# Hand me downs



## lau86

Just wondering what your thoughts are on hand me downs? Especially those with older children, are they bothered? I do hand stuff down from ds1 to 2 and even dd if it's good. Not everything though, they all get new stuff aswell just I don't see the point in buying all stuff new. I guess as they get older and grow more slowly, handing down will get less aswell.


----------



## LoraLoo

I save my favourite bits- nice next dresses that have only been worn I onCe or twice but most of it gets clothes banked, not because there's anything wrong with the clothes or handing them down, but because I just don't have any space to store them and my kids go gbgbg so theres a bit of an age gap between the same sexed kids. No point wasting them though if they can be reused x


----------



## Bex84

I think its fine as long as mixed with being able to pick their own clothes. I have a girl and boy so son has had a few uni sex things passed down. The only reason I would say mixed with new things as I got hand me down stuff throughout childhood to when teenager, first clothes of own were when got to a level (got job when doing a levels but lived in rural location with no transport so couldent buy own before that and even when had job I was saving to self fund university and didn't get much in way of pocket money before then) my sister was 5 years older and fashion changed and taste differed, my little sister got new as different shape to me and older sister plus more likely to say something. I always felt couldent express self or dress to feel confident. Love my family but I can remember the fact a majority of clothes wernt what I picked made me feel upset as I couldent fit in with friends. I think genrally is ok though. We have bought second hand but usually its looking at kids individual tastes. My daughter wants animals, princesses, fairys, butterflys etc on her clothes where son loves dinosaurs and paw patrol


----------



## george83

While they are young everything gets passed down, but they still get brought new clothes to based on their interests mainly. Ds3 now has like a million clothes


----------



## alibaba24

I save the stuff thats in good condition for dd2 . Dd1 has some outfits shes only worn once so i want my moneys worth out of them by keeping for her sister. The youngest does get new stuff too if its needed


----------



## SarahBear

A large portion of my son's wardrobe is hand-me-downs from his sister. They're far apart enough that things aren't going straight from Violet to Leo. I have to save them for a while. She probably would be upset if they went straight from her to him though. I was the youngest in my house (older sisters are twins) and I would get hand-me-downs and it wasn't an issue for anyone. It helps if new things are also mixed in.


----------



## catty

Nothing gets handed down from my son to daughter as his clothes are very boyish and my daughter would refuse, however i get lots of hand me downs from friends and also buy 2nd hand regularly. I will only re use things that look newish though and wouldnt if it was stained,ripped etc. Dd loves getting a big bag of new to her things.


----------



## Zephram

Almost everything my DS2 wears is a hand me down from DS1. This has worked great for baby clothes as they are mostly in pristine condition. This won't work when DS2 is older though as DS1 started kindy at 2 years 8 months and pretty much all of his clothes now get holes in knees, indelible paint stains, mud stains, what have you, and are in poor condition no matter how well I wash them when he grows out of them, so there isn't a lot that will last through two kids from that age onwards. I did also have a small problem with them being born in different seasons with the size not lining up to the type of clothes, but no biggie.

Nothing wrong with good condition hand me downs to younger kids, especially while they are too young to know or care.


----------



## Wilsey

We have a deal with one of our friends that they give us their daughters hand me downs for our daughter and we give them our sons hand me down for their son. So my daughter is in a lot of hand me down stuff. It's perfect because it's already pre-stained and she wears that stuff to daycare. I pass on all her stuff (assuming nothing has a hole etc) to my other friend. I just give her everything and she can choose to use or donate or toss. She does get some amazing dresses that my daughter never wanted to wear.

I think it's fine. As long as your second gets some new pieces every now and then, it won't matter. Half the time I loved wearing my sisters seconds because I'd always wanted it when it was hers and was stoked when she got too big for it ;)


----------



## Vickie

I have one of each so not much gets reused by me but I give all of my boy clothes to a close friend with two boys younger than mine. I change up who gets my daughter's clothes. This last batch went to a neighbor friend with two young girls. :). The odd item that is unisex does get passed onto my son (not much though as my daughter has refused to wear anything but a dress since she was 2 years old!)


----------



## Elli21

We get hand me downs from my friend with a son older than my son. Its saved me LOADS of money, he still gets new stuff too when needed but the clothes we get from my friend are always in such good condition and decent fashionable stuff my son doesn't mind at all.

My youngest daughter gets a few bits from my eldest daughter but the age gap is so big, its not often.


----------



## Tasha

My 8 year old has had two things handed down to her from her sister because they've got very different personalities so what suits my 11 year old doesn't suit her younger sister.


----------



## sabby52

Dan and dec have had a few hand me downs from their cousins/uncle when they were younger but they havent had any in a long time but I do love getting pre-loved clothes from their cousins :)


----------



## Midnight_Fairy

I love getting clothes from people ha ha! Not so much from siblings as age gap with my girls is 7yrs but I buy a big bundle for about a tenner and then I top up with new items. Preloved is fantastic for messy play too.


