To expect nursery not to stain ALL the clothes?

[Hollyisalrightactuallysorry]

Posting this as I genuinely am not sure if IABU

DS1 is 4 and DS2 is 20 months. DS1 went to a nursery where we used to live. No issues, fairly run of the mill. All of his old clothes are now being worn by DS2.

New nursery started 4 months ago for both. Again, no major concerns and kids have settled in nicely

Except, DS2 comes home with at least 2 bagged up bundles of clothes each day and is usually wearing his 3rd set. On washing the clothes, almost all of them are covered in paint. And this paint does NOT come out. I've tried everything!

I've just counted and DS2 now has just 4 t shirts and 2 pairs of shorts that aren't stained. And I'm talking quite badly, not just flecks.

I've brought this up with the nursery and they've sort of taken the attitude that I should expect clothes at nursery on a 20 month old to get ruined and therefore should just keep sending him in wearing the stained but clean clothes

The problem is that they are going through so many clothes each day that I end up inevitably sending him wearing something not stained and begging them to put overalls on.

I don't understand how DS1 wore these clothes for a whole season without getting a single stain on them and we are now not able to get through a single day without something being ruined.

I don't know what else to do. I've asked for overalls to be worn and asked why they don't use washable paint. They say they'll water the paint down but the latest bags of clothes are also ruined

AIBU to expect nursery to take a bit of care when using materials that stain?

YABU- pretty usual at nursery at that age
YANBU-I'd raise it with management again

Nursery massively stressed how messy they get and how the washable paint does not wash out when we started. We just send in the stained stuff.

Only times I grit my teeth is when they've done outside painting in coats and shoes, I don't feel they should be painted on

The only thing which halfway works on ours is stain remover and a full 2hr+ 40 degree wash (I usually use the hour long quick wash). I wish they would put them in proper overalls. But I simply don't send her to nursery in her nicer clothes and she goes in wearing any old rags basically.

This.

Just send him in the clean stained clothes

YABU. If I any painting with my 3 the clothes are never clean at the end so I wouldn't expect nursery to do any better with their ratios!

But why are you sending in so many sets of clothes?!? I only ever sent in 1 change and that has always been fine, if they're doing multiple messy activities through the day what on earth is the point of changing painty clothes only to do more painting! The 1 set for me was only really if they got soaked on a walk or had a toilet accident, I wouldn't expect changing due to a bit of paint.

I doubt you're going to change the nursery practice or the paint they use, but you can reduce your workload to 2 outfits a day max.

Children are differently messy.

I remember the day we went to a farm park with dd1 aged 4yo and dd2 aged 1yo. DD1 chose to wear a beautiful white dress, flower in her hair, with white socks and sandals. When we came out, dd1, having done exactly the same as dd2, (played on the playground, held animals, gone on the steam train etc) looked almost the same as when she went in except the end of her white socks was faintly coloured orange.
Dd2 could have rolled in mud and come out cleaner. There was nothing dd1 did that dd2 didn't except dd2 was in the buggy for a short time asleep.

And they've been like that, even now as adults. Dd1 will look pretty much the same as when she went in, and dd2 looks like you dragged her through a wet hedge backwards while throwing handfuls of mud at her.

Ds goes for the more dd2 approach, although he also gets stuck into what he's doing outside more, so you can see how he gets so filthy. I remember when he was about 6yo and I went to pick him and a friend up from touch rugby. I took it in turns with the friend's mum and we used to have bin bags on top of the car seats to keep them clean (ish). They didn't look too bad, and I commented as such. I picked the bags up and turned round to see them literally leap into a puddle of mud, of course they both simultaneously slipped and fell over. They were literally mud from the top of their heads to the bottom of their toes-but very happy!

Some answers to questions

-DS2 quite happily wears an apron for messy play at home. They have aprons but they don't seem to use them (photos on their app show no children wearing aprons)

-DS1 loves messy play and used to get through clothes at 20 months but not 3 sets a day. Old nursery used pinafores and all paint came out in the wash

-I probably wasn't clear but the paint isn't washable paint. It's not like it's washable and some colours are tough to get out. It's bog standard poster paint.

-I don't send him in wearing posh clothes. All DS2 clothes are hand me downs from DS1 and most are from Vinted or supermarket clothes

-I don't do washing everyday as I can't afford to run the tumble dryer every day (nice weather this week but the summer has been a wash out). But the sheer volume of clothes is forcing me to do a wash every day as I don't have the number of 'stained' clothes to sacrifice

-We both work full time. I don't want everyday to come home and soak 3 sets from DS2 and 1 set from DS1 each night to try and ease the stains

I honestly do get and understand the mix of responses but I guess I'm just frustrated that rather than make some simple changes like using the aprons they have or switching to washable paint, they are just expecting all the parents to constantly churn washing and clothes so they don't have to bother (I'm not the only parent who has complained apparently)

It's just annoying when you're already paying so much for childcare and then spending more on things I don't think should be necessary like buying even more clothes or running the washing machine/tumble dryer more when some changes their end could cut this down.

