As a kid living back east in big snow country, I remember hating wearing coats. I found them to be very binding. Looking at kids clothes now sometimes I wonder how kids manage to move around in them, kids’ jeans and coats, the seams are very heavy, the materials are heavy. Little kids’ jeans have the same thick heavy seams that adult jeans do. It would be proportionally like my own jeans having 3 inch wide seams.
@Horseyjane I agree. But I remember in 4th grade in Chicago, we were not allowed to go to recess without our coats on until the thermometer in the schoolyard said 50, and we’d try to warm it up with our hands or our breath so we could take off our coats. We were running around and playing and the coats felt too hot and we couldn’t hardly move in them. I think kids just run a bit hot also. Even as an adult who is a wimp for cold it has to be seriously cold for me to wear a coat, I’d rather wear a hoodie over a sweatshirt, hat, scarf, fingerless gloves and shearling boots so I can still move freely. And I love coats, I probably have 10 of them.
@earlyre At my mom’s (NE Ohio) over the christmas break, with a bunch of snow, high winds and temps <10 (before wind chill) I saw one fool in a t-shirt, shorts and flip flops walking (not running) from his car at the far end of the mall parking lot to the mall. And another women was in a t-shirt and no jacket. She was also doing things like scraping off her car (bare hands using her scraper, having walked from the mall to her car (again at the far end of the parking lot). Nuts.
@Kidsandliz Flip flops are called that because it’s what you do if you try to run in them, lol.
We actually had that happen to us a few decades ago by accident. When we went into the theater at the mall one afternoon in April it was in the low 80’s, we were wearing shorts, tshirts and sandals. When we came out two hours later it was still daylight, pouring snow with the temperature just below freezing. It had dropped 50 degrees in less than 2 hours. We were astonished (and freezing). The car was still pretty warm at least. We are high altitude, very low humidity desert mesa and subject to rapid weather shifts but that was the biggest I’ve seen.
@moondrake I remember being in first grade (3/4 miles from school, all of 3 houses from being able to be bussed) and walked to school with an umbrella because it might rain and a very light sweater. Walked home in the snow in a heavily blowing wind, two of us standing behind the umbrella I held open in front of us trying to cut the wind. Why no one came to pick us up from school I have no idea.
@Kidsandliz@moondrake no one came to pick you up because now, when your kids want you to drive them across the street to their friend’s house, you can tell them how when you were their age you had to trudge 3/4 miles through the snow and wind and so on …
When making sure my kid left the house appropriately dressed was still my responsibility they had that stupid fad of putting the coats on backwards with just your arms in it. Why you’d want it snowing on your backside was beyond me. While I could make her leave the house dressed appropriately, beyond my line of sight it was anybody’s guess how she wore (or not).
@Horseyjane You’d have to ask them. I knew WAAAYYY too many that did it when I was a teen (especially females) because it didn’t look as cool as their clothes did without the coat.
@lseeber That never made sense to me because when my daughter gets inside she can just take off her coat and snow pants and wear whatever outfit she wants.
Because it just wasn’t as cold as the adults make it out to be. Because after a week or two of cold even kids get ‘used to it’ and the coat is just too warm.
And because everyone everywhere seems to keep their stores and buildings too darn warm these days; granted your coat comes off at school but when you go into a store you roast or have to take it off and carry it, which is a PITA.
And I like coats and parkas. I had one of those Air Force green parkas with orange lining and genuine fake coyote fur ruff around the hood that was awesome… still just could not wear it unless it was really cold.
@duodec this was me. My Mum would always tell me to put my coat on and I’d say something like:
“But Mum, it’s not winter, and we’re on holiday… In Bermuda.”
At school though it was obnoxious. My parents would tell me to get overdressed so that I wouldn’t be cold walking from house to car or car to school… Then I’d get where I was going, it would be too hot for a coat and I’d spend the rest of the day lugging a heavy coat around everywhere.
Don’t know. As soon as we get inside a store or her school, she wants to take her coat off right away. It’s still chilly in the store… especially the entryway!
