School Clothes

Is it really that time again?  The ads for back to school specials are out!

I loved shopping for school clothes when I was little.  I remember how Mom showed us that the $100 would go much farther if we bought clothes that we could mix and match in the same color schemes.  I enjoyed trying them on to show Dad in a "fashion show".

I had dreams of enjoying this process with my own kids.  I didn't get to do this with the daughter I gave up for adoption.  It has been nice to see that her parents helped her learn how to, as my Mom put it, "look presentable". She is beautiful and definitely presentable!

I was so excited to be blessed with two step daughters!  I love the girlie stuff! The first year I helped them get ready for school, I took the lead from my new mother-in-law with dividing clothing up into "school clothes" and "play clothes".  This had been a new step for them, since they had been home-schooled before and often wore layers of fairy skirts and princess dresses most of the time.

I have to be careful.  Their mom, with whom they live every other week, let's them wear whatever they want.  Even when we showed the judge pictures of one of them in outfits we thought were inappropriate for a little girl in public, he said it was a parenting choice.  Changing out of "clothes from Mom's house" has to be handled in a way that doesn't insult the girls, their mom, or the clothing.  I just say that I want to wash them and keep them safe in the "mom drawer", so that we are respecting them instead of getting them dirty.  Playing in these clothes in the back yard with the dog and noticing they smelled like the dog was a good example that I used to show this.

When I tried to introduce "matching" at our house, I got mixed reviews. They didn't understand the point, that is for sure!  It was hard to match random shirts and pants from the local thrift store, so it was something with which they needed a lot of help.  One daughter would let me pick out her clothes often and then other times tell me "matching is bullshit!"   The other daughter said she was interested in learning more about matching better (e.g. shades of the same color that do or don't work), just not yet.

The next year, I tried taking each one shopping alone, so we could have some one-on-one time.  Each girl brought a favorite piece of clothing to match with other pieces in the store.  One girl wore the outfits together and liked knowing they were a combo.  The other never did wear the shirts WITH the skirt they were bought to accompany.

This year, we can't afford to go shopping.  Their drawers are FULL of hand-me-downs that work just fine.  They feel like they have a lot of options, and they even got rid of a lot of clothes to make room in their drawers.

This year, I'll continue to model wearing matching clothes.  I'll continue to giggle when one of the girls tells me that I should change into a different pair of shoes that match better.  But as for the girls, I think that we'll just focus on jeans as a compromise. I'll back off and just emphasize that anything goes with jeans.  I haven't even started on the shoes yet.  Maybe it is a good thing, though.  I don't need to turn them into a shoe-aholic like I used to be.  Besides, having a sense of their own style can be empowering.  In some ways, I wish I had the guts to walk outside the box more often!