Thanks, but...
August 5, 2013 12:38 PM Subscribe
How do we politely decline children's clothes?
Me and the Mrs have good friends who have children around the same ages as ours. Our oldest is a girl, their oldest is a boy. Our youngest is a boy, their youngest is a girl. So it seems this would be a perfect opportunity to swap clothes: the clothes from our oldest to go to their girl, and vice versa with the boys. Great!
It turns out we have different expectations and standards. The clothes we give are clean and in good shape. We have no problem continuing to give these over as we have no use for them and we're happy that they are reused. On the flip side, the clothes coming our way are dirty and worn. We are left deciding whether or not to clean them and give them to Goodwill but, more often than not, we wouldn't even give them to Goodwill.
So it's clear we would not like to be on the receiving end of this transaction anymore. I'm pretty sure this will come up again where they offer up a new batch for exchange. How do we politely decline receiving clothes while still offering up ours? Thanks!
Me and the Mrs have good friends who have children around the same ages as ours. Our oldest is a girl, their oldest is a boy. Our youngest is a boy, their youngest is a girl. So it seems this would be a perfect opportunity to swap clothes: the clothes from our oldest to go to their girl, and vice versa with the boys. Great!
It turns out we have different expectations and standards. The clothes we give are clean and in good shape. We have no problem continuing to give these over as we have no use for them and we're happy that they are reused. On the flip side, the clothes coming our way are dirty and worn. We are left deciding whether or not to clean them and give them to Goodwill but, more often than not, we wouldn't even give them to Goodwill.
So it's clear we would not like to be on the receiving end of this transaction anymore. I'm pretty sure this will come up again where they offer up a new batch for exchange. How do we politely decline receiving clothes while still offering up ours? Thanks!
If you feel like it would be awkward to tell them to stop, why can't you just toss them? If they aren't good enough for Goodwill somebody will have to throw them out - it might as well be you.
posted by something something at 12:41 PM on August 5, 2013 [10 favorites]
posted by something something at 12:41 PM on August 5, 2013 [10 favorites]
I think you can accept them graciously, pick out the two or three outfits that are in the best condition to have your son wear when the friends are coming over, and toss or donate the rest.
posted by payoto at 12:45 PM on August 5, 2013 [3 favorites]
posted by payoto at 12:45 PM on August 5, 2013 [3 favorites]
I think most of us parents have found ourselves in this position. One friend gave us only the occasional gift of a gorgeous, special, barely-worn item that we were as happy to receive as any gift. Another used to hand us giant garbage bags of all their kids' outgrown, stained, faded clothes that were nondescript, ordinary stuff we had too much of to begin with. Sometimes I would find a nice sweater or something in the bag, but I was tired of dealing with the stuff they were just not taking to Goodwill because our house was more convenient. I *really* didn't want to keep taking their stuff to Goodwill for them, even if, as something something notes, it would have been socially easier.
Eventually I solved it like this: Hey mom friend thanks so much, but there is so much that you give us I honestly don't have room for it all in the dresser. How about if instead of dropping the bag at my house, I look through it the next time I'm at your place and pick out what we need?
That happened once, I took maybe a sweater and left her with the giant garbage bag of old clothes, and then we were never offered their clothes again!
posted by third rail at 12:46 PM on August 5, 2013 [40 favorites]
Eventually I solved it like this: Hey mom friend thanks so much, but there is so much that you give us I honestly don't have room for it all in the dresser. How about if instead of dropping the bag at my house, I look through it the next time I'm at your place and pick out what we need?
That happened once, I took maybe a sweater and left her with the giant garbage bag of old clothes, and then we were never offered their clothes again!
posted by third rail at 12:46 PM on August 5, 2013 [40 favorites]
Something something: then what should Mazola and his wife say when that inevitable question comes up - "how come we never see little Mazola wearing that adorable Elmo shirt that we gave you?"
I believe this is the social situation that the OP is looking to avoid.
posted by JoeZydeco at 12:48 PM on August 5, 2013
I believe this is the social situation that the OP is looking to avoid.
posted by JoeZydeco at 12:48 PM on August 5, 2013
I think you can accept them graciously, pick out the two or three outfits that are in the best condition to have your son wear when the friends are coming over, and toss or donate the rest.
Ugh, please don't do this. We had a neighbor lady growing up who helpfully gave my mom garbage bags full of her kids stanky old clothes, and while most of them went in the trash, a few were saved out so that we could wear them when we saw her so she felt useful. All that resulted in was getting more garbage bags full of stanky old clothes for years, AND panicking about wearing the "right" shirt if we happened to see her.
