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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

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Original poster

Should I force DD to be fashionable?

55 replies

fuzzpig · 26/03/2013 18:34

Recently had a comment from another mum at a birthday party (thankfully NOT in earshot of DD) saying that she was wearing a ridiculous outfit because it didn't 'go'.

Perfectly pedestrian clothes BTW, just clashing bright/pastel colours and a long sleeved top under a dress. That's the sort of thing she likes to wear. She doesn't choose what clothes I buy - I get pretty normal supermarket children's clothes - but she chooses what to wear each day.

Apparently I should be inisting that she wears coordinating clothes all the time so she doesn't look silly.

She is FIVE, by the way. She shouldn't have to worry about this, right?! Or am I being naive and setting her up for a lifetime of social problems by not choosing her clothes?

OP posts:

Schooldidi · 26/03/2013 22:01

Both my dds have worn 'interesting' outfits from time to time.

Dd1 has now reached an age (13) where she is starting to pay a little bit more attention to it, but she is still quite fussy that her clothes have to feel right and less interested in how they look.

Dd2 has just turned 3 and wears some right wierd and wonderful outfits because she chooses her clothes most days. So she generally opts for long sleeved top under a t shirt with jeans, but some of the colour combinations make me wince a bit. Then other days everything she wears has to 'match' in the sense that it's all pink, or all green, etc.

Wellies (with cars and buses on ) are the footwear of choice at all times and the current favourite coat is a dressing up outfit to make her look like a ladybird . If she's warm enough I don't really censor what she wears.

UnEggspectedItemInBonnetArea · 26/03/2013 22:05

My DD is 5 and delights in the weirdest clothing combinations, it's a joy to behold. Ignore loopy woman.

Geeklover · 26/03/2013 22:09

My dd is a bit of a clothes horse. She is almost 10 and always looks fab. Just rarely very conventional
When she was a toddler and started wanting to wear odd combinations or fancy dress clothes out and about I never stopped her. I do hear people saying to their dc of both sexes you can't wear that etc. but I always felt I was letting then express who they were by their choice of clothes.
Dd is starting to see pressure from other girls but she just thinks they are being silly. She likes what she likes and doesn't care if anyone else does or not.
Ds as well often dresses like he got dressed in the dark at a jumble sale and has at times gone shopping with me in a party dress or something else he thought looked or felt nice .
He's 7 and also doesn't give a stuff what people say. He is a hat man and has loads. He gets comments everywhere he goes in his hats and luckily all complimentary.

If they are comfortable and in weather activity appropriate clothing who am I to argue with them.

Yardarm · 26/03/2013 22:32

I find much fashionable clothing for girls to be both impractical for playing and often also inappropriate for their age. I know there will be more pressure later to dress in a more 'grown up' way but for now I am very glad that my 7yo DD chooses boys trousers, shorts etc (but perhaps with a slightly more girlish top) and faces no pressure from friends (or their mums!) to dress in any other way. Perhaps that's because many of them have older brothers rather than sisters!

Beamur · 26/03/2013 22:39

I like my DD to be dressed in nice clothes and fairly matching outfits - but she has some choice too, after all she is a person - not my accessory!
Funnily enough, where I live artful clashing is way more fashionable than matchy matchy.
A friend of mine has a little girl with very strong ideas about what she will and won't wear and went through a phase where everything had to be stripy (and then it was spotty, or a certain colour) and everything she wore - including undies had to conform to that - and came up with some very interesting outfits!

glub · 26/03/2013 23:03

you are joking aren't you? like you said, she is 5! who cares as long as she can move and likes it herself. if she's anything like my daughter she will have her own ideas about what she wants to wear - she needn't wear what some old silly woman thinks is right.

margot1962 · 27/03/2013 02:50

She's 5! Get a grip on this! Tell her that what you achieve (good at reading)is more important than how you look.

sashh · 27/03/2013 08:06

At 5 a spiderman costume worn with glittery wellies and a blue tutu is a good look.

TheDoctrineOfSnatch · 27/03/2013 08:15

Who makes that kind of comment about a five year old?

TrinityRhino · 27/03/2013 08:28

that woman is not only rude but quite crazy....actually very crazy

noblegiraffe · 27/03/2013 08:38

Oh god, is there such thing as fashion for kids? Is Peppa Pig so last season? Is my DS in dinosaurs when he should be in diggers? The shame!

SofiaAmes · 27/03/2013 08:39

My dd has been picking her own outfits and dressing herself since she was 2. She's been designing and making her own outfits since she was 7. I used to get comments from other parents periodically about her clothes not matching. Well, now she is 10 and the other girls and adults all look to her for fashion advice and strangers stop her in the street to compliment her outfits. I can guarantee you that not one of her outfits ever "matched" in a conventional way.

