swimsuit ordeal

"Donna Metler" wrote:

I have to wonder what the big deal about a color is? In most cases, I
haven't found my DD's pink and lavender clothes harder to clean than other
colors, since it really seems to be a function of the fabric more than the
color (and, if I need to, I can bleach a load of pink clothes and they just
get a little paler pink-no big deal). Except that it might be a little less
modest for her to run around and roll on the grass in the skirts she prefers
vs shorts (and I have trouble being really concerned about modesty at age 3,
especially since she tends to match her underpants to the clothes she wants
to wear), it's not a problem for her to run, play, jump and do everything in
the clothes she prefers. Most of her clothes are hand-me-downs or from
consignment stores, and from what I've seen, at least for a preschooler, the
stuff I do buy new doesn't cost any more for a girl than for a boy. And,
actually, in some ways, her "girly clothes" tend to last longer, because
when her legs grow, she can usually still wear skirts and dresses (many of
her favorite dresses from last summer now are worn over shorts this year).

I'm not a pastel person-but it doesn't drive me crazy that my daughter is.

It's a symbol of past humiliation for some of us. Especially those of
us whose mom's dressed us in her style which was very frilly and girly
when we weren't frilly girly girls. Now this wasn't a problem for me
particularly - my mom made most of my clothes when I was a kid and I
didn't mind that at all. I didn't really care what I wore if it was a
nice color and didn't itch or bind.

I dressed my girls in boys jeans mostly when they were little because
they wore better than the girls jeans, and it didn't really make much
difference at that age. I'm still in the 'don't care what I wear as
long as it doesn't bind or itch' stage, but all of my girls want
clothing that fits and is fashionable. So I guess all of us to some
degree rebel against the way our mom's dressed us.

And my dd#2 complained to me when she was pg with her dd that she did
hope that she wasn't a girly girl. She was looking at a picture of
her brother's daughter and my DIL dressed her (as a baby) in what I
would regard as extremely unsuitable fancy clothes, with all kinds of
frills and she even had the baby in a lace headband.

Pink represents girly-girl. Not so bad in clothing because as you
point out, the color doesn't have much to do with functionality, but
the things like pink bicycles and pink phones etc seem really gross
and disgusting to me.