Just tell them you have so many clothes for little mazola that you don't know what to do with them all, and tell them how glad you are that they're able to take some off your hands for you.
posted by phunniemee at 12:58 PM on August 5, 2013 [5 favorites]
Ugh, please don't do this. We had a neighbor lady growing up who helpfully gave my mom garbage bags full of her kids stanky old clothes, and while most of them went in the trash, a few were saved out so that we could wear them when we saw her so she felt useful. All that resulted in was getting more garbage bags full of stanky old clothes for years, AND panicking about wearing the "right" shirt if we happened to see her.
Just tell them you have so many clothes for little mazola that you don't know what to do with them all, and tell them how glad you are that they're able to take some off your hands for you.
posted by phunniemee at 12:58 PM on August 5, 2013 [5 favorites]
It's ok to politely say "We're good for now, but thank you!" There's a million places to donate kid clothes, you guys don't have to be it.
posted by emjaybee at 1:05 PM on August 5, 2013 [1 favorite]
posted by emjaybee at 1:05 PM on August 5, 2013 [1 favorite]
It turns out we have different expectations and standards.
Do you both have economic parity, or does one of you make more than the other? I think that these sorts of socio-economic expectations may be affecting things more than you realize.
You cannot continue to give them your child's old clothes while refusing to accept theirs. To do so would be to be providing charity, rather than an equal exchange. If not taking their clothes means that much to you, you will need to accept that you will not be donating your own clothes there anymore.
There are people who would be grateful even for stained - which is what I assume you mean when you say dirty, rather than soiled - and slightly torn clothing. There are people who can mend beautifully, or throw on patches over stains, and be grateful for the opportunity.
Assuming that your friend is doing this out of some sort of malice, or wish to "not want to have to take them to Goodwill" would be a bad move. In all likelihood, these are clothes that she might otherwise keep or give somewhere else. Why not bring them to Goodwill? Why do you think that they won't take them? I can assure you that even if they won't keep them, they will definitely take them.
posted by corb at 1:10 PM on August 5, 2013 [16 favorites]
Do you both have economic parity, or does one of you make more than the other? I think that these sorts of socio-economic expectations may be affecting things more than you realize.
You cannot continue to give them your child's old clothes while refusing to accept theirs. To do so would be to be providing charity, rather than an equal exchange. If not taking their clothes means that much to you, you will need to accept that you will not be donating your own clothes there anymore.
There are people who would be grateful even for stained - which is what I assume you mean when you say dirty, rather than soiled - and slightly torn clothing. There are people who can mend beautifully, or throw on patches over stains, and be grateful for the opportunity.
Assuming that your friend is doing this out of some sort of malice, or wish to "not want to have to take them to Goodwill" would be a bad move. In all likelihood, these are clothes that she might otherwise keep or give somewhere else. Why not bring them to Goodwill? Why do you think that they won't take them? I can assure you that even if they won't keep them, they will definitely take them.
posted by corb at 1:10 PM on August 5, 2013 [16 favorites]
Yeah, corb hints at something that your question raises for me - if all other things are the same, but the clothes from their kids are consistently in really bad shape and yours are not, that suggests some non-parity, possibly financial. It might be that the clothes they receive from you are a godsend, but it also might be emotionally important to them that they are giving something to you. It might be really helping their self-esteem that they see themselves as in a position to do something for somebody else.
You say they are "good friends" of yours - good enough that you could have an honest talk about this?
posted by jbickers at 1:18 PM on August 5, 2013 [4 favorites]
You say they are "good friends" of yours - good enough that you could have an honest talk about this?
posted by jbickers at 1:18 PM on August 5, 2013 [4 favorites]
Alternatively I wonder if it's possible that their boy is just much harder on his clothes then your girl is on hers, and if so if you could just say something like that to your friends: "hey from the last bag of stuff I think it looks like young George is pretty rough on his clothes, and that's pretty normal for a boy, I'm not sure we can use them. Are you noticing this with our Emma's clothes, too, or would you still like to get them?"