@medz@Horseyjane where are these mythical places where stores are kept blissfully cool? The department and grocery stores here are always too warm year round.
@duodec I found the deeper south I live the colder places are with A/C. It’s 104 out and 99% humidity and I have to bring a sweatshirt if I go shopping.
@medz Live in the Deep South too. I froze in Walmart the other day, it was like a refrigerator in there! I did not have a coat with me, guess I will from now on!
My kids hate having to wear their heavy coats to school because both their coats and their huge backpacks have to fit in their tiny lockers at school. They aren’t allowed to have either during the day. It’s a pain in the ass for them to try to stuff it all in there and still be able to access their books and stuff throughout the day. I still make them wear it, but my daughter (rides the middle/high school bus) is always the only kid at the bus stop in anything heavier than a hoodie even in single digit temps.
My daughter is allowed to carry around her stuff at school. And yep I notice the same thing too, my daughter is by far the warmest dressed kid at her school, I don’t know how parents let their kids go outside so underdressed.
I come from a long, honorable line of radiator sitters. Mom never had a fight about coats with me. I was always cold.
On the other hand we did slide down the front walk in bare feet to turn it into ice. Then run inside, stand on the radiator to warm up our toes and go back out and do it again. Eventually we could slide down it with our boots on because it was a sheet of ice. Until dad salted it on Sunday mornings that is… Then once church was over (we lived next door) we’d shovel the salt off, shovel snow back on, and go back to trying to ice it over… rinse and repeat.
As a teacher for many years, I have seen kids in little jackets on the coldest days.
I would ask if they had a bigger coat, no.
That really drove me crazy, the children not having coats.
I would go through our lost and found to find coats, hats, gloves.
I always gave them gloves and hats for Christmas for them use outside at school. Usually gave them a pair to take home but those were always lost.
When weather was cold, but running around outside, they would ditch their coats, PUT THOSE COATS BACK ON!
I just feel like kids do not feel the cold like we do.
I do not like coats, wear them as little as possible, my blue jean jacket is enough for me most of the time here.
It was 73 yesterday, had shorts on, today it is 43!
One time when it snowed a little when son was about two, I bundled him up, took several minutes, we went out, he stood there and cried, we went back in, unbundled.
I honestly don’t know why anyone wants a heavy coat.
Many years ago, when my grandmother passes away, she was buried in Wisconsin in April (I think). It was not actively snowing, but there was a lot of ice on the ground and the grass at the graveyard crunched as we walked.
My father’s sister never left that part of the midwest. She and her family were bundled up in heavy coats and boots and stuff.
My father and his brother (coastal So Cal and Arizona respectively) were in suits appropriate to where they live with only a suit jacket, and in my uncle’s case a lightweight coat. I was in a California desert weight dress, with elbow length sleeves, midcalf, and pumps. My cousin (uncle’s daugher) was in light weight pacific southwest leathers.
We weren’t cold
My aunt and her kids were cold.
I think part of it is the actual temperature and part is the expectation. If it’s cold and not wet, we probably need less layers than we think.
Have you considered for those that don’t outgrow their clothes 3 times a year, light weight silk long underwear? Keeps you warm, isn’t bulky and doesn’t make you sweat?
@mike808 there are very few places in the US (besides Alaska) where not wearing a coat for a few hours will kill you.
You don’t get sick from being cold either… That’s a myth. A healthy human being maintains a temperature approx 98.6 degrees no matter what the temperature is outside.
The myth of cold weather making you sick is because people tend to huddle inside during cold weather and thus be more likely to pass diseases to each other. If people are outside in the open it’s harder to pass a disease. (Hypothermia is usually only from extreme temperatures for extended periods or if you’re in water and thus conducting heat out your body).
For the vast majority of the country and for the vast majority of the days… The only downside to not wearing a coat is that it could potentially make you feel a little cold.
@mike808@OnionSoup Amen! Same for catching a cold from being out in the rain! I tried to reason with my mom that colds are passed from people thru the cold virus but she would always freak out when I came in from the rain with wet hair! Bless her
@fjp999@OnionSoup the cold virus doesn’t just exist only in people. It’s in the environment too.
