Okay Really What clothes do my kids need?? ...What about toys?

[fancie217]

I have two sons... 18 months and 4 years... and EVERYONE gives us clothes... Not complaining but our kids have more clothes than they will ever wear. I want to downsize.... but am unsure... how many outfits do they need... how many of what??

Any help will be greatly apprechated.

 

[keljonma]

Just a thought -

How often do you want to hear - I have nothing to wear? Thankfully, you won't hear this from sons as often as you do daughters, ime.

Right now, your kids are probably out-growing clothes pretty quickly, especially the 18 month old. At that stage, I think I kept more pants than shirts, because of the whoops! of potty training.

If you reinforce the knees of their jeans when new, they will last longer. Or cut them off for shorts after the knees have torn or disintegrated.

If you have 7 interchangeable shirts and pants, you have a multitude of looks for 1 week. We usually made sure we had enough clothes for each child to go 3 or 4 weeks without laundry. This is great when one parent travels for work or a family trip pops up. (When they are about 9, children can learn to do their own laundry. )

ETA: you could possibly save some of the outfits from the older child for the younger, if you have the space. Of course, once you start to do that, the young one will grow 6 inches in a month and be taller than older brother (again just my experience.)

Hope some of this rambling helps.... I'm sure you'll get plenty of other advice.

 

[me&thegals]

I have this wonderful problem, too We get lots of hand-me-downs and I'm always looking for good deals at secondhand stores.

I don't have a great system, but here's what I do: I keep the current size in the kids' dresser and closet. There's a bin in each closet for outgrown clothes that are still in good condition. There's a stack in each closet of excess clothes IN their size and another for clothes TOO BIG for them. So, things keep getting rotated in and out as they are outgrown or get too stained for public wear (my daughter )

Sometimes we simply have too many to possibly be worn, and those get passed on to other family or St. Vincent de Paul. Anything outgrown in decent shape is treated similarly.

So, I guess I can't tell you how many of each outfit. That really depends on your kids. Do they play outside? Get muddy? Make paint and play-do messes? Have potty accidents? My son seems to get by on about 5 pairs of pants but many more shirts. My daughter has so many clothes handed down that I absolutely need to cull a bunch of them. She probably could use about twice as many clothes as my son since hers always end up stained beyond redemption. :/

 

[TanksHill]

I am in this exact same situation. This morning I am heading into my dd 6yo's room with a good will bag. She has lots of hand me downs from a cousin. Which I am greatly thankful for, but my dd is a bit round in the middle. The clothes that fit her are not age appropriate in my opinion. I think the best thing at this point is to pass them on to someone else.

I often think about the Ingles girls, you know Little house on the Prairie. They had just a few regular dresses and a Sunday dress. My mother talks about Pinafores(sp). The little aprons with ruffles that covered their dresses. To keep them clean I think.

How easy it would be to have 7 dresses in the closet and almost nothing more. My life sure would be simplified.

I would love to get some advice on this one.i gina

 

[PamsPride]

I try to think of the math behind it. If you have 4 dressy summer outfits for church...May-Sept...5 months they will only wear each dressy outfit 5 times! If you have 6 dressy winter outfits for the rest of the year they will only wear them 5 or 6 times.
My boys wear the same thing every single Wednesday to church...their Ranger uniform.
Monday-Friday it is generally sweat pants or camo (their favorite) because we homeschool and are not out and about.
Summer, if you have 10 pairs of shorts they will only wear each one 2 times a month. If you pay $20 for a pair of pants and they only wear it twice it cost you $10 per wear!
If they were in school and had 10 outfits for each season they would still only have to wear the outfit to school two times in one month!

(Don't ask me how full my kids closets are....11 and 13 yo have hardly anything that will fit them and 6 and 9 yo closets are bursting at the seems. People don't tend to have bigger boys clothes as hand me downs. But, doing the math behind this has helped keep me from impusle buying clothes for the girls!)

