To not want ds kitted out in dinosaurs and sharks?

[Aliceandthemarchhare]

Ds is four months and mostly wears babygros. I had mostly white and grey and cream to start with but obviously people bought us things and there was a lot of blue and I like the darker navy blues - it seems to suit him.

However looking for a sunhat for him and I’ve had to pay £11 for a plain navy one. I forgot his sleeping bag on holiday recently and had to get one covered in sharks.

Why are boys clothes so miserable? Surely baby boys can wear bright colours and slightly friendlier animals than T rexes and sharks?!

Enjoy the wide variety of baby clothing when you can. You have years of wading through a sea of pink to find the solitary boys rail in the back corner of the shop ahead of you.

I agree with H and M being great for proper neutrals that aren’t white or grey. Zara is good too although quite pricey. Sainsbury’s is the nicest supermarket, Matalan has some good stuff too.

I have never just brought boys clothes for boys or girls clothes for girls. I always buy whatever I or they like best. My eldest boy is 27. So not a recent gender neutral statement. Just seems sensible to me.

Be thankful you don't have a girl and all that's available are fairies and unicorns.

I used to dress DD in as many "boys" clothes as girls clothes, as she suited primary colours better than pastels. And needed the harder wearing fabric boys clothes tended to be made of (tomboy!).

Now, as a teen, she wears black leggings, black hoodies, occasionally some navy has recently crept in, or paler blue or white when necessary for team sports uniforms (and she will wear her school uniform, but the school sports uniform as much as possible rather than skirt and jumper). She literally has 1 piece of clothing that's pink - because the charity tshirt in school was pink 1 year (they have a foundation that do a few events and support a different charity every year - so there's a tshirt sold to support that charity also) so it is worn as a sleeping tshirt when no one will see it.

[quote Noodella18]@aliasgrape, I often find there's Picalilly stuff in TK Maxx.[/quote]
Oh I didn’t realise this! I’ll go for a nosey.

It’s as abs as vomitous pink for girls. I hate it and actively avoid it for my DD.

I’ve found h and m, Sainsbury’s and Asda best. I managed to pick up some lovely panda suits in Asda last week for my 3 month old

Have you tried M&S? I’m the opposite - my little girl is nearly two and I really resist dressing her in only pink sparkly unicorns. She has lots of dinosaurs from the “boys’” section. But M&S seem to do some really good gender neutral and plain stuff. Eg she is currently wearing a sweatshirt with sloths on and leggings with cute clouds on the knees. It’s also not nearly as expensive as you might expect (the leggings were a multipack of 5 for £12).

DD's sole 2 acknowledgements of being a girl is to wear fluffy socks at home - most of which are black....and to wear her hair (long enough to reach 2/3 down her back) in a single plait every day (never just a pony tail or loose, and never any kind of fancy or french plait - totally utilitiarian)

I loved monkey prints when I was a DC, I presume they are a bit of a no-no these days though.

Back in the 2000s the boys clothes were all covered in Tool Boxes and fucking Tractors or Lorries.

My boys were permanently wearing navy and white striped everything as a consequence. All my photos of them are more or less the same outfit for YEARS!!

@BigusBumus

Back in the 2000s the boys clothes were all covered in Tool Boxes and fucking Tractors or Lorries.

My boys were permanently wearing navy and white striped everything as a consequence. All my photos of them are more or less the same outfit for YEARS!!

Don't know where you were shopping but my boys never wore tool boxes in the 00's. Or sailor stripes. They were multicolours and neutrals and just clothes.

Erm he is 4 months old, does it really matter what is on his baby gro?

For what it is worth, my son struggled with his speech but would have a really good go at saying triceratops and stegosaurus- loved dinos!

I used to buy boys’ things for my daughter when she was a baby because girls’ clothes didn’t have dinosaurs on!!

As someone who spent her mat leave petitioning to have dinosaurs on girls clothes I think the more dinosaurs the better. BUT it is annoying to have no alternatives.

I found H and M good for basics, Jojo maman bebe was also good. otherwise its just scouring the shops and boden/frugi second hand. It became my maternity leave hobby.

I find loads of colourful clothes for my two, mixture of sainsburys, john Lewis, m&s, jojo mama babe, boden, asad, h&m.