And if I only send in 1 spare set of clothes, they send him own in spare nursery clothes AND bagged up spare nursery clothes which I then have to clean and send back so have asked for 3 spare sets

I worked in EYFS for years and managed to not send children home stained in a daily basis, they still played but I would be watching ready to offer an apron or showing an interest in what they were doing, when they're proud of what they're doing they use more thought and control and actually learn, anyone can leave a child in a corner with paint, yes they'd be messy but it's not an indication of having learnt anything
It's offensive seeing all the 'a messy kid is a happy one' and "just buy more clothes from X it Y' when we have no idea about the financial situation of OP.
Speaking as the child of parents who didn't have lots of money us being dirty was seen as possible neglect where the more fortunate messy children would be seen as 'exuberant/expressive', some people really don't understand their privilege.
Let's also consider the damage to the environment of buying and binning multiple clothes or having to do multiplie washes a week ago because nurseries aren't taking responsibility for buying washable paint.
Also, if they're not checking that they're actually washable can you be certain that they're checking they're not toxic?

I'm not sure you a being unreasonable tbh, rest many outfit changes is a bit much to expect. We do lots of messy play babies & toddlers included, I use aprons waterproofs. I'm not surprised you're getting fed up, especially if staff are making no effort to use the aprons they have - seems like it would be less work for staff to pop an aprons on rather than do so many outfit changes every day.

Weird that they're using non-washable paint.

I'd stop sending spare clothes, then you only have one set for each day to worry about. Keep using the stained clothes.

If there aren't three sets of clothes in his bag, they either need to keep his clothes dry, or use their own spares.

You still have to wash and send back the nursery clothes, but it saves your own clothes from getting dirty.

I'd pack two sets of nursery spares in his bag rather than your own stuff.

If there aren't three sets of clothes in his bag, they either need to keep his clothes dry, or use their own spares.

Yup, they use their own spares which they then send home in a bag with his own stained ones and I have to wash and return to the nursery as 'they don't have the facilities to wash all spares worn by the children'

Not the point I know but it always confuses me when people say to send kids in "old" clothes. They don't have old clothes, if they were old, they wouldn't fit them anymore. People should just say "buy them cheap clothes you don't mind if they ruin."

Wouldn't you prefer they use their clothes for messy play rather than yours though?

I would probably just put up with these and wash them and send them back at my leisure, rather than send in loads of my own clothes for them to put him in.

@retrainer I would love to just use their spare sets and not my own (although it doesn't stop the masses of washing they're creating). But they don't have enough spares for me to do this so they will send him home wearing spares and with dirty spares in his bag for me to wash but then ask for them back and that he has several sets of his own in his bag as they don't have enough spares to use them all the time and they should be by 'exception'

This is a very first world, wasteful, destructive attitude and I don't think it's a good idea to teach children that their clothes should be ruined just because they fancy wandering back and forth between painting and other things.

Surely they can have a set painting time and then wander freely about between none-messy activities? I can't imagine that would make a massive difference to their development...

I’d ask them why they are not using water based paint that comes out, definitely. And also if he’s not soaking wet just got a bit of paint on I don’t see why he needs to be changed. Just leave him in the paint covered stuff would be what I would say if he’s not uncomfortable.

But DS2 comes home covered in stuff all the time and occasionally it doesn’t come out. He won’t wear an apron so I’m just 🤷🏻‍♀️

I do understand your frustration but personally I’m happy to sacrifice some clothes for him to be having a good time. However I’m not getting 3 sets of clothes a day, I must say!! Just see if you can come to an agreement with them about it.

What would happen if you just didn't obey them, though? There should be no need to change him that often and you're at a stalemate if they won't accept that.

They should use washable paint and overalls! Would annoy me too

I would not expect clothes to be pristine and I did use cheap clothes and reuse stained clothes but relentless paint ruining clothes regularly I think might be excessive? I guess you've been told by them to send in stained clothes and that's what I would do. Mine were out in overalls to paint.

Sure, but my point is if you stop providing loads of spares, they have two choices - keep his clothes clean/dry enough for him to wear, or put him in their spares.

If they keep asking for more spares tell them you don't have enough!

Is this a nursery where the DCs are taught to put their coats on independently? (Both my DCs were with the 'laying it the floor, arms in, flip over the head' technique) If so, it is perfectly possible to also drum into them that before painting they must don an apron with the same technique. They can still free flow between activities, but this is made a non-negotiable along with washing hands after the loo etc. Whilst it is important to allow messy play, learning to look after your things and about their value is also really important.

Yabu

Messy child usually = stimulated happy child

Just buy 2nd hand clothes for nursery and who cares