 

[breconbcs]

It really depends on how dirty and rough your kid are on clothes. When my kids were that little I had them outside alot, playing in mud, dirt, etc. so we always had extras in the dressers, I'd say 10 to 14 days worth of clothes that could be mixed and matched. When things get busy or we go away, it may take a few days past laundry day for me to actually get laundry done.
For the 18 month old, I would have more pants than shirts - for when potty training comes around, as for the 4 yr old - isn't this the age where they seem to always find something to get into and get dirty.?? I would still make sure the 4 yr old has at least 2 or 3 extra pairs of pants/shorts. If they tend to spill on shirts, then I'd keep 4 or 5 extra shirts just in case.
Now the almost (Yah!) 18 yr old son has about 4 or 5 pairs of pants, and about 10 shirts that are "hand me downs" from a friend of ours who buys a new wardrobe EVERY spring - some even have the store tags still on them. My 12 yr old son has 2 pairs of jeans that he loves, couple pairs of shorts, and about 8 or 9 tops. He's not a get dirty type kid so he can get away with wearing his jeans a couple times over and when he does get them dirty, I just wash his pants (I always have some sort of laundry to do). I rarely buy his clothes at full price, I buy on clearance or from secondhand stores. My 10 yr old daughter on the other hand, has way to many clothes. We get hand me downs from the neighbour for her. We go through them and I let her pick out what she wants and what I think is appropiate and give the rest away. Then what I do is I keep an eye on what she wears and when I clean her closet I remove the clothes I've never or rarely seen her in. I also make a mental note or when my mind isn't working, write down what she has on that is getting to small and when I wash, I put it in the give away bag. I've found doing it that way she doesn't realize for the most part that the clothes are gone. I do keep 1 or 2 outfits for special occassions or outings and when they were younger those were kept in my closet so they couldn't play in them.

 

[patandchickens]

Try this:

See how many clothes they go through between laundries. You might try to string things out EXTRA long between kids-clothes-containing loads just to give yourself some margin of error. OK, however much clothes are in the laundry when you break down and decide you're gonna do it, that is sort of their minimal clothing needs. Count the shirts, pants, underwear, socks.

Then add a few extra to your total for 'what if they played in a lot of mudpuddles this week', and maybe add a couple other carefully-selected outfits for specific occasions that you know will come up occasionally (grandparents, restaurants, really messy hikes, etc). Something that wears out frequently like pants you would want to add in a few extra pairs to account for replacment.

And there ya go. That is approximately how much clothes they need. Their needs are likely to be quite similar in the next size or two up, too.

I think it'll differ a LOT among people because everyone has their own lifestyle, attitude towards how worn something has to be before it gets washed, and how often you do laundry. For instance each of my kids (almost 2, and almost 5) has exactly one pair of shoes (plus snow and rain boots), whereas I know kids who have, I am not making this up, twelve pairs of shoes and the mother claims they are all worn regularly.

Good luck, have fun,

Pat

 

[FarmerChick]

I farm so my kid gets dirty and rips clothes.

So decide how your kid handles their clothes. If you need less, then just decide how often you wash clothes, what clothes can truly get you from washing to washing and then a few good outfits for going out etc.

I don't think it is rocket science at all....only because if you downgrade clothes that do not fit, ripped etc. and then need something, the goodwill or salvation army stores are close by probably and you can easily replace what you might need.

I have farm clothes, boots, etc....things that never go out in public for her....then school clothes and I weed out tons all the time. Between goodwill and grandmas I have tons for my 4 year old.

But yes, declutter those clothes...I do it too cause they just pile up and grow on their own it seems...LOL

 

[fancie217]

thanks for everyones reply... Yep, I'm gonna go with 2 weeks worth... and will be working on going threw their closets the next few days.

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But I did add to the question with another thing that bothers me.... All the toys toys toys.... We do have more than they could ever play with. About half stay upstairs and we routate them out.... but I'm really trying to simplify our lives... how do I know which ones to keep and which ones should stay??

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My Hubby is one of those people who can keep everything 'cause he may need it one day.... I hate having things around just taking up space,,, lol

 

[PamsPride]

UGH! I hate toys!! I refuse to buy them except at Christmas time. I even ask all of the family to get the kids gift cards for one particular store a year for my older three boys and then they can go and pick out a large item that they want.
I have one toy box in two of the bedrooms and in the older two boys room I have a tub of K'nex and a tub of Legos.
I find the kiddos would much rather to pretend play, play outside, or play vidoe games.
Oh, we do have a LARGE box of Geo Trax in the living room and that is mostly because I do not want all of the pieces mixed in with other toys.
I even took all of the dvd's out of their cases and put them in one of those cases that holds like 25 or so....we have a couple of those.