Mini Harajuku Girl

my mini harajuku kids

When I see pictures of myself as a kid, I laugh at some of the outfits my mom dressed me in. Both of my kids are very opinionated about what they wear and won’t let me dress them. I shop for their clothes at the usual places: Target, Old Navy, GapKids, H&M, and occasionally the sale rack at Nordstroms, where I can find my favorite kid clothing brand, Tea Collection, at a discount. I also love going to the Splendid/Ella Moss outlet store to get cute and comfy cotton basics for the kids, and myself too. I buy clothes for them that I think are cute, but when I bring them home, my kids tell me to send most of it back. Thank goodness for good return policies. Sometimes I take them shopping with me and let them choose. They’re very particular about what they like, which is good because they like less stuff and, in turn, I buy less. I’ll point out a shirt that I like, and they will reject it and choose the last thing I would ever buy in the store. I usually indulge them, otherwise they wouldn’t have any clothes to wear. Now that they’re old enough to dress themselves, they get to choose their outfits everyday. This usually results in very creative ensembles. When my kids grow up and are embarassed by some of the outfits they wore, they can’t blame me.

Last year, my daughter was in her Hello Kitty phase. Like most Asian girls, she loves Hello Kitty (OK, I might have encouraged this a little). But she took her love to another level of obsession. She’d only wear clothes that had Hello Kitty on it, so she wore Hello Kitty from head-to-toe. This resulted in some ridiculous looking outfits.

My daughter is turning out to be quite the girly girl (I was a tomboy growing up). She likes princess dresses, tutus and tiaras just like the next girl, but she has a special affinity for animal prints and bright colors. At first I thought it was a funny joke to get leopard print jeggings for my toddler. Then, my daughter fell in love with her “cheetah” pants and can’t get enough wild animal prints: tiger, zebra, giraffe and leopard are all her favorites.

Recently, I found these shoes at H&M which combined all of her loves into one: bright colors, zebra and leopard print. She loves them and wears them everyday now. They’re so outrageous, I kind of wish they made them in my size. 😉