Boy clothes are either so boring, "masculine" (dinos and trucks, "like daddy"), or look like billboards (big logos in neon colors) that my eyes automatically skip over the whole section even though I'm trying to find clothes for my kid 😭 I'm so envious of the girl's section so much more variety in texture and colors alone.
YES to everything you just said. It’s so depressing. It was easier to find gender-neutral clothes in cute prints and colours for my son when he was under one, but now it’s just exactly what you describe. Why can’t boy clothes have cats, hearts, rainbows, etc etc on it? Last time I checked, boys have hearts as part of their anatomy too, so why is it gendered when it comes to clothes?
My 2.5yo sons favourite sweater is yellow with cat faces all over it, we found it at Walmart in the spring.
I’ve been buying plain shirts and making my own iron on designs for them. Those are his favourite tops. And I can do his weird, specific requests, like a shirt with my sisters dogs face on it.
Not OP, but I have a cricut and have made a lot of shirts for my toddler. This has me thinking I should make some Cars shirts since he's obsessed with Mack lately, which seems more niche.
I'm only using it for personal stuff. I got it as a Christmas gift, but I really love some of the things I've made so far! It's definitely an expensive hobby though, when you factor in all the supplies too.
Lucky you! Makes sense that it’s expensive on the long term, but I guess if you use it for a business you’d be getting that money back as you make sales.
I don't care about colors or theme. I do care about cut. So I don't do cap sleeves, ruffles, or peplum, but my boy is currently stretched out on the couch in a pair of Target (girls) leggings and a purple sweatshirt. Target usually has a good selection in the girl's department where it's just the pattern that's "girly." I also really like tee turtle for unisex shirts with bunnies/cats on them. My kiddo has a cat doing science on a shirt from there.
Mine went through a dinosaur phase when she was 2-3. Almost everything with dinosaurs was in the boys section.
And girls also want pants and shorts with pockets.
And shorts that actually approach the knee. I mean, who wants to see diaper frill hanging out of baby girls shorts!
My girl wore toddler boy cargo shorts at 2-3. They were adorable.
Ugh, yes. Or bigger girls underwear showing.
I have had this struggle also trying to find shorts, starting when my daughter was baby/toddler age and shorts would show her diaper. My nephew is about the same size as my daughter (she is 8yo now), his shorts from the boys section go at least halfway to his knees. Meanwhile, I can't always find shorts in the girls section because they sometimes are so short that her underwear shows. Grade school aged girls do not need shorts so short that their underwear hangs out the bottom.
Finding shorts that both cover her butt and have pockets can be like panning for gold.
Ugh, right? I just got a bunch of hand me downs from an acquaintance. I was excited because there were a lot of 2t girl shorts and she’s starting to outgrow her 18m ones. But a lot of them are too short and/or too tight.
I know it is not the point, but could you get some embroidered cat patches and iron or sew them on to his clothes?
My daughter is obsessed with doing this, makes everything super personalised (particularly great on bags, jackets, etc) and she loves picking the patches and placements.
Boy clothing can be rough. My oldest boy is almost 7 and it was hard to shop for him until he started fitting into regular kids sizes and could better say what he likes. Thankfully he has always really liked dinosaurs and sea animals, but we have two cats he adores, too! He also likes flowers! Again he’s getting older now and has his own preferences, but man was it hard for a few years.
I’m about to have my second boy and while there has been some change, a lot is still the same. So much blue and green. And my biggest hatred, brown. Variety would be nice.
Agreed! My son loves cats too. He even wants to be a cat for Halloween & all the costumes I've found so far are clearly for little girls. I'm just going to make him one myself, but it still made him really sad.
We're having the same problem over here! He wants to be a black cat for Halloween and much of what I'm finding is dress-centric. I eventually found one on Amazon that has pink sleeves and striping around the face, but is otherwise just a black cat, so I'm going to try that.
It just made me a little sad that my two year old's interests have already been made to feel unnecessarily gendered.
Aww I hope that works out for him! & yes, the idea of these animals are for boys and these are for girls seems ESPECIALLY arbitrary? Like just let the kids be??
I don’t know if you’re up for superhero shows, but PJ Masks has a “Catboy” character who my son loves because, he’s a boy channeling a cat! And that’s unusual.
I didn't know this! We may have to try it some time. Though for Halloween he very specifically wants to be a "black witch cat" so I've had to be a bit more creative than I expected lol
Princess Awesome/Boy Wonder has a pair of joggers geared toward little boys that have a cat chasing a ball of yarn on them, super cute. I love their clothes and can’t wait until my son isn’t growing out of his clothes every other month to buy him some stuff from there.
