I'm not very attached to things, so I gave everything away to the church, there are so many people who have nothing.. and I think it is the best solution, if your sisters in law don't have kids, don't give it to them, it's strange.

Oh I should clarify. I meant save the clothes until the sisters in law do actually have the babies and then give it to them. Yes it would certainly be weird to do it now.

I think the hardest is the gifts (especially if they were only given last year) and those that were hand made mostly by my mother in law. I think an incident in my childhood about not giving away a present has made a big impact on me.

I don't think giving to my church is an option in terms of them giving them straight to the needy, though giving them to an op shop is giving to poor people in a less direct way. DH suggested one mother of a new baby who may want them.

I can't believe how many hand me downs we are offered! I have started to say no to everything except ones for the oldest.

Hi Anne,

My Mum has kept some of our very special (often handmade) items of clothing from when we were small so that her grandchildren can wear them. You could always consider doing something similar?

Anne - you probably don't have an actual attachment to the girls' clothes and gifts but an attachment to the memories of the girls in those clothes. I also have 3 little ones and I've made a point to take pictures of each children in my favorite clothes for them and with special gifts that were given to them but have now outgrown. I put these photos in each child's album and can revisit these memories whenever I want. After that, I either donate or pass along the clothes with no regrets. You don't have to donate all of the clothes at once - try passing along a few at a time until you don't have any twinges of regret! You can also pick out the absolute best of the best that your girls have and put them aside in the case that any of your sister-in-laws need them one day. Good luck!

I'm always amazed at the strange things which effect us emotionally. I have set aside a small memory box and keep a couple of the things I love in there. I have kept a hat which they both wore home from the hospital, one of the pram blankets I used to swaddle them, plus other small items. Remember you are just chucking the clothes and not the memories.

*A big hug from one mummy to another*

The local community health visitors in the UK have a scheme where they give your old items to people who are in the most need, I gave my moses basket and in went to a teenage mother. Do they have a similar scheme in your area?

I've always made sure I took pics of the kids in the most precious outfits. And I have saved one or two outfits from each kid that have the most memories for me in their memory boxes. If you have the space, there's no harm in hanging onto a few items. The rest I have passed on...other new moms, consignment shops, various charities. Every year, there are new clothes and new memories!

My mum kept a few of our baby clothes, but only the very special or handmade things (dresses she smocked for us, sweaters and hats knitted by our great-grandma, a few nice pieces she bought in France). Everything else was gradually given away over the years, either to the church or to other mums.

I think she had the idea that our kids could wear the things she did keep, which is nice, but not very practical! I'm sure that by the time I have kids (if I do), I'll want to get/make them things myself and have new memories, not force my old clothes and memories on them.

I remember getting awesome hand-me-downs from friends of my parents when I was little. One girl, who babysat for us, gave me some old blazers with which to play "office". Turns out they were actually very well-made wool riding jackets- which came in very handy years later when I started riding!

I saved a couple of baby things in my old hope chest. When my grand daughter came along I got out some old baby dresses my daughter had worn, my daughter would not let me put them on her baby. The styles change so much. Hand made things would be more of an heirloom I think.
I totally understand you emotional feelings about these things though. I was just the same. In that old hope chest I have all kinds of school work my kids did over the years.

Anne, I went through the same emotional pull with my kids old clothes. I just gave away the everyday stuff and have kept the "too cute to give up". I remember my mom showing me some of my old childhood clothes she'd kept in a hope chest- I enjoyed it so much and could remember wearing some of the outfits she and my grandmother had made.

I think if you do a purge of the clothes, setting aside a few things to keep, you've done really well. And it's so much easier to keep the kids organized when there aren't a bunch of outgrown clothes floating around. And if the baby things are too hard to let go of right now- get to it later. It took me years to go through those things without teary eyes.

I'm not very sentimental about the kids clothes. I kept a few things that were special, but the rest was passed on pretty quickly. I took a lot of pictures when the kids were little, so I have pictures in most of my favorite outfits, and that's better than the outfits themselves. I do still have the box of stuff that I was using to plan my wedding, and for some reason I can't go through that yet- 15 years later and it's still under my bed.

Thanks for all your sympathetic and thoughtful comments and sorry for not getting back to this thread earlier.

I decided to stop with the baby clothes for a bit and move on to culling the girl's current clothes collection, which I found easier (especially since the percentage of handmedowns, as opposed to gifts, is much higher at the bigger sizes. And a lot more of it is worn out or stained.

Thanks again!

Anne - I know how you feel. I had to save some of the favorites. The rest, I felt better when I could pass on to someone I knew vs. dropping it off at the thrift store. Then watching those outfits on others babies made me feel a lot better. And yes, it does get easier as they get older. Plus they get more ragged/dirty too as their activity level rises.