How to Dress Your Baby in the Morning Without a Fight
It should be pretty simple: the person wakes up in the morning and changes their pajamas instead of daytime clothes. We humans do this almost every day, and yet your little one is not interested in performing this ritual. In fact, the very idea of getting dressed right now infuriates them.
If you find yourself trapped in this particularly pervasive battle of will with your young child, we have a few ideas to help lessen the frustration you all experience.
Let them choose
This is the main advice that parents give veterans new parents: kids want to control something, anything. So start by letting them choose their outfit in the morning – or at least give them a simple choice, like choosing between a blue shirt or a yellow shirt, or wear that shirt first, or pants first.
However, as many parents of toddlers will tell you, giving them choices certainly helps, but doesn’t always solve all problems. A parent posted to our Offspring Facebook group asking for advice on this:
So this three-year-old boy has been choosing clothes for a while and is still doing it. However, getting it is actually putting them on where we are stuck. He gets distracted, yells at the dog or starts making faces in the mirror, and he has a ton of “squirrels!” moments that turn into 40 minutes when I ask and repeat the frustration of “please get dressed.”
That’s when it’s time to get creative.
Make it a game
Your toddler is more likely to do what you want him to do if it’s less chore and more play. They just want to have fun, and if getting dressed puts them off, the only thing to do is make it enjoyable. Here’s how some of the parents on our Facebook group played it out:
- Drive them. Who can get dressed first – you or them? Not only do they love to play games, babies love to win.
- Imagine dressing up is an Olympic sport, with commentary on the game while your toddler rushes against the clock.
- PlayMadagascar’s “I Like To Move It” and invite them to dress for the rest of the song.
- Likewise, invite them to help you get dressed before you can sing an entire alphabet song or count to a certain number.
- Let the clothes fight with each other over who will wear this day: “Ella wants to wear me!” “No, Ella wants to wear ME!”
- Bribe them with whatever comes next, whether it’s opening the Advent calendar for the day, adding a sticker to their table, or their favorite breakfast pancakes. It’s not really a game, but using phrases like, “After get dressed, then we’ll do XYZ …” can make them think ahead to something you know they’d rather do.
If you are desperate
So you gave them a choice and it worked for a while. Then you turned it into a game and they dug it until they suddenly stopped. And now you are so tired of having to deal with it every day that you can just scream. That means it’s time to try one of these “oh who cares” type suggestions that were echoed by several of our group members:
- Let them watch TV while you dress them. In any case, the screen time rules are meaningless this year.
- Dress them while they are still sleeping. They may even be in that precious half-asleep, half-asleep stage in which they subconsciously follow your instructions (“raise your hands, dear!”) Without the usual attitude.
- Let them sleep in tomorrow’s clothes. Don’t want to fight over dressing up in your pajamas? Then don’t wear them in your pajamas at all. This was one of the main proposals of our group. Opt for tomorrow’s clothing after bathing tonight and enjoy the added benefits of smaller linens.
And finally: remember that this too will pass (although it seems that you have been fighting this war for ten years and counting). Rest assured that they wo n’t end up being toddlers who dress up in the morning without screaming, crying, or fluttering their clothes in a hurricane of undisguised rage.