There was the one day in 3rd grade where she had convinced her entire year that wearing deflated red bouncy balls at a rakish angle on your head was the latest style in hats....And the day that a mum texted me to say how hip my dd looked and where did i get her clothes from...I didn't have the heart to tell her that they were hand-me-downs from her dd, just worn in a slightly more unique combination.

Toasttoppers · 27/03/2013 08:40

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

extracrunchy · 27/03/2013 08:40

Ridiculous. And actually quite sad...

SatsukiKusukabe · 27/03/2013 14:44

will out myself here.. basically I dress dd myself, we live in area with extreme weather and a 2 year old doesn't get the option of deciding her clothes for that reason. However she "accessorises" herself on her own. She has a collection of probably hundred Mardi grass type beads dozens of hats and sunglasses and shoes to choose from. I live near a couple pretty amazing charity shops and occasionally go overboard... inevitably she wears her dragon wellies or red sparkly shoes firefighters helmet or Easter bonnet type thingAnd a couple of suprisingly well color coordinated beads. She then tops off her look with putting her sunglasses on sticking both thumbs up and saying aaaay like the Fonz. I find it hilarious I realize it's totally unacceptable or so I have read time to time on mumsnet... but I love it. Ds is still little but been practicing putting in hats.

Bue · 27/03/2013 15:44

Stargirl Dressing fashionably at six months?! "Outfits" for babies would have no place in my life. Who can be bothered with the faff?

TheSmallClanger · 27/03/2013 16:01

If you can't wear crazy clashing clothes at 5, when can you wear them?

DD had some co-ordinating outfits and a lot of thrown-together ones at that age, and she did go through a phase of liking to wear layers - skirt or dress over trousers, with a cardi or jumper and perhaps a scarf. She wasn't the only one. Lots of the little girls round here wore/wear colourful wellies as their main footwear.

OBface · 27/03/2013 16:06

How bloody depressing.

OP take no notice

WoTmania · 28/03/2013 11:03

NO is the short answer.
Let her wear what she wants and experiment and gain confidence in the way she looks and develop her 'own style'.
My mum and I clashed for years (and years and years and years and years and years) because she tried to get me to conform to a certain way of dressing that just wasn't me. We get along a lot better now I'm in my 30s and she leaves me alone mostly.

samithesausage · 29/03/2013 01:03

I was told off for letting ds 2 wear pink when he was 3! He had pink wellies, tshirts, hoodies. My reasoning was piccasso had a blue phase.... He's turned out ok. Likes pink, won't wear it though! The woman's a loon! Ignore!

infamouspoo · 30/03/2013 18:25

No. Fashion is a way to make women buy more stuff than they need and feel insecure. Why make them start at 5?

InNeedOfBrandy · 30/03/2013 18:30

Oh I am the complete opposite of all of you on this thread. I always have my dc looking nice, it might be head to toe primarni (well actually no I hate primark but they have had the odd thing) but they always match and look nice. EG I wouldn't let dd wear her pink trainers with red trousers, why because it looks awful.

FreyaSnow · 30/03/2013 20:29

I agree with the poster who mentioned 'artfully clashing' as being a fashion. It is a sterotypical look for a middle class child from a certain sort of family - lots of bright colours, wellies, skirts over trousers, long tops under dresses and tshirts, boys with long hair, knitted striped jumpers etc.

If I go to my local park, half the kids in the playground are dressed like this.

chipmonkey · 30/03/2013 20:44

How rude of her to comment!

I remember one of ds2's friends aged 3 coming to a party in a pink top, orange trousers and wellies! The Dad was at pains to explain that it was her own choice of clothing, not his, but to be fair, I was more worried about where all the friends were at any given time, rather than what they were wearing. Mind you, she was easy to find!

Schooldidi · 30/03/2013 21:28

Freya we fit that stereotype well in our house. Dd2 chose her own clothes today and mil nearly had a fit when she saw her. Everything was spotty!! So she had purple with yellow spots on a long sleeved tshirt, then on top of that she had a white sundress with tiny multi-coloured spots, her knickers and socks were both white with spots. The only problem with her 'spotty' look was the trousers because she doesn't have any spotty trousers so she chose stripey leggings because "stripes are nearly spots". Top it off with a ladybird dressing up waistcoat, a monkey head hat, and a bright red coat, and she looked a complete state. BUT she had chosen it herself and had got herself dressed without any help, which is a big deal when you're 3 and she was so proud of herself. It would have been cruel to tell her it didn't look great.

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