Making your Kid's Clothes Last Longer

Tips on making your kid's clothes last longer & where you can go to sell your children's clothing. Make money on your used kid's clothes at resale shops.

We're sure we are not alone when we send our children off to school dressed in nice clothing only to see them come home with grass stains. Dirt is always smudged on elbows at the end of the day and groan! We're sure that's a tell tale sign that they had a good day. Here are tips on making your kid's clothes last as long as possible. Sponsored by method detergent.

How Can we Make My Kids Clothes Last Longer

We have 3 girls. My initial thought when we had our 3rd and final daughter was “awesome, well at least we will save money with hand us downs!”

Let us start by saying that we are a frugal shopper. From the time our first time daughter was born we shopped at children's resale shops. We always picked out the best things they had and nobody ever knew they were “used”.

Getting Clothes to Look Brand New

When our 2nd daughter was born we did the same thing. We paid special attention when washing our kid's clothes because one missed grass stain or buying the wrong detergent could ruin the item.

• This meant not only could we not use it as a hand us down, but we couldn't take it back to the resale shop and sell it back. So our quest to keep their clothing looking the BEST began!

Here are a few tips we've learned in our quest to keep our kid's clothing last longer (and stay cleaner):

How to Get Clothes to Last Longer

1. Great Detergent – Method 4x concentrate laundry detergent has been great for keeping colors bright, whites white, and a big reason why we love it is it is hypoallergenic. My 2nd daughter's skin is sensitive, and a great benefit for kids in general.

2. Stain Fighters – YES, for those grass stains especially. Here is where method detergent works for #1 and #2 on our list! a spoonful of the 4x concentrated detergent on the tough green stained knees for about 10 minutes acts as a great stain fighter.

Laundry Tips

• Wear it again – Many times if we've been at home all day, their jeans don't need to be rewashed. If you can avoid washing articles of clothing more often than they need to be you can lengthen the wearability of them!
• Hang dry – If you have room, why not skip the dryer for some articles of kid's clothing. For nicer dresses and jeans many times we hang them up to dry in our laundry room.

Many years ago we had our husband hang a shower curtain rod in our laundry room so we could immediately take things out of the washer or dryer and hang them up to dry. Helps the colors last longer (they fade in the dryer). Their jeans seem to last a bit longer and look nicer doing this too!

• Rotate – When the seasons change so do the things we wear. In some states you may go from snow suits to short sleeve shirts. In others (like here in Ca.) you may go from long sleeve shirts to tank tops.
  • Nevertheless you should rotate out the clothing from last season. Create a box in their closet for the next season. If you have a younger child they can wear things from that box when the season rolls around again.
  • If there's no one to hand them down to and you know they won't fit in them next year it is time to visit your local resale shop.
  • You can make a little money selling the clothes you've taken such good care of.

Keep Kids Clothes Lasting Longer

Here is the end result of washing these cute name brand jeans with grass stains she wore. With method laundry detergent they're solid again ….good right??!!

Even though we found these at a bargain, we still want to take the best care of them so we can resell these back to that same store. Yes we do it all the time and don't feel guilty at all. We make some of the money we initially spent on them back and they have nice clothing to wear all the time!

• This is the way to go when you have several kids, want to dress them as nicely as possible, and you don't want to break the bank doing so.

We hope these 5 tips for making your kid's clothes last longer helped! For more thrift store shopping tips We have those too.

That should get you started. Let us know next month if we got you hooked on the power of method detergent + shopping and buying at children's resale shops!