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Girls' clothes are my weakness. If I have a tendency to impulse buy or make an emotional purchase, it's usually with little girl's clothes or my clothes.
Lately, I have found the best defense against overspending with little girl's clothes is to buy what I love to begin with and be selective with hand-me-downs. To love what we have and have what we love.
Because you are only a mom to little girls once and childhood goes so fast, I think it's important to
LOVE your little girl's wardrobe. If I only had boys, I would be more into what they wear. But since my boys are destroyers of all things nice, I choose to spend more time, effort, and money on dressing the girls.
I enjoy dressing Laurie and Caroline in pretty and playful prints and understated pieces. I like mostly simple, classic children's clothes, not ladies clothes shrunk down to children's size.
Even if it means spending a little more, I think it's so important to LOVE what your girls wear. Even pj's. Especially pj's.
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One way I'm finding to save money is to take a really good inventory. Every few months I have been going through my girls' things and evaluating what we already have. We have tons of hand-me-downs from cousins and friends and sometimes it all piles up and we just have SO MUCH that I get overwhelmed.
When I sort it out and decide what to keep I play this little game where I shop my own stuff. I'm very selective in what I keep. I ask myself "What would I pay for again if I was building my daughters' wardrobes from scratch?"
Another trick is to cull enough to "pack" for an imaginary 3 week vacation in your climate.
I find that these games help me make decisions. After a big inventory, I will make a list of needed items and then I try to buy exactly what I want so that it is a satisfying purchase.
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One last idea...
One day I was scrolling Instagram and I spotted a little girl wearing a summery dress that my daughter owns. This little girl also had on leggings and a sweater with that dress. It was styled so cute.
I don't know why this was such a revelation to me, but I realized I could definitely do more layering during the fall and winter instead of putting away summer dresses and replacing them with all long sleeved items.
Especially since where I live we have mild falls and winters. I think we will try hanging on to all the summer items as long as they last and still fit.
Laurie was a sweet little model for me for this post. Watch how she takes the same dress from summer to fall to winter.
summer...
fall...
winter....
See how that works! So fun reinventing the same dress. It's like getting a little shopper's high without shopping.
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So what are your thoughts on spending and girls clothes?
P.S. I appreciate all your comments on the previous posts in this series! Thanks for reading.
