them in the mixed wash to go grey. I won't be wasting my time with stain removers and I won't be wasting natural resources buying new.

Kids are meant to be active, creative and learning not perfectly smart.

orange or red stains come out of clothes if you leave them lying in the sun.

best bit of advice I've read on mumsnet.

you're welcome OP

I think the school have totally over reacted and what they did is clearly embarrassing for you. I would be mortified. Do you think that there are other things that may suggest to them that you are struggling in any way? Sounds like the phone call was possibly an attempt to broach the subject?

If i'm honest, I wouldn't send dc to school with a food stained shirt/polo shirt as they are cheap enough to replace or do without until I could afford a new pack. However I would continue using a jumper which clearly had pen or paint on from school, as long as it wasn't in a very obvious place as jumpers are expensive.

A STAIN ON HER SCHOOL UNIFORM?!

If all the kids looked similar then op’s child would not have been singled out. There is far more to this than she’s let on.
It’s possible to wear stain free clothes and still project an air of unkempt scruffiness.

Arriving to school with actual stains may have been the tipping point.

You need fairy liquid rubbed into stain, leave for 30-60 minutes & wash, may need repeat application but definitely works. For added whiteness wash with a dishwasher tab, totally brightens whites.

No more bank rolling Asda 😂

My DC are 5 and 4. At least 3 polo shirts a week end up with a stubborn stain on. Yes, they get washed and used again.
Apart from anything else, does no one think of the environment when they’re throwing away perfectly serviceable clothes and replacing with brand new ones?

orange or red stains come out of clothes if you leave them lying in the sun.

Food based ones, particularly tomato, yes. Not bastarding paint.

This thread is an eye opener. I had no idea people spent so much time on laundry. How do you find the time to be soaking and scrubbing? I honestly couldn't tell you if my dds polo shirts are stained, although it's probable. They're clean though

And Yanbu op. Ridiculous overreaction from the school.

Tomato based stains are one of the easiest to get out, all you need to do is leave the stained bit in the sun.

This time of year, I’d hang the offending top in a window for a few days.

It’s the marker pen stains I struggle with.