Going from 20 degrees to 70 degrees and back puts stress on your lymphatic and immune systems, and it is that stress that gives opportunity to “catching” a cold instead of your immune system just fighting it off and your lymphatic system disposing of the remains.
Wearing weather-appropriate clothing doesn’t shock or put that temperature change stress on your body. Consciousness does not magically change 40,000 years of biology and evolution when we’ve only had written language for maybe a tenth of that.
I agree Horsey Jane, my girls are 6 and 9 and they sometimes don’t want to wear coats, even on rainy days but I just tell them that I’m the mother and I say jackets are on AND zipped up otherwise they get loss of privileges.
Let them go outside without a coat and get cold. It’s not going to hurt them, but if it truly is cold they’ll learn to wear a coat next time and be more likely to listen to you next time
Because they suck, they are way too hot, and they are usually unnecessary. If they are old enough to walk to school they are old enough to zip up their coat and put on their hat and gloves if they get cold. They aren’t idiots and just because you’re cold doesn’t mean they are.
I can still remember my mom insisting on putting on a hat and the second I was outside that got thrown in a pile of snow if we were playing. How do you expect a kid playing or excerting energy to release heat.
How “cold” or how “hot” it is depends on adjusting to the temp and metabolism. 65 is hot to me during the winter inside. I usually prefer it around 55-60 in sweat pants/tshirt. I know people who would turn it up to 80. And still be “cold” in a sweater. Personally I think they are insane. Why would kids be any different? If your kid tells you they are too hot why would you assume it’s BS just because you’re cold?
@therealjrn if you review the thread @stolicat is the dirty necroposter. Replying to @Kidsandliz and @moondrake. Notice 21 hours ago vs my 18. That brought it to the front page. And in the midst of all the stupid zip/jacket threads I clicked the wrong one to whine on. Lol I invoke blame the goat
I recall one time getting called into school for a conference because my 5th grade stepdaughter was showing up with a skirt, t-shirt, and no coat when it was 15 degrees outside. She was leaving the house with jeans, mittens, and a puffy winter coat, and taking them off at the bus stop and stuffing them into her backpack.
As I recall she also used up about an entire can of hairspray getting ready for school, the smell used to drift down the hallway through 2 closed doors and wake me up choking. Her hair was crunchy, and she could stand outside in the wind and it would not move, like a plastic hat or something.
As a kid living back east in big snow country, I remember hating wearing coats. I found them to be very binding. Looking at kids clothes now sometimes I wonder how kids manage to move around in them, kids’ jeans and coats, the seams are very heavy, the materials are heavy. Little kids’ jeans have the same thick heavy seams that adult jeans do. It would be proportionally like my own jeans having 3 inch wide seams.
@moondrake with how cold it gets, heavy coats are a necessity.
@Horseyjane I agree. But I remember in 4th grade in Chicago, we were not allowed to go to recess without our coats on until the thermometer in the schoolyard said 50, and we’d try to warm it up with our hands or our breath so we could take off our coats. We were running around and playing and the coats felt too hot and we couldn’t hardly move in them. I think kids just run a bit hot also. Even as an adult who is a wimp for cold it has to be seriously cold for me to wear a coat, I’d rather wear a hoodie over a sweatshirt, hat, scarf, fingerless gloves and shearling boots so I can still move freely. And I love coats, I probably have 10 of them.
@moondrake it’s nowhere near 50 for us, at that temperature I would let her wear a light coat.
Also kids don’t like getting dressed in general so putting on pjs at night or getting dressed in morning is awkward movements for them
@CaptAmehrican Little kids yeah, but my daughter is 13!
@Horseyjane i have a friend in her mid 30’s who doesn’t like to wear coats. it’s a miracle if she wears shoes(instead of flip-flops) let alone a coat.
her 10yr old daughter has WAY more sense in that dept.
