I’ve always seen hand-me-downs as a practical solution. Older kids are done with clothes. Younger kids are about to get bigger and will need new clothes.
When my son is ready for the next size up, I pack everything that he has outgrown and bring it to his younger twin cousins the next time I visit them. It’s fun seeing them in his old favorites, like a beloved Spiderman t-shirt or cozy footsie pajamas.
Over the years we had received pieces here and there for him, which helped a lot, because I wasn’t on anyone’s hand-me-down list for my daughter.
Everything she wore was new, bought by me, or a gift from the grandmas. Sure, it’s nice to crack open a box with shiny new outfits in them. But, holy shmo, it’s also expensive. I happily passed them on to others when she was done with them, but never got anything in return, until she was five-years-old.
One of her friends in her Kindergarten class was a boy with a baby brother and two older sisters. As her friend’s mom and I became closer, through school functions, on the playground, and eventually a book club, she saw that I was someone who would happily take her daughters’ old clothes off her hands. It was helpful to her and to me.
I looked forward to discovering bags she’d drop on my doorstep. It was a treasure hunt inside! We never knew whether we’d get a bag of t-shirts, soccer cleats, or some jeans and one white dress shoe.
Usually, I’d go through the bags by myself. Then my daughter began insisting on trying every piece on upon arrival, even if it was obviously too big for her.
I humored her at first, but then it became our thing.
When a bag showed up, I hide it away until I knew we’d have the time to pour through it together. Once she saw it, she’d squeal with delight, clapping and hopping with impatience for me to get started. I’d talk about the things we’d find in the bags, remark on how cute some t-shirt was, how perfect a sweater would be for school, how those shoes can be polished up and worn at Thanksgiving dinner.
Then, one time, I pulled a dress over her head, and smoothed it out. She looked down at herself, twirled and said, “Mama, you know what I like best about getting the clothes?”
I assumed the best part was twirling in new dresses, but I wasn’t going to steal her thunder. I replied, “No, baby, what?”
She pulled two fistfuls of the dress up to her nose, inhaled, and said, “They smell just like Louis’ big sisters.” She looked me right in the eyes, still clutching the fabric up by her face with a look of pure happiness. “THAT’S my favorite thing.”
I sat there on her bedroom floor, breathing in a wafting of my friend’s detergent still spinning in the air, realizing that my daughter saw those bags of clothes as more than just fun stuff for an in-home fashion show.
She saw herself as closer to her friend’s big sisters each time she put their old clothes on. She felt a comfort in the familiar scent of that whole, loving family, and loved wrapping herself up in it in any way possible.
I knew that soon enough she’d be older and wanting to envelop herself in other people, ones I didn’t know. It made my heart swell to know that she was already choosing wisely which friends and families to surround herself with, literally wrapping them around herself.
I looked at her, still twirling before me, and replied, “Yeah. That’s MY favorite part, too.”
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Another version of this post originally published on Mamalode.
That’s so sweet. I was always jealous of my friends that had older sisters, not just for the clothes but for the “cool” factor of having that older girl to learn from. I had boys for friends though, and that came in handy later 😉
It owns how kids can thoroughly enjoy stuff like hand-me-downs that you’d expect them to find flaws in.