A few months ago, Bean made it clear that she had certain ideas about what she’d like to wear. For years, Dave would set out two outfits for her and let her pick which shirt/pants/dress/leggings she wanted to wear today. And then for a few days in a row, she confided, “Tell Daddy I want to wear my polka dot dress tomorrow” or “I want to wear my rainbow shirt tomorrow.”
I figured it was time to let her access her full wardrobe.
I spent an afternoon re-arranging one of our Ikea Pax wardrobes. Sheets, blankets, and pillows moved to the top; towels were moved to a drawer (which, sidenote, is brilliant). Bean’s clothes got the real estate closest to the ground. Clothes on hangers, socks and accessories in baskets below. (I also grouped clothes into general categories to make it easier for her to find what she wanted: short sleeve shirts, long sleeve shirts, sweaters, dresses, skirts, pants, and pajamas.)
This was long overdue. I’m not sure why when we already had her dishes and bathroom needs on low shelves and tables, we hadn’t thought about adjusting her closet as well. It makes sense for her to be able to grab her own clothes, and be responsible for putting them away.
The first few days, she was so excited that she could open the closet and get her own stuff out. I GET IT MYSELF, MOMMY!! Indeed, little Montessori child.
Now that we’re a few months out, there are a lot of reasons I wished we’d done this sooner. Simply, it’s a very easy way to figure out what clothes she finds uncomfortable or doesn’t like. Who knew she even noticed.
She doesn’t like zippers on dresses (?), and even though at stores she always chooses to buy the pink shirt, she only wears her blue and white shirts. When it comes to pants, it is roomy sweatpants every single time. Her jeans are getting dusty.
Then there’s the sweet joy of watching what outfit she puts together every day. You have to allow yourself these things, in the face of all the other 3-year-old behavior going on. You could correct her, but you could also watch her walk around in a green striped dress, blue striped leggings, and red and blue striped socks all day and smile to yourself. Stripes match, Mommy.
Three year olds like to find similarities between things and group them. It took us a while to convince her that stripes-on-stripes-on-stripes didn’t actually “match” in the clothing sense. (She’s still not convinced.) A yellow and grey floral shirt calls for pink flower pants. Then there are her favorites, which obviously match because they are her favorite and duh mommy: a Steph Curry Warriors t-shirt, with pastel pink and yellow summer dress on top, with blue striped leggings below.
People routinely chide her, “did you get dressed all by yourself today?!” She gives them a look like, “yeah, I did because I’m a big girl and check out this awesome outfit.”
If you’d like to try something similar and just have a normal-height clothes rod, you could try out a clothes rod extender like this. Or you could just come on over to the cult of the Ikea Pax (you’ll never look back.)
What fun household experiments have you tried with your kids recently?