----------



## CaptainMummy

I dont keep any of dd1s stuff. I feel like keeping clothes for 3 years before dd2 can wear them is a bit silly. 

My youngest two pretty much share clothes, so they dont really get handed down, just shared. Eg the jacket that my dd3 wore today, still fits my dd2 who also wears it sometimes. I buy them way too many clothes! X


----------



## jd83

I think it's fine, as long as you mix in some new things too. I wouldn't think it fair if the younger child never got anything new, or to pick something that was more personal to them. Colton's wardrobe is probably 50/50 hand me downs and new stuff. As they get older, it will depend on their taste in clothing, and difference in size. My sister and I were completely different sizes from about middle school onward, so didn't do hand me downs beyond grade school. We also had completely different tastes in clothing.


----------



## caz_hills

Almost all of our sons clothes come from his cousin. My sister has been so generous and given us all of his clothes so we get boxes every now and again. We buy him some new stuff to complement it but he loves the clothes from his cousin. Whenever my new phew wears something nice we always comment - 12 months and that's coming our way!

I love it and plan to share as much with my sister back the other way as she is having another child and it's a boy so perfect.


----------



## Septie

We re-use. 3 boys, so it's even easy. Even with our first, we used some of the stuff my parents had saved from when we were young 40ish years ago lol - including some really nice sweaters. I also buy new only when on major sale, or in second hand stores (except for shoes). New high quality clothes are just too expensive to be worth it for the short periods they can be worn with young kids, even though we are quite well off.


----------



## mum22ttc#3

We do a bit of both, anything good gets handed down but we also buy new for each child, there's no way we could do 100% hand me down even if we wanted to with 4 of them.

Ds has nothing handed down as he is the first boy for us, he has a few outfits though stored from his cousin for when he's older, doesn't bother me in the slightest. None of mine seem bothered either, at the same time though they love going out and buying their own clothes :)


----------



## Moominmummy1

I have two boys so I save lots of my eldest clothes for my youngest son.I go through at the end of the season and get rid of any worn or stained clothes.I also store them labelled in our attic and sadly also record what I have up there.
I also buy my youngest new clothes as well.My eldest is not hard on his clothes at all so they are in really good condition.


----------



## DCS

We pass alot down to dd from ds. Alot of the time she helps herself to his clothes. Today I'm sorting the kids clothes. Anything ds has outgrown goes into a pile, dd can then pick what she wants out of there, anything she doesn't want gets passed onto my uncles boys. DD gets plenty of her own clothes, too many infact, but she likes superheros and ds has some bits that dd loves.


----------



## jessmke

SarahBear said:


> A large portion of my son's wardrobe is hand-me-downs from his sister. They're far apart enough that things aren't going straight from Violet to Leo. I have to save them for a while. She probably would be upset if they went straight from her to him though. I was the youngest in my house (older sisters are twins) and I would get hand-me-downs and it wasn't an issue for anyone. It helps if new things are also mixed in.

My older sisters are twins too and I thought the hand me downs were awesome because I would often get two of something that I really liked!


----------



## xprincessx

My two youngests will be 13 months apart but one is a girl and the other a boy. If they were the same sex or if the clothes were at all neutral then I would definitely pass down DD's clothes. Would be nonsensical IMO to bin them and buy all new for the sake of it. If when they were older they expressed they didn't want to wear hand me downs then of course I would stop and let them choose their own but I definitely don't see the harm whilst they're young and don't know any better or care. 

I will definitely be passing toys etc down which isn't much different because it's still having "someone else's" stuff


----------



## morri

I have got one kid, so no direct hand me downs, but i often buy second hand clothes at classified boards :)


----------



## Torz

I have two boys two years apart & I save everything, literally everything good condition or not. I still buy ds2 new stuff too, his wardrobe is much fuller than ds1 who gets bought all brand new stuff. I tend to keep everything because I know at some point ds2 will need the scruffy clothes, we have an allotment & I put the well worn stuff on him then. It makes me feel better as I know how much clothes cost me. 

Once ds2 has grown out of hand me downs I do tend to get rid or sell it on if it's in really good condition. I don't think I could put a 3rd child in the same items.

Ds2 loves getting hand me downs because he is in to similar interests as ds1, he's loving all the Spider-Man stuff right now that was DS1's. They are in totally different sizes though, ds1 moves through clothing size at the stage for his age, so at age 6 he moved into age 6-7. My youngest though is very petite & tends to stay in a size clothing for much longer, he's Ben in age 2-3 for 18 months now.


----------



## tommyg

I wasn't a big fan of hand me downs esp if I'd already owned the same item ie if we'd been bought matching outfits sis would outgrow I then hated inheriting the outfit. However I also had a fair chunk of new stuff. 

Most off the hand me downs were treated as clothes for out playing in or spares for school.

I have kept most of DS's baby clothes, but only stuff that still looks good. Not much has been kept since he was 18 moths


----------



## Kiwiberry

Having another girl so the clothes are going to be great hand me downs. I just removed the ones with stains. I won't be doing hand me downs when they are older though. Just as babies for us.


----------