@earlyre At my mom’s (NE Ohio) over the christmas break, with a bunch of snow, high winds and temps <10 (before wind chill) I saw one fool in a t-shirt, shorts and flip flops walking (not running) from his car at the far end of the mall parking lot to the mall. And another women was in a t-shirt and no jacket. She was also doing things like scraping off her car (bare hands using her scraper, having walked from the mall to her car (again at the far end of the parking lot). Nuts.
@Kidsandliz Flip flops are called that because it’s what you do if you try to run in them, lol.
We actually had that happen to us a few decades ago by accident. When we went into the theater at the mall one afternoon in April it was in the low 80’s, we were wearing shorts, tshirts and sandals. When we came out two hours later it was still daylight, pouring snow with the temperature just below freezing. It had dropped 50 degrees in less than 2 hours. We were astonished (and freezing). The car was still pretty warm at least. We are high altitude, very low humidity desert mesa and subject to rapid weather shifts but that was the biggest I’ve seen.
@moondrake I remember being in first grade (3/4 miles from school, all of 3 houses from being able to be bussed) and walked to school with an umbrella because it might rain and a very light sweater. Walked home in the snow in a heavily blowing wind, two of us standing behind the umbrella I held open in front of us trying to cut the wind. Why no one came to pick us up from school I have no idea.
@Kidsandliz @moondrake no one came to pick you up because now, when your kids want you to drive them across the street to their friend’s house, you can tell them how when you were their age you had to trudge 3/4 miles through the snow and wind and so on …
Because.
When making sure my kid left the house appropriately dressed was still my responsibility they had that stupid fad of putting the coats on backwards with just your arms in it. Why you’d want it snowing on your backside was beyond me. While I could make her leave the house dressed appropriately, beyond my line of sight it was anybody’s guess how she wore (or not).
@Kidsandliz That sounds like a pretty stupid fad.
@Horseyjane In my opinion it was…but no accounting for what teens do.
Cuz it ain’t cool, man.
@lseeber There’s the real answer. That and kids are dumb.
@lseeber but why be cool when you can be warm lol
@Horseyjane You’d have to ask them. I knew WAAAYYY too many that did it when I was a teen (especially females) because it didn’t look as cool as their clothes did without the coat.
@lseeber That never made sense to me because when my daughter gets inside she can just take off her coat and snow pants and wear whatever outfit she wants.
@Horseyjane Cuz it ain’t cool!
Because it just wasn’t as cold as the adults make it out to be. Because after a week or two of cold even kids get ‘used to it’ and the coat is just too warm.
And because everyone everywhere seems to keep their stores and buildings too darn warm these days; granted your coat comes off at school but when you go into a store you roast or have to take it off and carry it, which is a PITA.
And I like coats and parkas. I had one of those Air Force green parkas with orange lining and genuine fake coyote fur ruff around the hood that was awesome… still just could not wear it unless it was really cold.
@duodec this was me. My Mum would always tell me to put my coat on and I’d say something like:
“But Mum, it’s not winter, and we’re on holiday… In Bermuda.”
At school though it was obnoxious. My parents would tell me to get overdressed so that I wouldn’t be cold walking from house to car or car to school… Then I’d get where I was going, it would be too hot for a coat and I’d spend the rest of the day lugging a heavy coat around everywhere.
Don’t know. As soon as we get inside a store or her school, she wants to take her coat off right away. It’s still chilly in the store… especially the entryway!
@medz around here it’s usually the grocery stores that are kept so cold. I’m always bundled up whenever I shop.
@medz @Horseyjane where are these mythical places where stores are kept blissfully cool? The department and grocery stores here are always too warm year round.
@duodec I found the deeper south I live the colder places are with A/C. It’s 104 out and 99% humidity and I have to bring a sweatshirt if I go shopping.
@medz Live in the Deep South too. I froze in Walmart the other day, it was like a refrigerator in there! I did not have a coat with me, guess I will from now on!
@duodec grocery stores in the northeast are pretty cold
@Kidsandliz I often joke that local business want to advertise that it’s 75 here, so when it’s 100 outdoors they make it 50 indoors.
