Helping kids pick outfits for school... color matching

[wilbret]

Anyone have a good chart or resource that kids can understand? I obviously will google around, but figured someone else must have dealt with kids that thought a solid orange shirt and red shorts are good to go... lol.
My poor boys have no clue. Blue shorts and blue shirt, it's a match!

 

[AgentMama]

No resource to offer since that's a common occurrence in our house and we generally don't comment

 

[Carol_]

They’re only kids once… I let mine make these non dangerous poor choices. Take a picture. Gotta have bribery material for high school.

 

[Minnie1222]

Only buy/keep the clothes you want them to wear! My son's wardrobe was mostly gray and blue of various shades and patterns. Everything matched.
Orange shirt and red shorts sound really cute though

 

[wilbret]

Only buy/keep the clothes you want them to wear! My son's wardrobe was mostly gray and blue of various shades and patterns. Everything matched.
Orange shirt and red shorts sound really cute though

Lol, it’s not.

 

[wilbret]

They’re only kids once… I let mine make these non dangerous poor choices. Take a picture. Gotta have bribery material for high school.

That’s the problem, worst offender is in 8th and taking 9th classes. No matter the examples we provide, he just grabs whatever.

 

[Bjkandma]

When my daughter was in high school, she was involved in lots of after school activities. She would wear plaid with stripes, polka dots whatever. When any one said something to her she would show how there was a small stripe of yellow and maybe a yellow or orange in the plaid. Coaches and team members laughed. Fast forward (almost 20 years later) and now what do you see? Parents wearing "pj bottoms and tops as at leisure wear". Prints and plaids together. As she says now " I was dressing this way, before it became everyday".

As long as they are wearing clean clothes, don't let it bother you. It shows you are raising an independent child!!

 

[NYCgrrl]

I’m sooo glad that DGD attended a private grade and middle school that required uniform dressing right down to the shoe style. Nothing to think about but schoolwork and hallelujah to that!
Was a little worried about the public high school regarding dress but her school requires uniforms too

During most of my sons‘school time there were no uniform policies so I made one up for them to keep me from going crazy in the mornings. It was the ‘80/90s so they wore red, grey, and blue patterned and solid tops with blue, red or dark denim bottoms; problem solved and once again it was the hair but for them it was just a matter of where oh where did they put the combs and brushes.

When they “required” individualism they had the entire summer vacation to lose their little minds but they knew when school began the “Rainbow Brite“ look was over.

 

[MomOfDisneyPrincess]

When my daughter was a toddler and going to daycare, she had tops and bottoms that went together. Whenever her dad would dress her, he just grabbed anything. I began folding her clothing with pants on the bottom and shirt on top with underwear and socks sandwiched in between. I pulled out a set the night before and sat it on top of her dresser if he was the one to dress her in the mornings. It worked like a charm.

Later, in grade school, I would still fold and match pants with tops in the dresser, so she could just pull out a set and know she was matched up. Now that she's in high school, we just go with pants in one drawer and tops in another. Her wardrobe is primarily black (a phase I can live with), so there's no problem coordinating. If she does a burst of color, she usually runs it by me, but she really does a nice job on her own. I tend to only buy things that coordinate and when we buy separate pieces, we talk about how they pair up with other things to make an outfit, so I'm sure that helps.

 

[HopperFan]

Anyone have a good chart or resource that kids can understand? I obviously will google around, but figured someone else must have dealt with kids that thought a solid orange shirt and red shorts are good to go... lol.
My poor boys have no clue. Blue shorts and blue shirt, it's a match!

Ah my brother wore ALL Garanimals, he always matched. I doubt they are a thing anymore.

 

[xlsm]

Maybe they just have different ideas of matching. For me personally orange and red seem better than blue on blue, depending on the shade.
Unless my kids have something dressy they need to get ready for, or if they are just really dressed inappropriately, I don't know that I've ever worried too much about what they were wearing (I've told them to ditch the sweatpants a couple of times probably, but that's about it). They're 16 and 18 at this point, and if they can't figure it out for themselves by now...

If it really bothers you, my best advice would be to just buy pants/shorts in neutral colors like olive, navy, khaki, black, denim. Then it won't matter so much what color any top is.