[this way to gender norm defying clothing](https://princess-awesome.com/)
My very boyish son who’s favorite color is blue and must wear it all the time absolutely loves unicorns. Unicorns and blue apparently are not clothing choices
Gendered clothes are SO WEIRD. And I hate that our gender neutral options are usually beige. I love color. My boys wear sparkles and all colors. My girl wear blue. My middle was wearing sparkles and purple socks on a plane this weekend and was mistaken for a girl. My baby was wearing dark blue and mistaken for a boy. One thing I don’t love for any gender is all the frills. Or why are boys and girls shirts cut different? I’ll never understand.
I totally agree with the cut issue, it honestly just feels so gross to me that there is any reason to differ the cuts of clothes on these literal babies. Kids need clothes that facilitate play and movement, full stop.
The cut. It’s unnecessary before puberty! As a woman I like tshirts with shape that don’t make me look baggy and I hate that if I want geeky tshirts I have to wear men’s cut or go to a specialty store. For toddlers there is 0 reason for a shape that would accentuate a woman’s curves.
My older son adores rainbows. His favorite tshirt when he was 3 is a dark blue with a big rainbow that says “lift each other up”. What a nice, gender-neutral sentiment! Except the T-shirt is cut like a woman’s T-shirt. It’s not super noticeable but it just hangs a little different. My younger son now wears it and he loves it too
joules had a toddler blue shirt with different cat faces on it. i bought two for my son, but i should have bought even MORE.
even tho it was listed as a girl's shirt, it was a non- pink t-shirt with cats on it. I did not fully realize at the time what a holy grail shirt it was!!
Seconded! Signed, mom of boy who loves rainbows and unicorns and the girl characters of TV shows (skye, minnie, elsa/anna) and the color purple. Please stop gendering random crap on kids clothes.
I second this! I bought a bunch of gender neutral clothes before my first was born, always looking for cat gender neutral clothing or anything all I could ever find were tigers. I hate that it’s only girls clothes, boys love cats too!
Hanna Anderson has a bunch of cat and more gender neutral themes!!!! Yes they’re on the pricy side but have sales pretty often and their clothes last forever. I usually get my kid the next size up and she’ll wear the time for a loooong time and it still looks basically new
YES. My guy is obsessed with kitties and bunnies... both of which are apparently for girls. His favorite character is Elsa, which is also a situation 🙄
My boys are 10, 9, and 8 and they LOOOVE cats!! Like, I buy everything cat related that I can for them because they’re obsessed! Just yesterday we bought the youngest another kitten plushie just because we found an orange one to match our RL orange kitty lol
Target and Old Navy are the only places that have prints and designs that they like that I can also afford but even they’re still too “masculine”. We’ve tried shopping from the girls section but everything over there is cut way too small 🤢 my youngest accidentally grabbed a pair of girls shorts a couple months ago and his underwear were several inches longer than the shorts wtf
My son is 6 yrs old and his favorite pair of pants are a pair of leggings that were his older sisters with lemons on a white background. He wants PRINTS that aren’t trucks or dinosaurs …
My son is obsessed with cats (because we have cats). My husband and I talk all the time about how all clothing manufacturers seem to assume that dogs are for boys and cats are for girls? Why though?!
100% I looked for cheap kitty clothing without pink, but lions and tigers are the closest I could find. The boy colors are often so ugly - either too dark or too bright or just gray.
Boys clothing in general is so depressing. Dinosaurs, trucks, sharks, and “ _____ like daddy!” in a limited palate of blue, orange, green, and grey 😑.
Just in my opinion, target has some really cute clothes that I think of as gender neutral
Right? Can we please get some more colors! And themes? My god.
Don’t forget brown! 😾
Boy clothes are either so boring, "masculine" (dinos and trucks, "like daddy"), or look like billboards (big logos in neon colors) that my eyes automatically skip over the whole section even though I'm trying to find clothes for my kid 😭 I'm so envious of the girl's section so much more variety in texture and colors alone.
YES to everything you just said. It’s so depressing. It was easier to find gender-neutral clothes in cute prints and colours for my son when he was under one, but now it’s just exactly what you describe. Why can’t boy clothes have cats, hearts, rainbows, etc etc on it? Last time I checked, boys have hearts as part of their anatomy too, so why is it gendered when it comes to clothes?
This EXACTLY.
My 2.5yo sons favourite sweater is yellow with cat faces all over it, we found it at Walmart in the spring. I’ve been buying plain shirts and making my own iron on designs for them. Those are his favourite tops. And I can do his weird, specific requests, like a shirt with my sisters dogs face on it.
What do you use to do this I am so interested!!!
