I have plenty of baby clothes, how do I keep my family from buying more?
Monday, July 26th, 2010 at
5:44 am
I have plenty of baby clothes and still need a lot of other things…I have a registry at Target and Walmart, but am afraid that people won’t see what we really need and will just go out and buy the typical baby shower gift—clothes. How do I just get them to get the items that we still need?
Thanks!! All of the answers really did help and gave me a really good idea as to what to do. 
Filed under: Baby Clothes
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Usually people are really good at giving gifts with gift receipts so hopefully you can return the ones you don’t want. Also many places take back baby clothes with tags even without receipts and then give you store credit. I had people tell me that it was too boring to buy off my registry so they would just buy clothes. I just try to think that my baby was very loved and I could get all the "boring" stuff on my own with gift cards. The other thing I did was use outfits almost as bibs – just let them get dirty during feedings! Then I could play dress up
All you can do is make a registry, but it doesn’t ensure people stick to it. I think it would be rude to actually tell them what to get you, so just let them get what they’re going to get, keep your fingers crossed for things you need & you can always return the things you didn’t want.
I feel the same way! The only way I think is through word of mouth, just tell your family members and close friends to spread the word if people ask what to get you, but be sure not to sound pushy about it. and you can return a lot these days too. good luck.
Ask them for vouchers or money instead of gifts that way you can get what you really need – people usually prefer honesty
I was the same way with this pregnancy. I had TOO many clothes with my daughter, some she never even got to wear. I am having 2 girls and a 1 boy this time but I was given clothes earlier and still have too many clothes, both boys and girls!
I told my close family members I did not need clothes and they kind of spread that around even though I still got tons of clothes at my shower this time. SO I finally just loaded all the clothes back up and took them back and exchanged them for things I did need.
Well if they give you clothes and other things you dont need you can just get them all together and take them back and get something you do need. Let everyone know to get a gift receipt. You could also just tell them that you have all the clothes already and that the things on your registry are the most important things you need.
My mother and MIL are rediculous when it comes to clothes buying…when i hit the max of baby clothes I told them. I then told them if they really wanted to continue buying clothes to move up to the next size. I sware I had clothes for my kids until almost a year old.
Like I said they are rediculous when it comes to buying clothes….granted 1/2 were 2nd hand but they looked brand new!
I had registries and I told everyone if they wanted to buy clothes, please buy bigger sizes. Only a few people listened to me. Target and Walmart are pretty generous with exchanges though. I ended up with a lot more newborn things then I wanted or needed. If it was from someone I knew I wouldn’t see very often, I had no problem exchanging the items. I also lived next to an outlet mall that had a Carter’s outlet.
If the items are regular Carter’s and not "Just One Year " or the other special Carter’s brand, ( I can’t remember what the name is) they will do the exchange without a receipt as long as the tags are still attached.
Really you can just keep being polite and drop several huge hints to everyone when talking about your shower and your registry. "I’m so excited about my shower, I really hope people uses my registry. We have so many clothes, what I really need is…."
Congratulations on your new baby!
What I did was just tell my mother in law that we had plenty of clothes and ask her if she could spread the word that we had enough clothes and we needed other things. So, she took the job and was willing to ask people politely to not buy us clothes.