To buy school tops in the wrong colour

[katiestar]

Our state primary school stipulates either the school sweatshirt which is bright red or bright red jumper / cardi with grey skirt/ pinafore.
I have bought my DDs dark grey cardigans to go back to school in for the following reasons.
1 They always get stained because the school doesn't have enough whiteboard markers so children have to use their hands , which inevitably ends up on their top.

2 Only buy uniform from M&S and their stocks were decimated , but had grey in every size.

3 Won't look too diffreent colour-wise from those wearing a pinafore.

3 Am really pissed off at the school who have agreed to be my placement school for a course I have been doing , but failed to return some paperwork in time for the deadline so I have wasted £200 and many hours for nothing.Not really relevant to the school tops but indicative of my feelings to the school.

5 MOST IMPORTANTLY looks lovely against their long pale blonde hair

Have said lots of times DD1 WANTS to wear grey.Am really not sure about the getting teased thind.We have only 60 children in teh school and many of the parents are very green.Have seen some pretty shocking home knitted jumpers and one girl wears a red zip hooded fleece top with sunflowers and winnie the pooh embroidered on it.Have seen a few white cardigans with summer dresses in the past too (how impractical is that) .People here avoid designer branded clothing like the plague .It really wouldn't bother me if people think we are poor , we are certainly much poorer than most of their school friends , but so what ?

Be prepared for your beautiful grey cardigans to be forever stuffed into their bookbags/rucksack irrespective of the weather because some kid has asked yours 'why haven't you got a red top like everyone else?'. Result - cold dcs in the middle of winter cos they're too embarassed to wear the grey cardis, and filthy shirts/polo tops/whatever they wear underneath said cardigans.

Just as I thought katiestar your dd will not be the only one in the whole school not wearing exactly the same cardigan as everybody else and therefore grey is fine.
By some of the comments on this thread you would think you were sending her in a dunce hat

Katiestar, your school sounds exactly like my DDs - and nobody there would care about a grey cardigan. Stop worrying about it!

So, katiestar - it's ok for your dd to break a school rule 'because she wants to..' How is this a good lesson to teach her?

NSM, it is Mumsnet though - this is the place where you can get support and love if you snap and scream at you children but shunned if you buy them the wrong colour cardigans!

In fairness though, a lot of the responses are in reaction to someones attitude this whole "sock to da man" crap when it is the dc who are being made to do the socking - wether they want to or not about something this silly does tend to make people think the op is a ridiculous idiot!

King canute - I refer you to the answer I made a monent ago.

Which I read and which seems to have no relevance to my post at all?

KingCanuteIAm
yes forgot about mumsnet moving in mysterious ways, I got caught up in the cardigan outrage, is this what the summer holidays has reduced me to, and I was doing so well yesterday with 'laundry mountain'.

LOL. I got caught up in it and forgot to send DS1 off to tennis on time !

I hope she is wearing the regulation tennis whites katiestar

Your Dc's will stand out and that is unfair IMO.

That was my DS1 that went to tennis .Have 2 DSs and 2 DDs.
No he was a bit mismatched.He is 11 and could make anything look scruffy !

'Have said lots of times DD1 WANTS to wear grey.'

Is this because you asked her if she minded after you had bought it or was it a completely open choice of 'would you like grey or red' before you bought it?

I have to say that over the years I have asked loads of DCs their favourite colour and I can't remember it ever being grey, although red often gets a top vote.

Oh well if there are others in different colour cardigans then that is a bit different I guess. I just asked two 10 year old girls who were wondering past my laptop how they would feel if their mother's (ie. me in one case) sent them to school wearing a red jumper instead of the black with logo one they have.

They looked at me a bit blankly for a moment, I don't think they could get their heads round it as just no one does it in their school and the idea of facing up to the deputy head about it makes my knees quake and I am nearly 40. I did finally get an answer from both, which was the same, embarrassed, but that doesn't appear to apply to the OP's DD.

Not addressing any of the other issues here, but a few (ok, a lot of) people have said kids don't like to be different , but my kids wouldn't really be bothered about being different to the others like that. Maybe yes, if I asked them to wear a yellow cardi, but not grey. They all have different shoes and coats and hairstyles. And cardis/jumpers - some have school logo, some don't. Are your kids really all that bothered about being the same?

YABU. Get them red jumpers and insist they wipe the whiteboard with their hair, thus killing two birds with one stone - darker hair to compliment the red tops, and stain-free uniform!

M&S online have the red jumpers:

v neck jumper

cotton crew neck sweatshirt

You can get free delivery on school uniform using the code SCHOOL09.

Both are in stock for your DD's ages. The smaller size is £2 and the larger size is £3.

Totally depends on the school.

Our school has a uniform policy which states there is 'an expectation' that children wear uniform, but they are open about not being legally allowed to enforce it.

Most children wear the uniform, small variations (like your change of cardie) would go totally un-noticed and un-commented on. When it was snowing, I sent my girls in in warm jeans with a school sweatshirt, and that was fine. some children (a minority at the younger end of the school) ignore the uniform policy completely.

Other schools have much stricter policies, and in that case I would not bend the rules, as it would make your daughters feel different.

Crokky, tbh I think you're wasting your time posting those links (although I did have a good nose and will bear the code in mind thanks ). I don't believe the OP even believes in the excuses she's made for her 'rebellious' behaviour. She chose the jumpers because they were convenient at the time and has maintained a belligerent 'stuff 'em' stance ever since. It's more to do with a desire to provoke the school due to her own issues with them.

Not, IMO, an exactly constructive way to deal with them.

I don't think she wants her DDs to have red tops even if someone buys them from M&S and delivers them to her house as a present! She is wanting to make a statement, and it comes before the feelings of her DCs. She has several weeks to change them-it is very simple, but she has to want to do it.

Did you know the uniform policy before you put them in there? If so you are being a spoilt madam. Pick your battles. We all have to conform to some degree.
You are lucky you live in such a liberal place of the world..our rules are pretty minimal, and its nice to get kids used to certain rules at school to prepare them for a good social ability later in life. After all who wants to be the odd one out anywhere?
By all means embrace individuality but to be honest the kids in my dc schools who have always been a bit'different' have not been so in a uniform sense, as that just smacks of trying too hard.

i love that this is still going on

If you think you are being reasonable why did you feel the need to post on here??