There comes a time in every child’s life when they no longer sit, complacently eating their breakfast while their clothes are presented to them on a tray, in a folded offering for their quick nod over a bowl of cereal.

Things become complicated when we encourage those independent actions towards opening the fridge, sourcing a spoon and messily figuring their way through the peel off top of a yogurt container. We celebrate these small victories but when it comes to getting dressed on their own, where is that tickle trunk when we need it?

I have three young daughters ages six, four and eight months. We could dress the eight month old in a Santa’s elf costume twelve months of the year and it would still be adorable as long as she is round, toothless and riding tandem in an infant carrier, but there is a fine socially acceptable line for my four and six year olds, somewhere between giving permission to bike the neighbourhood, roam the mall and participate in group activities after selecting their own colour and seasonally challenged ensembles.

It is on these days, seemingly more and more frequent, I fear I am throwing my children to a pack of judgemental, grocery shopping “wearwolves.”

Enter daughter age six. Today, she is off to a birthday party and in keeping with Mommy’s boring row of black dresses theme, she is sporting the following; a canary yellow tank-top with white and silver sequined star in the centre, size 3 (she is a size 7), for sophisticated bottoms, try black, Lycra soccer shorts with white drawstring. I suspect this is the only black she could find in her closet but she has made the connection, black equals fancy, so look out soccer field, your prom queen has arrived. Skip into spring with a fuschia hooded sweat shirt with a white cat licking its paws embroidered across the back. I’m not sure if she will look like an invited party guest or the clown hired to entertain the group but I must allow this important rite of passage towards independence to proceed.

For a more eclectic ensemble, daughter age four is jazzed up in her tights (always with the tights), for a splash of colour, try on your older sister’s brocade skirt. Mix things up with a winter, long sleeved pink velour shirt and tie it all together with a purple “fluffer nutter” (actually, a feather boa but for some reason, the girls have been calling it a fluffer nutter since discovering it in our costume bin and in a typical day, one of the two finds a way to make it an integral feature of their wardrobe). I curse the days when the fluffer nutter is clipped to their heads as an eye-catching hair piece, depositing enough purple down to fill a king-sized comforter.

Why is Daddy okay with all of this? Is it because he’s a better parent, more nurturing, more caring, more understanding, more patient? No. He allows this insanity because for him, walking around with two crazy sidekicks detracts from his own ridiculous get-up and he is finally the one who appears well put together.

We must also consider the frightening, cluttered steps towards the girl’s rooms on dress-yourself-day. I can usually envision the height of the heap of clothing I am about to be tripping over based on what the girls are sporting. If my four year old has a winter inspired outfit, it means she has stopped just shy of pilfering through her upper drawers and I will have only the bottom two to remove and re-fold whatever is left hanging from the now wide open cavern of clothes.
If my six year old is wearing small sizes, strange patterns in combination with anything resembling a Halloween costume, I might be looking at some over-turned drawers, a puppet theatre starring her socks and I may require my tool-kit to re-install the doors on the closet.

Dressing themselves can be dangerous too. I have saved a shredded fluffer nutter caught in the spokes of a child’s bike on more than one occasion after being used as a belt atop a taffeta dress worn with mismatched socks over crocs.
A friend of mine who works in child care had to make an important call to a have a mother pick up her daughter after arriving at her home wearing her mother’s halter top as a dress and nothing else. The four year old had selected a piece of twine to wrap around her non-existent waist but that did nothing to keep her torso from becoming completely exposed while this strange, flapping piece of silk wreaked havoc on a game of duck-duck-goose.

Arriving at the birthday party, filled with misfits, baby elf in tow, I realized we made the right decision in allowing our children to leave the house defying all fashion etiquette (and logic). Glancing around at the girls wearing their older brother’s hockey jerseys, the costume jewellery, men’s work belt, curtain tie-back for a headband and my favourite, a crocheted blanket doubling as a cape, pinned together with a 1980’s banana clip, the one child whose pretty party dress and appropriately sized sandals actually matched, appeared very, very unhappy.

Nice try Mom, but your husband looks absolutely ridiculous.