My kids hate having to wear their heavy coats to school because both their coats and their huge backpacks have to fit in their tiny lockers at school. They aren’t allowed to have either during the day. It’s a pain in the ass for them to try to stuff it all in there and still be able to access their books and stuff throughout the day. I still make them wear it, but my daughter (rides the middle/high school bus) is always the only kid at the bus stop in anything heavier than a hoodie even in single digit temps.
My daughter is allowed to carry around her stuff at school. And yep I notice the same thing too, my daughter is by far the warmest dressed kid at her school, I don’t know how parents let their kids go outside so underdressed.
@cinoclav
/image Maggie coat
@cinoclav Yep.
My son will argue with me that his hands are warmer without gloves. As he stands there in sandals and hoodie. In Michigan. Teen logic!
@katbyter Maybe they cut off warm blood flowing to his hands…?
@medz more likely they cut off warm blood flowing to the brain…
@Kidsandliz
/giphy touche
@medz now that giphy is funny!
I come from a long, honorable line of radiator sitters. Mom never had a fight about coats with me. I was always cold.
On the other hand we did slide down the front walk in bare feet to turn it into ice. Then run inside, stand on the radiator to warm up our toes and go back out and do it again. Eventually we could slide down it with our boots on because it was a sheet of ice. Until dad salted it on Sunday mornings that is… Then once church was over (we lived next door) we’d shovel the salt off, shovel snow back on, and go back to trying to ice it over… rinse and repeat.
As a teacher for many years, I have seen kids in little jackets on the coldest days.
I would ask if they had a bigger coat, no.
That really drove me crazy, the children not having coats.
I would go through our lost and found to find coats, hats, gloves.
I always gave them gloves and hats for Christmas for them use outside at school. Usually gave them a pair to take home but those were always lost.
When weather was cold, but running around outside, they would ditch their coats, PUT THOSE COATS BACK ON!
I just feel like kids do not feel the cold like we do.
I do not like coats, wear them as little as possible, my blue jean jacket is enough for me most of the time here.
It was 73 yesterday, had shorts on, today it is 43!
One time when it snowed a little when son was about two, I bundled him up, took several minutes, we went out, he stood there and cried, we went back in, unbundled.
I honestly don’t know why anyone wants a heavy coat.
Many years ago, when my grandmother passes away, she was buried in Wisconsin in April (I think). It was not actively snowing, but there was a lot of ice on the ground and the grass at the graveyard crunched as we walked.
My father’s sister never left that part of the midwest. She and her family were bundled up in heavy coats and boots and stuff.
My father and his brother (coastal So Cal and Arizona respectively) were in suits appropriate to where they live with only a suit jacket, and in my uncle’s case a lightweight coat. I was in a California desert weight dress, with elbow length sleeves, midcalf, and pumps. My cousin (uncle’s daugher) was in light weight pacific southwest leathers.
We weren’t cold
My aunt and her kids were cold.
I think part of it is the actual temperature and part is the expectation. If it’s cold and not wet, we probably need less layers than we think.
Have you considered for those that don’t outgrow their clothes 3 times a year, light weight silk long underwear? Keeps you warm, isn’t bulky and doesn’t make you sweat?
The simple answer, it’s not cold inside!
Cause kids are oompa loompas and winter coats don’t help that look.
Because they think Darwin is just another lame dead science guy with a “theory”.
@mike808 there are very few places in the US (besides Alaska) where not wearing a coat for a few hours will kill you.
You don’t get sick from being cold either… That’s a myth. A healthy human being maintains a temperature approx 98.6 degrees no matter what the temperature is outside.
The myth of cold weather making you sick is because people tend to huddle inside during cold weather and thus be more likely to pass diseases to each other. If people are outside in the open it’s harder to pass a disease. (Hypothermia is usually only from extreme temperatures for extended periods or if you’re in water and thus conducting heat out your body).
For the vast majority of the country and for the vast majority of the days… The only downside to not wearing a coat is that it could potentially make you feel a little cold.