The place I find to be worst is matalan. Everything is blue/grey or pink/grey. Theres little in red, green, yellow, orange, purple etc regardless of which sex you sort by.

Zara and H & M are great for neutrals. Also try T K Maxx if you can bear it. I get DS’ smarter clothes from there sometimes.

I have two daughters, two and newborn.

I popped into sainsburys at weekend and they had loads reduced.

Dd2 loves dinosaurs so I bought "boys" vests, jumper, snowsuit, tops, plus "girls" shorts.

The checkout lady asked if I had boy/ girl twins.

marks and spencer have upped their boys clothes game recently. Fred and Noah have been mentioned - its worth checking out their second hand page on fb - you can get some good bargains. Sainsburys definitely the best supermarket for kids clothing too, wears so well

@swimlittlefishy I was shopping in the cheapest places possible, ie supermarkets for my boys clothes as I had bugger all money in those days and it was all I could afford.

I used to look longingly (at Le Petit Bateau for example) for the nice neutral and multi colours you sneeringly mention but could never afford them.

God this is a discussion on baby clothes. What's with the shitty attitude?

Actually hollyhead I’m quite happy to buy gendered items hence buying a blue hat. I just don’t want everything covered in prints. Plain is good, sometimes. Whether that’s blue or pink, white or grey.

See I don't really like plain stuff, as lots of my friends dress their little ones exclusively in Instagram friendly plain neutrals and I can't stand adult imposed fashion on kids. As soon as kids are old enough they often choose bright colours, patterns, prints, sequins etc, because those are fun & childlike. From 18m mine have demonstrated preferences and as long as those are reasonably practical/tidy looking I'm happy to go with it. DS liked cats & dogs, vehicles and flippy sequins, DD loves dinosaurs, dotty stuff and ducks/birds. They both love colourful stuff but do also like grey and brown sometimes, their choice!

Having b/g twins I agree that the choice is really limited for boys clothes if you don’t want to pay too much, and is less nice than for girls.

For girls you have the pink/frills but then also a good selection of patterns/colours.
Boys it is loud/dangerous animals and vehicles (seriously, who thought boys should wear clothes covered in diggers ans trucks??).

I have an oldest son, middle daughter and younger son. I try really hard to buy stuff that, if it doesn't get wrecked, would be fine for all 3 of them. Daughter is a total 'tomboy' (for want of a better phrase) which helps, but my general rule is no vehicles, predatory animals, camo print, or on the other end pink, frilly, hearts/flowers. They end up with lots of primary colours, fruit and veg prints, birds/jungle/Hawaiian type stuff, but it is a struggle and it's getting even harder as DS1 is now 9 and apparently shops think he should only wear dark green, navy or black, or 'gamer' related prints. When they were younger, little bird, frugi and Boden were good from eBay. Zara can be quite good depending on what's 'in' that year.

M&S and John Lewis are good for unisex a lot of the time, H&M best for plain block colour.

I am sooo sick of unicorns and bunnies for my baby girl. I have never got her any but relatives go mad as there have only been boys in the family until now. I managed to steer clear of gendered clothing with my first (a boy), but as soon as he had any interests his whole wardrobe became diggers, tractors and then moved on to dinosaurs and sharks.

I have to be honest and say I care a lot less about clothes with my second, but the unicorns are EVERYWHERE and magical and sparkly so they piss me off. At least dinos and sharks are real and interesting.

I buy majority for my 12 month old from h and m or Zara for his basics. Supermarkets dont sell clothes where we live

There’s lots of nice stuff about tbh. I don’t buy clothing with tv characters, and avoid slogans. Dont dress in head to toe blue either.

Today Ds is wearing:
Long sleeve white koala vest - zara
Black and white panda leggings - Liewood
Knitted dark red socks - homemade
Dark red knitted cardigan - h and m, girls department

I buy most his cardigans from the girls departments as often nicer colours. From the top of my head the dark red one he has today h and m girls, and he has a lovely green cable knit cardigan from Next girls department ( that he’s almost outgrown!)

I don’t mind buying the odd more expensive item from smaller boutiques, and just mix it up with 90% basics. I don’t buy that many clothes in each size.

I found it easier to find gender-neutral baby clothes than toddler and pre-school. My son is almost 4 and it's getting hard to find something affordable that isn't a franchise advertisement or some aggro/camo design. H&M seems the best of the lot.