Every so often in discussion of mother's looks on YLF the picture is painted of a child dressed to the nines and the mother looks like she has made no effort at all.

Well sometimes I feel that in my family the reverse is true to the extent that my kids look worse than me! They are attractive (in my unbiased opinion!) but frequently they head out the door with hair unbrushed, no shoes on and old clothes which don't go together all that well.

The older two aren't so bad on school days ( we have a uniform of the practical government school variety) and they don't scub up too badly on Sundays, though they are not always particularly fashionable, and I often don't seem to have the right "toppers" or shoes. Winter is much more difficult, as in summer they can just wear a dress, which they have many of. In winter (in Australia) it can get quite hot by the middle of the day for a child who is running around, so they need to dress in layers.

I don't buy many of their clothes as they get lots of handme downs and a number of gifts. But it makes me feel not very in control of what they wear - there is no sense of planning a wardrobe - just buying the odd thing to fill in the gaps and culling when they get too much!

The oldest is now getting more fussy about what she likes too! And I am itching to buy her some clothes when I go shopping next week - but know that her birthday is next month and that one of my regular handme down people hasn't given me any winter clothes yet.

Not sure what I am after in terms of response to this thread! Empathy perhaps!