Grrrrr Non-uniform day

[Nodecagon]

Yesterday at pickup the DC bring out a note saying because today is last day of term, they can come in their own clothes (at the cost of £1) great, less than 24 hours notice is not enough.

So now DD is crying hysterically in her bedroom floor surrounded by every piece of clothing she owns, because she doesn't know what to wear. I have tried suggesting she just wears her uniform anyway, but that is wrong too because it is NON uniform day.

She has so far decided on a pink tutu and the top half of a Halloween cat costume that is age 3-4. I can't cope with all this extra stress in the mornings so I've come here to offload. Still have to deal with school-refusing, getting dressed in anything-refusing DS. I'm sure he is loving this as the attention is off him for once and he might actually think I have forgotten about beginning the daily battle to get him dressed.

No idea what time we will get to school today, if at all. Someone thought a surprise non-uniform day would be great fun. Yeh wonderful

DS now 12 used to struggle with non uniform days. The way I solved it was to buy him a 'non uniform outfit' at the start of every school year; so that it was hanging in the wardrobe ready for days like these. I realise this won't help you know, but perhaps it might in the future.

meant 'now' obviously

Oh good idea about non-uniform uniform.

it was all too much for DD. She had to go back to bed.

She'll probably go in at break time.

Only 8 months of school left thankfully.

I can empathise, Nodecagon. We have similar on dressing up days. Did you get them in in the end?

Yes thankfully, they are now in school and I'm at home with my although having a slight bad mummy moment because I didn't read the note about today until after DD was in bed last night, which would have meant we could have done clothes choosing yesterday instead. I had wrongly assumed that a note on second to last day of term, would be about something happening after the holidays. In my defence though most of yesterday evening was taken up with dealing with the trauma of the 'complete unfairness' of a whole class lunchtime detention (IMO it WAS unfair, but I don't have the energy to fight that one right now)

The non-uniform day uniform is a great idea, but unfortunately I don't think it would work for DD. She like to choose which clothes she wears, same as most nearly 8 year old girls I think. What makes her different from them though is the length of time she needs to make (the right- in her mind at least) choices of clothes and also that she has the fashion sense of a toddler (see above for her outfit of choice ) Add it to the short notice change from what normally happens and the pressure to be at school on time (late twice already this week) and it was never going to go well, was it?

In contrast DS couldn't of cared less what clothes he wore today, so I just grabbed the first tshirt and pair of jeans I could find for him. the struggle there is to get the clothes actually on his body, but that is the same with ALL clothes so today was no different. Relatively few complaints about going to school either because he knows it is the last day and then we can 'go back to normal' for the next 10 days.

Your DD sounds very like mine (who is also 8!), even down to the hideous fashion sense

I find it's easier if I just pick out an outfit for her and lay it out. If I give her too much choice, i.e. let her pick herself, she almost internally combusts with confusion, and can take hours to decide something. If she's had a good day, I'll maybe pick out a couple of outfits and let her pick from them if we've time, but no, usually I just pick it and lay it out.