June 26, 2012 by blue milk
If, as the mother of a son, you are bored with the boys’ clothing section in chain stores we can recommend the girls’ section.
You will be bored with all the pink there soon enough but it is nice for a change… until that day when we finally get to a world where we don’t only have hyper-masculine and hyper-feminine clothing choices for little kids.
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omg tiny hipster! I mean that in a good way 🙂
Thanks you. He knows how to rock the ladies skinny jeans.
I used to shop in the baby boys section for Ms 6 when she was a wee mite to get things that weren’t pink and t-shirts that weren’t tight.
We did that too. Do overalls really need to be so pink?
Also, why shouldn’t boys rock a puppy or kitten t-shirt? I mean really, being a man doesn’t mean giving up animals. Just look at cute boys with cats.
my son loves his kitten shirt! we found a great one a few months ago on e-bay and it’s his new fave 🙂
My little boy loves the hand-me-downs from his sister because they’re much more colourful – he loves the stripy trousers particularly. I got fed up recently when looking for something smart for him for a wedding – all I could find were combat trousers, baggy jeans and sweatshirts, while in the girls’ section there were loads of gorgeous dresses. On the other hand, I always pounce on anything in the girls’ section that’s feminine but not pink (happens rarely).
I don’t get why girls get all the colourful clothes while boys get that aggressive ‘street’ gear in muted greys and browns … deadly dull. Where’s the purple cords? 🙂
Thank you for this post!
love this post! totally agree – aside from some fabulous scandinavian kids clothing lines, which we have loved since my litttle guy was born (but struggle to afford) we have had a hard time finding the sort of cheerful/colourful clothing that my son is drawn to. he loves rainbow stripes and bright pinks and purples, and yet so little is available for little boys (any older boys/men) in these tones and styles. shopping in the girls section works sometimes, but i’m not going to buy him something with ruffles and frills either – not because “it’s too girly”, rather simply because we find it all too fussy. is it so difficult to design basic cut colourful kids clothing that is unisex?
Yes! Our son looks great in pink, bright reds and greens, etc. I refuse to buy anything that’s camouflage/army coloured, skulls, etc. Our boys look so good in colours, why would we want to make them wear muted browns and blues?
I always pick one item from the boys’ section and one from the girls’ and let him decide, so he’s had some lovely pink pyjamas and t-shirts over the years. And he’s teaching the boys at school that anyone can wear any colour – for a shy, introverted kid, he can be strong when he believes in something.
Unfortunately there are so many people that he has to come up against – when at face-painting day he wanted a butterfly (“you look like a girl!”), when he was choosing a new bike (“here’s the boys’ blue bike” when it was obvious to everyone that the red bike was much cooler), when we took him to the bead shop to make a necklace – faced with walls of beads in all sizes, shapes and colours he was directed to a small corner and told “these are the ones the boys like, pirates, skulls, and wooden beads”. He made a fabulous necklace with every shade of the rainbow, thank you very much.
My sons too always want face painted butterflies, but the face painters are often sooo reluctant, or will paint a boring black butterfly without the glitter. I love swim class, when they wear their red rash shirts, red swim caps and pink goggles!
I was so happy when my daughter, after being directed to the girls’ queue for face-paint at a party, asked for Spiderman
He sounds like my son 🙂
We’ve started preschool in the last few months and are getting awesome feedback from the very supportive staff about his pink and generally brightly colored clothing (his favorite colour is pink, especially the eye-searing bright shade) and how it’s encouraging conversations amongst other children about gender and what makes a girl/boy.
Thank you.
Honestly, most of the boys’ clothing comes second-hand from a friend, from the in-laws, or from my stepmother, and nearly all of that is the regular old boys’ stuff. But I’ve been finding that we do need to fill in their wardrobe a bit with stuff from the consignment shop — I think I can get creative there! And I think that my stepmother would enjoy getting creative, too.
I’ve also noticed that once you’re past the infantwear stage, most of the clothing for boys is real mini-man wear – I don’t much like the majority of it, and so seek out neutral shirts, leggings/pants and woolies for our son where I can. Our fifteen month old recently got mistaken for a girl while out with his father. On this particular day, baby was wearing pastel greens, blues and yellows, including a knitted cardi. My husband and I have talked a bit about wanting to protect our son for a while from the barrage of hypermasculinity that goes down for little boys. However, our situation is informed by our son being bi-racial – I’m white and my husband is black. My husband is conscious of the many stereotypes of boys of colour, and also conscious of our son’s ‘visibility’ in the Australian culture – and even as a very gender-aware, punk-politicised man, he’s also cautious about protecting our son from any ‘double-takes’ that might result from being a little boy of colour dressed ‘outside the norm’. But we’re both also reluctant to bow fully to the pressure – so in coming years we’ll be balancing this one carefully.
With my son’s long curly blond hair and the fact that I avoid hypermasculine clothing for him, he is mistaken for a girl on a daily basis.
The difficult part has been combating the perception that by doing this (not cutting off his gorgeous curls, and dressing him in a variety of clothes) I am imposing my own beliefs about gender on him. It seems almost impossible for people to wrap their minds around the idea that *society* is imposing its gender binary in a much more effective and powerful way than I, with my minimal rebellions, will ever be able to combat. And that I am not, in fact, imposing anything at all, but am actually offering him alternatives to the incredibly narrow role he would otherwise be handed as a matter of course.
There is a great piece about this here that I read when I need encouragement or inspiration: http://feministpigs.blogspot.com/2012/02/childrens-gender-self-determination
[…] it’s not compulsory, and there’s no reason it can’t change. A Mighty Girl has a directory of clothing […]
Most of this families shopping occurs in op_shops (that seemed a thoroughly 20th century spelling). I’ve been encouraging my boys to pick out their own clothes; I want to raise kids who’ll buy their own underdaks and it starts at 5 and 3 for us. Last week Mr loves spider man and ben ten and is 5 chose a red batwing tee shirt with a love heart made out of tiny safety pins printed on it. I love opshopping because there is no HYPER. Mr three choose a pair of pink velour slacks with pretty on the bum and i think sheesh wold i have let my hypothetical gal get them? But i would”ve struggle to say no…. they were 50 cents