Clothing question re: Gender

Just wondering what other people's thoughts in this are and what may have been done.

First pregnancy we did not find out the gender, as such we bought what gender neutral clothing we could and once DD was born we bought some girly clothes to mix with the neutral clothing. Mostly short sleeve body suits to go under grow suits. This time around we are also not finding out the gender, we still have the neutral clothing and some new items that MIL has bought. MIL's idea of neutral is actually boy's clothes :rolleyes:

Anyway after chatting to MIL about the clothing situation, I had said to her if we have a boy I will just buy some boy short sleeve body suits to go with the neutral clothes. Her statement was that is should not matter, especially at home, what a baby is wearing. Whilst I understand the logic of the statement, a part of me really could not dress a boy in pink and same with having another girl, dressing her in MIL's boy outfits. I had enough trouble with people calling DD a boy even when she was wearing something pink and with flowers, let alone when she was wearing gender neutral, that I would not want to give anyone the wrong impression of gender by dressing them in gender specific clothes of the wrong kind. I know minor, but it does bug me. Currently re washing the newborn clothes and I know I will be sorting them into gender groupings before putting in the wardrobe.

What have other's done in this situation?

Hi Astrid,

I've got a couple of blue things that I dress Amy in at home but wouldn't take her out in blue just cos clothes are pretty much the only way people can tell what gender a little baby is! Hehe. I really only dress Amy in the boyish clothes for bedtime to be honest, because like you, it doesn't feel right. I personally wouldn't put a boy in pink at home or out. Just my personal opinion.....for some reason it seems wrong! Haha. How hypocritical of me! When your bub is born, dress it however you like. MIL will have no say because I doubt she'll be there every time you dress your bub and if she wants to waste her money on stuff that isn't going to be worn, then so be it! At least you've told her what you think. MIL's definitely test you sometimes! Congrats on your pregnancy! xx

hmm... depends on the clothes I guess.

DD is wearing 'boy' nappy covers coz I've only bought a few girly ones, together with the gender neutral covers.

I will probably recycle DS's jeans too, and just get girly shoes and t-shirt to go with them. She'll probably wear the odd t-shirt of his too LOL.

Wondersuits - haven't used them much coz of the weather, but we have blue, yellow & green suits, and we only ever used them at home, so I guess she'll be getting around in blue suits at home too LOL.

Having said all that tho, I probably wouldn't do it the other way around. I don't have a problem with a girl wearing blue or boyish clothes (not full on outfits tho) but I don't think I'd put a boy in girly colours/clothes - even at home.

Seth wore red & purple bonds stripey stuff, but he still "looked" like a boy iykwim. That was about as feminine as he got and it was still gender neutral. I never really put him in any of Paris' stuff for the same reason.

Blue on a girl is definately not too much of a problem, just co-ordinate with pink socks, singlet etc and the outfit looks girly. Blue and red sail boats are a bit harder to girlify if need be. Pink kitty cats is definately too hard to turn into a boy's outfit.

PMSL at sailing boats and kitty cats - who's idea was it to put those on baby clothes?!

I took DD out in a head to toe purple bonds outfit yesterday and a middle aged gent commented on 'what a happy boy he is' LOL! You can't win!

No I couldn't do pink on a boy, nor would the sailing ships go near my DD...you can get away with both light and dark blue on a girl (minus teddy bear motifs), but pink on a boy is a stretch!

Re gifts, ppl gave us some very boy-ish clothes and I thanked them, and tucked them away at the back of the wardrobe, ready to re-gift when the time arrives!

I just went through all of DD's clothes and donated all the pink stuff. I agree, blue on a girl is ok, you can accessorise, but pink on a boy??
I kept mainly the singlets, and bibs (some of which are pink or purple, but that doesn't worry me) and blankets. I have a pink blanket, which I think I will use as well, so that will be the only pink thing that will be near our little man i think.

Nic

Looks like I am the odd one out here! Much to DH's disgust I did dress DS in a couple of pink or yellow bodysuits when at home! Couple of reasons for this a) I had SOOOOOOO many clothes from DD that were in almost pristine condition and b) DS was a very spewy and pooey baby so his clothes would constantly get dirty at both ends - some days not including pj's he would wear 4 outfits due to them getting dirty.

So I suppose I did it more out of necessity/practicality IYKWIM? :)

Must admit that even now DS loves dressing up in his sisters dressing up outfits - mainly Snow White and the fairy one!:p

Yep, I'm the same as most people. Wouldn't flinch at putting DD in blue rompers for bed but would only use her leftover pink ones for a boy in an emergency.

But I'm so utterly and completely OVER pink and butterflies and am steering right away from girly stuff. I bought her a black hoodie the other day - DP didn't like it and has banned me from buying any more black stuff!

I'm with Gabysmum... we kept all my DD's clothes (I gave the girliest stuff to my sis rosehannah for her 2 girls... she has given us a lot of boys' clothing for my sons) We still have a few pink bonds suits of which I happily put my ready-for-bed baby boys in. Tucked up, in bed, at night, honestly, who sees them? Especially in winter when it's hard to keep the laundry flowing (ie getting stuff from dirty to clean and dry again can be hard if you don't want to use the tumble drier too much). I don't think it hurts. We have sooooo much baby clothing I ain't gonna buy any more! What we have will just have to do. My 4yo gets a few new outfits a year (which are often expensive as I buy top quality that will last for his little brother). My 13yo DD gets clothes from me now as hand-downs or from an Op Shop.... maybe 2/3 special occassion pieces new a year. We don't have much in the budget for clothing. We have the best OP shop nearby that really helps if we are stuck for the basics... but otherwise we don't worry too much.

When we had DD, we bought all unisex clothing (well, as much as we could considering there wasn't that much at the time besides white :rolleyes:). Then Target had a huge babies clothes sale so I went and picked out clothes I liked for both genders and made two seperate layby's. When DD was born, DH and I went and picked up the girl one and cancelled the other the day we were discharged.

HTH

MG

Agree with the general consensus - pink on a boy is weird, yet Sam can be dressed from head to toe in pink (as she was the other day) and i STILL get asked 'oh, isnt he cute'....WTF ??? So obviously some people do do it....

What would your DH think???? Would he be okay with yr lil boy going to bed in a pink bondsuit???? Personally i wouldnt mind, but i know my DH wouldnt have a bar of it...

My DH doesn't have a problem with it. He's a practical guy. If the pink suit is the only one left then so be it. Love that man :)

Not sure what DH thinks, he just seems to assume that all the clothing is gender neutral. I have to keep on explaining to him that whilst most of the 000 stuff is, as the sizing gets larger it is all girlie, except for MIL's knitting and some presents from her (gee anyone get the idea that she really wanted a grandson) He seems to think that we would be right for a year :rolleyes:

I assume he would not want girl stuff on when going out, but I am sure he would be fine if that was all that was left or it might prompt him to help with the washing ;) I suppose all I can do is wait and see. There is a local swap it place for kids clothes, so if need be I can go and swap the girl stuff for boys or vice versa.

I just kept it neutral..no blue and pink

Good luck! :)