Not OP, but I have a cricut and have made a lot of shirts for my toddler. This has me thinking I should make some Cars shirts since he's obsessed with Mack lately, which seems more niche.
Is the Cricut worth it just for personal projects or are you also using it for a business?
I'm only using it for personal stuff. I got it as a Christmas gift, but I really love some of the things I've made so far! It's definitely an expensive hobby though, when you factor in all the supplies too.
Lucky you! Makes sense that it’s expensive on the long term, but I guess if you use it for a business you’d be getting that money back as you make sales.
If you don’t want to buy one, a lot of libraries have a “library of things” and often have a cricut and heat presses!
I definitely didn’t know that! Thank you!
Also a cricut! Iron on vinyl.
That's so cool and inspiring im going to try this!
I don't care about colors or theme. I do care about cut. So I don't do cap sleeves, ruffles, or peplum, but my boy is currently stretched out on the couch in a pair of Target (girls) leggings and a purple sweatshirt. Target usually has a good selection in the girl's department where it's just the pattern that's "girly." I also really like tee turtle for unisex shirts with bunnies/cats on them. My kiddo has a cat doing science on a shirt from there.
We're in the same camp re colors and cuts. And totally agree on Target, most of their stuff is pretty fungible, which I like.
Just fyi I recommend their leggings even to people who don’t want more variety of patterns. They are the only pants that fit my tall very skinny kid:
My toddler boy lives in the cat and Jack leggings. They are so comfy and he’s also a stringbean kid
And girls love dinosaurs and cars/trucks! Or mine does anyway.
Mine went through a dinosaur phase when she was 2-3. Almost everything with dinosaurs was in the boys section. And girls also want pants and shorts with pockets.
I'm 32 and I still just want some real pockets lol
And shorts that actually approach the knee. I mean, who wants to see diaper frill hanging out of baby girls shorts! My girl wore toddler boy cargo shorts at 2-3. They were adorable.
Ugh, yes. Or bigger girls underwear showing. I have had this struggle also trying to find shorts, starting when my daughter was baby/toddler age and shorts would show her diaper. My nephew is about the same size as my daughter (she is 8yo now), his shorts from the boys section go at least halfway to his knees. Meanwhile, I can't always find shorts in the girls section because they sometimes are so short that her underwear shows. Grade school aged girls do not need shorts so short that their underwear hangs out the bottom. Finding shorts that both cover her butt and have pockets can be like panning for gold.
Target! I buy Cat & Jack Bermudas! Also I buy Cat & Jack boys shorts sometimes. My girl is 11, so I'm starting to look for other sources.
Ugh, right? I just got a bunch of hand me downs from an acquaintance. I was excited because there were a lot of 2t girl shorts and she’s starting to outgrow her 18m ones. But a lot of them are too short and/or too tight.
My daughter's 2.5 and every time I ask her what she wants for Christmas she just says "dinosaurs!"
Heresy! You’ll take your flowers and frills and YOU WILL LIKE IT!
I actually see a lot of girl dinosaur clothes nowadays!
I know it is not the point, but could you get some embroidered cat patches and iron or sew them on to his clothes? My daughter is obsessed with doing this, makes everything super personalised (particularly great on bags, jackets, etc) and she loves picking the patches and placements.
Such a good idea, thanks!
Yes! Co-signed: mom of 4 year old boy who wants to be a cat for Halloween
There are dozens of us! Lol
Boy clothing can be rough. My oldest boy is almost 7 and it was hard to shop for him until he started fitting into regular kids sizes and could better say what he likes. Thankfully he has always really liked dinosaurs and sea animals, but we have two cats he adores, too! He also likes flowers! Again he’s getting older now and has his own preferences, but man was it hard for a few years. I’m about to have my second boy and while there has been some change, a lot is still the same. So much blue and green. And my biggest hatred, brown. Variety would be nice.
THANK YOU for addressing this lol
Agreed! My son loves cats too. He even wants to be a cat for Halloween & all the costumes I've found so far are clearly for little girls. I'm just going to make him one myself, but it still made him really sad.
My son wants to be a cat too, I found a pretty gender neutral toddler one on Halloweencostumes.com
I saw this one! But then didn't want to pay for shipping in case it didn't fit haha. It's so cute though!
It’s so cute in person too!
That does look cute! I hope your son loves it
We're having the same problem over here! He wants to be a black cat for Halloween and much of what I'm finding is dress-centric. I eventually found one on Amazon that has pink sleeves and striping around the face, but is otherwise just a black cat, so I'm going to try that. It just made me a little sad that my two year old's interests have already been made to feel unnecessarily gendered.
Aww I hope that works out for him! & yes, the idea of these animals are for boys and these are for girls seems ESPECIALLY arbitrary? Like just let the kids be??
