Flauntly Yours

It is back to school time. So lets talk about kids, school, and fashion.

I am a step mom, my step sons were 10 years old and 4 years old when my now husband and I started dating. I had NO clue what I was in for. I did learn to pick and chose what battles I fought. One battle I decided not to fight was what the boys wore to school.

I learned rather quickly their dads (my husbands ) way of waking them up was NOT going to work for me. He is a pound on all the doors and walls while yelling to wake everyone up kind of person. Ugh. You can’t start your day like that. Well at least I didn’t think the boys should.

When we moved in together I decided to start getting up in the mornings with the boys and get them ready for school. I had all these dreams of it being sweet memories of fixing them breakfast and us talking about the day. (insert huge laugh here) While the boys and I adjusted to this new morning routine together, I had to let go of caring about what they wore to school.

I decided if their clothing choice was appropriate, even if it did not match, it was way better to let them be. The boys starting the day off in a decent mood was better than arguing over something that they did not care that much about.

On one of our mornings the youngest wore a pair of green camouflage cargo pants and a long sleeve grey and white camouflage shirt. His thought was camouflage matches camouflage. He was 6 years old at the time so I guess that was pretty good. It was not worth the fight to make him change. I cringed letting him go to school in this outfit. He was dressed weather appropriately and he was happy so off to school he went.

This brings me to high school years. This is where I gave up on caring if it was weather appropriate! The boys were old enough to decide what they wanted to wear.. I would tell them the weather for that day in the mornings while getting them up and ready. If it was going to be 35 degrees outside and they wanted to wear shorts and a T-shirt, then so it was. I would suggest a hoodie or a coat. That rarely was advice they took me up on. The oldest wore ripped jeans and a t-shirt several times in this type of weather.

At this age I felt like they were old enough to make the decision on what they were going to wear. If they wanted to be cold so be it. Not worth putting them in a terrible mood. I always thought they would learn if they got cold. Maybe next time would wear something more weather appropriate . I am not sure that ever happened, but I held on to my dream.

Picture day was the one or two days a year I really tried to make sure the boys looked nice. I stressed about trying to make sure their hair and clothes looked nice and neat. However, looking back some of my favorite school pictures of them are the ones that were not perfect.

Life is not perfect. We should not expect our kids or their fashion choices to be. Helping to raise my stepsons was one of the biggest joys of my life. Also one of the most challenging things I have ever done. I do wish wish I would not have taken things so seriously while they were younger.

Flauntly Yours,
A

Including a picture of my boys and me