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This is great, and I know I have been lucky not to have to go out and buy clothes every season.
The downside is, I have sometimes felt like I am literally drowning in children's clothes! And, to top that off, I have found that I do have a "style" of kids clothes that I prefer. This means, if I see a really great deal at a garage sale or thrift store, I do buy more children's clothes.
Here's how I have been combating the madness that children's clothing can bring:
- When I am given clothes, I sort them right away. Keep to wear now, save for future use, give away.
- When I put the clothes away, I go through what I already have, and get rid of clothes my kids haven't worn, stained clothes, and clothing that will not be worn for the rest of the season.
- I keep folded up paper bags in all rooms. When I do laundry, if I notice a significant amount of clothes that need to be passed on, I open up the paper bag and start filling it up. When the bag is full, it either gets taken to the local charity I donate to, or to a friend who could use them.
- If I know I am well stocked with clothes for the kids, and I have been given more clothes, I will simply donate them without going through them.
You're definitely not the only person with this problem. In our case, once the third baby boy was born I learned to "Just say 'No thank you!'" Granted they were all born in different seasons, but after the 2 boy we pretty much had all the seasons covered in every size with the exception of an extra long sleeve shirt here or 1-2 pairs of shorts there, and we'd never know what we needed until the boy reached that stage because every kid grows at a different rate. So we shop thrift stores and clearance racks to fill in the gaps and just say no to any more free bags of clothes. I just don't have the time to stop everything else I'm doing and sort through 50 odd items for the 2 or 3 we *might* need later down the line. My time is worth more than the $3-7 it takes to buy the missing items.
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