Also, how do YOU dress, Susan? She may reject "pretty" as being not her style because she wants to wear what looks cool on Mom. Nothing wrong with that either.

I should start letting Emeline have a say in her daily clothing. She doesn 't really dress herself, one of us always does it for her.

Crap. I'm probably mucking up some milestone by being such a control freak, aren't I?

Maybe ... but she always looks cute.

Where do you draw the line, though? I remember that Adam Sandler movie ("Big Daddy"??) where he let the kid dress and do and eat whatever he wanted, but then realized that his kid was the smelly freak of the class, and was like "Crap!"

I wouldn't want my kid to be the ostracized freak, but....on the other hand, if my kid is a boy who wants to wear a skirt, I'm about the last person who has any right to say no! Where's the line?

I think you have to draw the line where it's going to cause hassles for the kid. If you have a boy who wants to wear a skirt, maybe explain that boys usually wear pants and say he can wear a skirt around the house, but that the other kids will be mean. Then buy him a kilt.

Crap. I'm probably mucking up some milestone by being such a control freak, aren't I?

Doubtful.

Insent, btw.

I'd think you'd draw the line at "clean and covers the important bits". After that it's socialization stuff to figure out (possibly with parental discussion).

Toddson is wise.

Kids can be mean when confronted with something "different" and it depends on the individual child's ability to defend his/her choices.

Letting them experiment at home is always fun. I still ponder the shorts and a sweatshirt in 100 degree weather.

See, I don't know.

I put a lot of stock by how people are dressed. I don't mean labels or any of that shit - people can look just as awesome in Target stuff as they can in Chanel - just how they are put together. And I judge the ever loving crap out of people I see if they are dressed poorly (meaning: not put together), so I naturally assume that people do the same to me and by extension, Em.

But I also have a "thing" that harkens back to the 50's that if my kid and my husband don't look put together, then I'm falling down on my job. Drove Joe nuts when we first started dating. Now, he's kind of resigned to it and asks, "What am I wearing?" when we go out.

Where the heck is FedEx?? I wanted to hang out iwth my friend and do lunch, but it's now 12:30, and no FedEx. Grrr.

Also, how do YOU dress, Susan?

More or less the grownup version of how Annabel likes to dress, actually. No one would mistake me for a man, but I prefer dark colors and jewel tones to pastels, and I think simple lines flatter me far more than elaborate, ruffly things. And I shed my work clothes for jeans or shorts the instant I'm home. So that's probably a factor.

And, really, I don't care what she wears as long as it's reasonably appropriate to the weather and the occasion. I'm certainly not the type who wants to dress her up like a doll or anything. It's just kinda tough when her grandmothers buy her things and she refuses to wear them, you know? Though her grandmothers have both been around enough children that they understand and don't seem hurt or anything. Also, if we had to go to a wedding or a funeral anytime soon, I'm not sure how we'd persuade her into something appropriate, though she's probably only a few months from being old enough to understand that sometimes we have to wear clothes we wouldn't otherwise choose because that's just how you dress for certain occasions.