How do you dress your kids during winter?

[ScottishLeanne]

With Winter now here and temperatures dramatically dropping, I have now got Bethany's winter jacket out.

Due to the fact we walk to school plus Beth likes going out in the snow with her friends, I always dress her so that she is warm so for going out I always make sure she has her wellies on, instead of her trainers plus she does not get out until she has her warm jacket on and zipped up, her gloves on and, if she wants, she can put a scarf and hat on or put up her hood. During winter, we don't have a power struggle, she quite happily puts all these items of clothing on and will willingly zip up without needing asked. She will sometimes put her scarf on and always puts up the hood.

So, how much do you bundle your kids during winter :)?

[lakelover]

My kids are grown up & left home now, however does she wear extra socks inside her wellies as from my experience wellies are useless at holding heat in.

[ScottishLeanne in reply to lakelover]

No, just the one pair of socks :).

[Minushabens]

I have to be honest & say that no matter how much I might have tried to bundle up my lad (who had fairly serious asthma as a child), it wouldn't have done any good. I remember watching him play football in a t-shirt & shorts when he was 5 in minus whatever wondering how the hell he managed - & he's still no better at 23!

I think you just have to know your child really; some feel the cold some don't; some will have their breathing affected (mine always is, but I still hate being wrapped up & don't bother much with jumpers), others won't.

[Wheezycat]

For me it rather depends on what you mean by winter. I grew up - a very long time ago - in north Scandinavia, where it could get very cold indeed. But a dry cold which is far easier to manage. Hats gloves, scarf, warm coat, winter boots (not wellies as they have thin soles and don’t hold warmth. They were for spring and autumn) is a given, and culturally it is generally what people do, even now. Not wearing warm clothes, a la many people from the north east here in the U.K. looks silly. When our daughter was young, a long time ago in London, I would always make sure all those things were available, but it does not mean she would listen.

[ScottishLeanne in reply to Wheezycat]

I mean very cold and prone to rain or snow hence why I get Beth to bundle up as much as possible. It gets so cold that I feel safer with her having her jacket done up.

[Wheezycat]

I would completely agree.

Our daughter has just lived in Sweden for three years, now moved to Scotland. Though much lower temperatures in Sweden I think she finds the damp, windy cold of Scotland harder to handle.

[ScottishLeanne]

That's good because I was worried that I could be over dressing her lol. Saying that, I do think she would still bundle up the same way even if I didn't ask her too.

I do believe though that I am not the only parent at the schoolgate that is saying "zip up your jacket" or, "I think you may want to put up your hood".

[Wheezycat in reply to ScottishLeanne]

As I think I already said, I find the stoical attitude to cold really odd. I don’t mean those who don’t feel the cold, but those who do and still decide not to give in by wearing warm clothing. But then I hate being cold! I intensely dislike being cold indoors. We always have blankets around to wrap ourselves in, have had for very many years, just like two elderly gnomes........ooops! We are old........Oh, well, I suppose my age has caught up with my blanket using ways at long last.

[hypercat54]

Thinking back to my childhood my parents always made sure we were dressed warmly. If we were too hot we took something off. I think making sure your child has all the clothing they need is part of being a good parent, but if they shed some of it when they are out of sight then you can't make them do it then. x

[Wheezycat in reply to hypercat54]

One of the oddest sights for me was many years ago when I saw some kids playing in a school playground in some village in Derbyshire I think. It was cold, probably below freezing, or near enough, and all little girls wore knee socks! Standard stuff, I know, in U.K. schools in those days, but all I could think about was the knee problems they would develop in the future! Their knees were bright red from the cold. It was not a sight you ever saw in a Swedish school, especially not on a cold day (temperatures in those days could easily drop to minus ten, fifteen, twenty, twenty five- proper cold).

[Hidden in reply to Wheezycat]

Not just knee length socks for girls but for boys too, and back then it was shorts that boys wore at primary school. It was shorts for both my boys at the school they went to until they were about nine or ten. I remember groaning aloud when we reached that point of changing to trousers with the younger one; he was very good at tearing holes in the knees of his trousers, largely because he was very good at running whilst looking back over his shoulder. He ended up in casualty for doing that eventually - with delayed concussion.

I can state that neither of my parents (at school between mid to late 1920s to the late to early 1940s) got problems with their knees from wearing socks and shorts in the winter. I can remember wearing tights to school in winter (this was the 1960s) - but I do get knee problems: nothing to do with the cold - in my case it’s all down to having collagen that’s a little too elastic.

Both my boys are now grown up, but when they were small I was a firm believer in a number of thinner layers are better when it’s very cold than one or two thick ones.

[Wheezycat in reply to Hidden]

Glad to hear it! One of those things I am really happy to be wrong about. When my mother brought me to Sweden as a three month old to visit her family, I was, I am told, not wearing socks. There was quite a shocked reaction, as if my mother had neglected me ....... it was in late June or July, and pretty warm. I heard stories about it as I was growing up, but as my mother said, babies in the U.K. didn’t wear socks, at least not in summer!

[gandac]

It is good too to start from the inside out! A close fitting vest keeps out drafts very nicely. You can put on all the coats and scarves you want but if there isn't a layer close to the skin you won't be warm.

On a historical note when I was as old as your little girl I wore a vest and then a liberty bodice with rubber buttons on top of that.

[Wheezycat in reply to gandac]

So did I, but it was mainly to hold up the stockings we had to wear. No tights in those days. They were held up by elastic bands with button holes in, and buttons sewn on to the top of the stockings. I did not miss the passing of any of the above.

[hypercat54 in reply to Wheezycat]

Oh well I remember those awful stockings! I hated wearing them and found the elastic bands holding them up so irritating! They kept popping open on me or those silly button things would fall off. I remember the relief when tights came out and my mum bought me those instead. I guess that's why I could never bear to wear stockings as a teenager or adult and never have. x

[Wheezycat in reply to hypercat54]

Yeaaahhh! Best thing for the whole kaboodle thing to never be seen again!

[hypercat54 in reply to Wheezycat]

Oh and do you also remember having to use those awful pens with nibs you had to keep dipping in the inkwell? I got blots over all my work in those days. Thank goodness for another great invention - ball point pens. What a blessing. x

[Wheezycat in reply to hypercat54]

Yes, that too. And the classrooms in a Swedish primary school in those days always had organs, the sort with tramples. Imagine trying to sing a jolly song, accompanied by one of those!

[hypercat54 in reply to Wheezycat]

Not easy! x

[ScottishLeanne]

My daughter is happy that jackets nowadays have zips instead of buttons/toggles because she will not wear a jacket unless it has a full zip and velcro.