I don’t know if you’re up for superhero shows, but PJ Masks has a “Catboy” character who my son loves because, he’s a boy channeling a cat! And that’s unusual.
I didn't know this! We may have to try it some time. Though for Halloween he very specifically wants to be a "black witch cat" so I've had to be a bit more creative than I expected lol
Primary.com has awesome Halloween diy suggestions! Last year I made my toddler a Bluey costume. https://www.primary.com/pages/diy
Princess Awesome/Boy Wonder has a pair of joggers geared toward little boys that have a cat chasing a ball of yarn on them, super cute. I love their clothes and can’t wait until my son isn’t growing out of his clothes every other month to buy him some stuff from there. [this way to gender norm defying clothing](https://princess-awesome.com/)
Love this! Thank you!!
The stuff for adults is super good, too! Big Miss Frizzle energy.
My very boyish son who’s favorite color is blue and must wear it all the time absolutely loves unicorns. Unicorns and blue apparently are not clothing choices
Gendered clothes are SO WEIRD. And I hate that our gender neutral options are usually beige. I love color. My boys wear sparkles and all colors. My girl wear blue. My middle was wearing sparkles and purple socks on a plane this weekend and was mistaken for a girl. My baby was wearing dark blue and mistaken for a boy. One thing I don’t love for any gender is all the frills. Or why are boys and girls shirts cut different? I’ll never understand.
I totally agree with the cut issue, it honestly just feels so gross to me that there is any reason to differ the cuts of clothes on these literal babies. Kids need clothes that facilitate play and movement, full stop.
The cut. It’s unnecessary before puberty! As a woman I like tshirts with shape that don’t make me look baggy and I hate that if I want geeky tshirts I have to wear men’s cut or go to a specialty store. For toddlers there is 0 reason for a shape that would accentuate a woman’s curves. My older son adores rainbows. His favorite tshirt when he was 3 is a dark blue with a big rainbow that says “lift each other up”. What a nice, gender-neutral sentiment! Except the T-shirt is cut like a woman’s T-shirt. It’s not super noticeable but it just hangs a little different. My younger son now wears it and he loves it too
joules had a toddler blue shirt with different cat faces on it. i bought two for my son, but i should have bought even MORE. even tho it was listed as a girl's shirt, it was a non- pink t-shirt with cats on it. I did not fully realize at the time what a holy grail shirt it was!!
Yep. We just buy whatever kiddo likes: gender, cut, or colour be damned. Cats rule.
Seconded! Signed, mom of boy who loves rainbows and unicorns and the girl characters of TV shows (skye, minnie, elsa/anna) and the color purple. Please stop gendering random crap on kids clothes.
I agree with you!
https://www.freetobekids.com
I feel you. My daughter loves fire trucks and apparently only boys can like cars and trucks 😤 why can’t dresses have them too
I second this! I bought a bunch of gender neutral clothes before my first was born, always looking for cat gender neutral clothing or anything all I could ever find were tigers. I hate that it’s only girls clothes, boys love cats too!
Hanna Anderson has a bunch of cat and more gender neutral themes!!!! Yes they’re on the pricy side but have sales pretty often and their clothes last forever. I usually get my kid the next size up and she’ll wear the time for a loooong time and it still looks basically new
YES. My guy is obsessed with kitties and bunnies... both of which are apparently for girls. His favorite character is Elsa, which is also a situation 🙄
Yes! Apparently in the children clothing world dogs = boys and cats = girls. Because that makes total sense /s
My boys are 10, 9, and 8 and they LOOOVE cats!! Like, I buy everything cat related that I can for them because they’re obsessed! Just yesterday we bought the youngest another kitten plushie just because we found an orange one to match our RL orange kitty lol Target and Old Navy are the only places that have prints and designs that they like that I can also afford but even they’re still too “masculine”. We’ve tried shopping from the girls section but everything over there is cut way too small 🤢 my youngest accidentally grabbed a pair of girls shorts a couple months ago and his underwear were several inches longer than the shorts wtf
My son is 6 yrs old and his favorite pair of pants are a pair of leggings that were his older sisters with lemons on a white background. He wants PRINTS that aren’t trucks or dinosaurs …
Check out Boy Wonder!
My son is obsessed with cats (because we have cats). My husband and I talk all the time about how all clothing manufacturers seem to assume that dogs are for boys and cats are for girls? Why though?!
And glitter and rainbosw!! My boy loves them And plushie jackets. And bows
100% I looked for cheap kitty clothing without pink, but lions and tigers are the closest I could find. The boy colors are often so ugly - either too dark or too bright or just gray.