When I was a kid I remember my mom being frustrated with my stepdad about what he'd wear. His answer was always, "Khaki goes with anything". He had some shirts where that was most definitely NOT the case, LOL!! It was the 80s/90s so I'm sure you can imagine

 

[wilbret]

They are definitely independent. This isn’t that. This is laziness. Just grab whatever… red and orange was just an example. It might be baby blue and red. Red and red. Size too small. Same thing as yesterday. Lol.
Just wanted a reference so they can’t claim to not know navy blue shirt with khaki shorts is better than navy blue with baby blue. Etc.

Thanks!

 

[unrequited23]

Just wanted a reference so they can’t claim to not know navy blue shirt with khaki shorts is better than navy blue with baby blue. Etc.

But is it really? Is navy and khaki really better than navy and baby blue? Or are these just two color combinations where you have a clear personal preference?

I'm with you in that clothes should be clean and clothes should be appropriate for the occasion, ex. no sweatpants at funerals.

 

[dez1978]

One day my husband dressed one of the boys in orange (neon osh kosh orange) basketball shorts and an ombré orange to grey polo shirt his reasoning was it’s all orange. Sigh. None of that went together. Not the style or color

 

[wilbret]

Thanks folks for helping with the request to find a chart that shows complimentary colors and not going off-tangent.

 

[DisLiss]

They are definitely independent. This isn’t that. This is laziness. Just grab whatever

You say it's laziness.....so what are the chances they're going to take the extra time to consult a chart before choosing their clothing? But if for some reason you think they actually will, then perhaps just a simple color wheel that marks "complimentary colors". Although from what you've said so far, I'm not sure you'd agree with what a color wheel considers complimentary colors.

 

[Rick195275]

Here you go! I tend to agree with the general sentiment here though and let the, wear whatever. But I’m in my late 30s and still don’t worry about color coordination so you likely don’t want my opinion

 

[lanejudy]

That’s the problem, worst offender is in 8th and taking 9th classes. No matter the examples we provide, he just grabs whatever.

If it bothers him, he'll ask for help. Until then, let him be. By 8th grade he either cares about fashion or he doesn't, and all the nagging by mom isn't going to help any -- in fact, it may more strongly solidify his "inappropriate" choices if he knows it bothers you.

As a PP suggests - if it's that big a deal to you, buy tops in one color vein and bottoms in another. If he likes flashy bright colors, let him have that for his tops and keep his bottoms neutral (black, gray, etc.). If an item has been outgrown, remove it so it's no longer an option.

 

[tinkerjo]

As someone else mentioned above. My DS14 likes muted colors anyway so the closet is mostly greys and blacks, especially the bottoms so most anything he grabs will work. Maybe hang up what you consider outfits together. Of course mine thinks he needs athletic clothing every day since he does sports after school. I say if you DS doesn’t care don’t stress too much about it. Maybe he is setting a trend or it’s the “in thing” at school to not match.

 

[NotUrsula]

Assuming that the person knows there is an issue and would like to solve it, I recommend a quilter's color wheel, like this one: Sew Easy Colour Wheel

These are simpler wheels than those designed for artists, and are designed for matching fabrics. What you do is pick your first garment, set the wheel down on it, then looking at the wheel, find the color window that comes closest to the color of the fabric peeking through it. Then point the wheel arrow at that window. The lines that radiate from the arrow show you the best complementary colors on the wheel for that item. It also corrects for shade, which solves your "orange is orange" problem. Each color on the wheel has a letter code on it, so when you follow the lines to the complementary colors, you can also match the shade by matching the code in your original garment's window block to the same-coded block in the complementary window. This video illustrates: https://slcl.overdrive.com/ (Ignore the part about tonal estimators)

I grew up in a mostly color-blind family, and what tended to happen was that the men either just learned to rely on women to buy their clothing, or they limited their color choices; you tend to get the phenomenon of the "khaki man". (Khaki the color, not khaki the fabric. Color-blind people tend to gravitate to shades of brown, even if they look hideous in it, and it is the most difficult of the so-called "men's neutrals" (black, navy, gray, brown or olive green) to coordinate with.