(PS: It is also possible that you guys have totally different senses of style and your friend isn't using your clothes much either. You never know.)
posted by onlyconnect at 1:26 PM on August 5, 2013 [6 favorites]
(PS: It is also possible that you guys have totally different senses of style and your friend isn't using your clothes much either. You never know.)
posted by onlyconnect at 1:26 PM on August 5, 2013 [6 favorites]
Yeah I'm loath to bring gender into it but having raised 2 boys I can tell you that there were very few hand-me-downs because they joyfully wore the heck out of their clothes. Whereas my brother's 3 girls can all grow into and out of the same clothes and they're still shareable.
You can always bring body type into it too, if they're different then they just won't fit right.
posted by headnsouth at 1:39 PM on August 5, 2013 [1 favorite]
You can always bring body type into it too, if they're different then they just won't fit right.
posted by headnsouth at 1:39 PM on August 5, 2013 [1 favorite]
In this awkward situation, the person who cleans up the clothing and gives it to a charity is the winner. There are so many unemployed parents, so many part time workers not paid a living wage. This is the time to' think of the children'. Please donate - and get a tax deduction slip.
posted by Cranberry at 1:40 PM on August 5, 2013 [6 favorites]
posted by Cranberry at 1:40 PM on August 5, 2013 [6 favorites]
FWIW Goodwill can still make money off of clothes that aren't good enough to resell. They bundle them and sell them to rag dealers.
posted by Gungho at 1:57 PM on August 5, 2013 [4 favorites]
posted by Gungho at 1:57 PM on August 5, 2013 [4 favorites]
Plenty of quite well-off people have bags of outgrown, stained old leggings and T-shirts and socks from target that that they want to get rid of. Kids who are financially comfortable are still getting chocolate ice cream and grass stains on things, in fact even more so because they aren't taught to be as careful if their parents just buy them new things. It *might* be a case of economic disparity, in which the OP's friends are poorer, but there is no reason to assume so here. In any case, I would never give poor people I am friends with old, ripped clothes just because they know how to mend. They might mend their own clothes (as do I) but it is kind of insulting to give them my kids' ripped and stained old clothes just because they are poor. And I wouldn't assume someone who gives them to a friend is poor either. Actually quite the opposite.
posted by third rail at 2:23 PM on August 5, 2013 [5 favorites]
posted by third rail at 2:23 PM on August 5, 2013 [5 favorites]
Yeah, I have two boys. The earlier age stuff was fine, but from about the time the eldest was 2 or 3 the amount of his clothes that made it through to his brother has dropped off dramatically. It's astonishing how quickly he manages to destroy stuff. He came home without one of his elastic shoelace thingies the other week. A shoelace! I don't even... Anyway, I would think with good friends, you can find a way to have a laugh about this without offending them.
posted by IanMorr at 3:07 PM on August 5, 2013 [1 favorite]
posted by IanMorr at 3:07 PM on August 5, 2013 [1 favorite]
I've handed down stained (not dirty, but stained) and worn clothing, sometimes even with holes. Especially when my kids were toddlers and going through clothes so fast, I just didn't have the time or energy to sit down and not only weed out what they no longer needed, but judge what my friends' kids might like. I have a bag in the laundry room where clothes to be handed down go after I've washed them, and that's all the sorting I do.
If you were my friend and didn't like the clothes I was handing down, I'd be fine with you saying "No thanks," or "We're all set for clothes." I know a lot of people who need hand-me-downs, so I'd just offer them to someone else.
I've been given hand-me-downs that were kinda gross, so I know it can be annoying. But sorting clothes is drudgery and I don't blame anyone for not wanting to spend a minute longer on it than they have to.
posted by The corpse in the library at 5:48 PM on August 5, 2013 [3 favorites]
If you were my friend and didn't like the clothes I was handing down, I'd be fine with you saying "No thanks," or "We're all set for clothes." I know a lot of people who need hand-me-downs, so I'd just offer them to someone else.
I've been given hand-me-downs that were kinda gross, so I know it can be annoying. But sorting clothes is drudgery and I don't blame anyone for not wanting to spend a minute longer on it than they have to.
posted by The corpse in the library at 5:48 PM on August 5, 2013 [3 favorites]
I think it'll be easiest if you just stop the mutual transfer of hand-me-downs entirely: nothing goes from you to them, nothing comes from them to you. You can either donate all your kids' outgrown stuff to charity, or start trading with OTHER parents with less-damaged clothing --- but either way, to prevent arguments, tell these people you're donating it all.
