The last receipt, from the shoe shop, went into the jar on Wednesday, and the total for the whole uniform list came to £203.15. That is £15.75 more than last year's £187.40, and for once I know exactly where it went. Most of it is Isla's feet and Isla's legs.
She turned ten in June and has gone up a size every time I look away. She is a 5 in shoes now, which is only one size under mine, and she has moved out of the age ranges and into the adult sizes for trousers and PE kit. That means the pinafores are finished (her two went to Priya's daughter Anaya, who is delighted) and the supermarket school-trouser pairs are now women's size 8 at a slightly higher price than the age 9-10 ones were.
The list, item by item
- School shoes, measured in the shop: Isla's Clarks £54, Alfie's £42. Total £96.00
- Logo jumpers from the school's supplier at £13 each: two for Isla (a cardigan and a sweatshirt) and one for Alfie. Total £39.00
- One logo sweatshirt for Alfie from the PTA's preloved rail: £4.00
- Polo shirts from the supermarket: a five-pack for Isla (£9.00) and a five-pack for Alfie (£7.50). Total £16.50
- Trousers: two pairs for Isla at £9 each, and two two-packs for Alfie at £7. Total £32.00
- PE kit: Isla's shorts and T-shirt in adult XS (£7.00) and new shorts for Alfie (£2.65). Total £9.65
- Socks, two multipacks at £3 each: £6.00
That adds up to £203.15, and the jumper price hasn't moved since last year. The shoes did: last year it was £50 and £38, which is £88, and this year it's £96, so £8 of the £15.75 is just feet. The rest is the adult sizes. I haven't bought a book bag, because both survived the year with a safety pin and a bit of stitching on Alfie's strap.
What I'd do differently
I went into the shoe shop on Wednesday with a plan, which was to buy a size up for Alfie, until I remembered why I stopped doing that. He had blisters from a pair that were too big and a toe crease that wore through anyway. So he was measured, he is a size 12, and the assistant found a pair with about a thumb's width of room for £42. It's the second year running I've been talked out of a size up by Alfie's blisters.
The other mistake was buying Isla's trousers before she'd had a growth spurt that has apparently arrived in the last fortnight. I tried them on her on Thursday and the hems stop just above the ankle, in the way that makes a ten-year-old look like she's wading. The receipt is staying in the jar in case they need swapping for the next length, and I'll take them back on Monday if they still look like that.
What's going where
Everything outgrown has been sorted into piles. Isla's Year 5 trousers and polos go to Anaya, who gets all of Isla's outgrown clothes and says thank you in a voice I can only describe as ceremonial. Alfie's Year 1 trousers, the ones with the knee patches, go to the PTA's preloved rail, which takes donations on Fridays. Anything with a logo that is still good goes in a bag for the rail too, on the principle that the £4 sweatshirt Alfie is wearing this year came from someone else's cupboard.
Everything has been named with a laundry pen, which Alfie considers an act of surveillance. I wash the new polos once before they go on, because school polos straight from the packet have a smell and a stiffness that all of Year 2 will be able to detect. The new polos go on the line tomorrow morning if it's dry, and on the airer if it isn't, before the party. Term starts on Thursday 3 September, and tomorrow is Rob's 40th, so tonight the uniform is in a basket by the door and I am trying not to look at it.
The sums: £203.15 for two children, £187.40 last year, £15.75 more. Eight pounds of that is shoes, and the rest is a ten-year-old who is nearly my height.