@mike808 @OnionSoup Amen! Same for catching a cold from being out in the rain! I tried to reason with my mom that colds are passed from people thru the cold virus but she would always freak out when I came in from the rain with wet hair! Bless her
@fjp999 @OnionSoup the cold virus doesn’t just exist only in people. It’s in the environment too.
Going from 20 degrees to 70 degrees and back puts stress on your lymphatic and immune systems, and it is that stress that gives opportunity to “catching” a cold instead of your immune system just fighting it off and your lymphatic system disposing of the remains.
Wearing weather-appropriate clothing doesn’t shock or put that temperature change stress on your body. Consciousness does not magically change 40,000 years of biology and evolution when we’ve only had written language for maybe a tenth of that.
@fjp999 @mike808 @OnionSoup So we should write our cold virus a letter?
The word ‘unprepared’ simply does not enter their consciousness.
My job as a parent is not to be my child’s friend, but to guide them in the transition into adulthood.
Parents don’t always get to be the ‘good cop’ bringing rainbows and lollipops. Life isn’t always happy fun mode.
@mike808 hehehe, yea, Serious Sam.
I agree Horsey Jane, my girls are 6 and 9 and they sometimes don’t want to wear coats, even on rainy days but I just tell them that I’m the mother and I say jackets are on AND zipped up otherwise they get loss of privileges.
@ScottishLeanne You could let them learn from experience.
Let them go outside without a coat and get cold. It’s not going to hurt them, but if it truly is cold they’ll learn to wear a coat next time and be more likely to listen to you next time
Because they suck, they are way too hot, and they are usually unnecessary. If they are old enough to walk to school they are old enough to zip up their coat and put on their hat and gloves if they get cold. They aren’t idiots and just because you’re cold doesn’t mean they are.
I can still remember my mom insisting on putting on a hat and the second I was outside that got thrown in a pile of snow if we were playing. How do you expect a kid playing or excerting energy to release heat.
How “cold” or how “hot” it is depends on adjusting to the temp and metabolism. 65 is hot to me during the winter inside. I usually prefer it around 55-60 in sweat pants/tshirt. I know people who would turn it up to 80. And still be “cold” in a sweater. Personally I think they are insane. Why would kids be any different? If your kid tells you they are too hot why would you assume it’s BS just because you’re cold?
@unksol Where were you last year when the op asked the question?
@therealjrn @unksol Lol. Yes, how did this get bumped to the front page. People will post to it now!
@Fuzzalini @unksol We should quit bumping this thread up!
@therealjrn @unksol Totally. So annoying this thread getting bumped.
@Fuzzalini @unksol Totally!
@Fuzzalini @therealjrn @unksol I don’t get why people keep bumping this thread up to the top.
@therealjrn if you review the thread @stolicat is the dirty necroposter. Replying to @Kidsandliz and @moondrake. Notice 21 hours ago vs my 18. That brought it to the front page. And in the midst of all the stupid zip/jacket threads I clicked the wrong one to whine on. Lol I invoke blame the goat
…
stolicat said 21 hours ago
@Kidsandliz @moondrake @stolicat @unksol Oh, perfectly understandable @stolicat! I just don’t understand how this thread keeps getting refreshed.
Because the kids are cooler without them. Literally.
I’m over 40 and people are still whining that I’m not wearing a coat. Get over it, it’s not that cold outside and I don’t want to wear a coat.
@OnionSoup They’re not the boss-ah-you.
If they wear a coat, no one can see the cool clothes they’re wearing.
I recall one time getting called into school for a conference because my 5th grade stepdaughter was showing up with a skirt, t-shirt, and no coat when it was 15 degrees outside. She was leaving the house with jeans, mittens, and a puffy winter coat, and taking them off at the bus stop and stuffing them into her backpack.
As I recall she also used up about an entire can of hairspray getting ready for school, the smell used to drift down the hallway through 2 closed doors and wake me up choking. Her hair was crunchy, and she could stand outside in the wind and it would not move, like a plastic hat or something.
Why would I wear a coat if it is 80 degrees outside?