Either way, there's a point at which it's embarrassing to a kid to be wearing hand-me-downs from other families: it's easier to be wearing stuff from your older siblings or total strangers (like a thrift store) --- and I say that as Daughter #3 in my own family, AND as someone who kept getting garbage bags of my cousins' crap from holier-than-thou aunts.
posted by easily confused at 5:48 PM on August 5, 2013
Either way, there's a point at which it's embarrassing to a kid to be wearing hand-me-downs from other families: it's easier to be wearing stuff from your older siblings or total strangers (like a thrift store) --- and I say that as Daughter #3 in my own family, AND as someone who kept getting garbage bags of my cousins' crap from holier-than-thou aunts.
posted by easily confused at 5:48 PM on August 5, 2013
Oh, maybe the "exchange" part is the problem. I don't do anything that formal. I hand friends clothes, they hand me clothes, whatever. It all comes out in the wash.
posted by The corpse in the library at 5:50 PM on August 5, 2013
posted by The corpse in the library at 5:50 PM on August 5, 2013
I agree with the suggestions to just politely remove yourself from that particular clothes exchange. I think people generally don't ask difficult questions about stuff they have given you, I think most people do generally know that if you can't use something you'll pass it on, or get rid of it some other way.
I don't think anyone should donate or pass on clothes that they themselves wouldn't use, and even then, even if you are super frugal I don't think you should assume that *everyone* is so poor they want what is basically garbage.
I was extremely, frighteningly poor for a time, and I searched second hand clothes places and scrimped and saved to find and buy decent, in good shape clothes for my kids. I would have been absolutely insulted if I had been given clothes in bad enough shape that they needed considerable work to repair, or were too stained to wear in public. Poor people don't want to dress their kids in your garbage, whatever you might think about how grateful or industrious they should be. I repaired my own clothes to the point of falling apartness, or wore the same three shirts over and over - but I trimmed every expense to be able to buy decent stuff for the kids.
posted by Kaleidoscope at 7:21 PM on August 5, 2013 [3 favorites]
I don't think anyone should donate or pass on clothes that they themselves wouldn't use, and even then, even if you are super frugal I don't think you should assume that *everyone* is so poor they want what is basically garbage.
I was extremely, frighteningly poor for a time, and I searched second hand clothes places and scrimped and saved to find and buy decent, in good shape clothes for my kids. I would have been absolutely insulted if I had been given clothes in bad enough shape that they needed considerable work to repair, or were too stained to wear in public. Poor people don't want to dress their kids in your garbage, whatever you might think about how grateful or industrious they should be. I repaired my own clothes to the point of falling apartness, or wore the same three shirts over and over - but I trimmed every expense to be able to buy decent stuff for the kids.
posted by Kaleidoscope at 7:21 PM on August 5, 2013 [3 favorites]
It's also possible that they simply don't recognize these clothes as stained or worn. I am sure I've become blind to the spots and tears in my kids clothing. I see these things every time they are worn, so I don't even realize they're there. Or if I do realize they are, they're associated with some positive memory ("Aww, look at that rip from when we were picking blackberries and the bush got stuck in that shirt.") When you get a box or bag with a bunch of someone else's clothes, you really do notice way more of the flaws. For me, when I'm gifting clothes I try really hard to have a clear and objective eye on what I'm giving away, but I'm sure I miss stuff and also not everyone can do this or is even aware that it should be done.
posted by gubenuj at 12:56 AM on August 6, 2013 [3 favorites]
posted by gubenuj at 12:56 AM on August 6, 2013 [3 favorites]
I agree that it could be awkward to keep giving them your old clothes while telling them that their old clothes are not good enough for your kid. It is useful for a kid to have a few old shabby play outfits for mud pie making, adventures with non-washable paint, learning to polish shoes, cleaning bike chains, etc. There are also kid-friendly things you can make and do with clothes of pretty much any quality, like making halloween costumes or doll clothes. Maybe you could accept and use at least a couple of outfits for the sake of your friendship and decline (or discreetly toss or donate) the rest?
posted by steinwald at 9:24 AM on August 6, 2013
posted by steinwald at 9:24 AM on August 6, 2013
Nth the "we're good, thanks" idea.
But I urge you to re-consider the Goodwill donations. Their CEO makes a fortune. There are other charities that are much more charitable out there.
posted by Neekee at 11:50 AM on August 6, 2013
But I urge you to re-consider the Goodwill donations. Their CEO makes a fortune. There are other charities that are much more charitable out there.
posted by Neekee at 11:50 AM on August 6, 2013
This thread is closed to new comments.
Then just let it die.
posted by Ruthless Bunny at 12:39 PM on August 5, 2013 [16 favorites]