Cool to Be Cold

Why do kids - mainly tweens and teens - find it so much more appealing to underdress, and shiver, than to simply dress appropriately for cold weather?

It's not like my kids don't have plenty of outerwear options to choose from. There's an entire closet filled with jackets, coats, scarves, gloves, hats, etc, varying in colors, formality, warmth, and style.

Yet my ten-year-old daughters were reluctant to wear jackets or coats, much less gloves, to school. Until last Thursday, when the weather turned cold enough that they couldn't stay warm during their running club with just a track suit and t-shirt on. Afterward, my daughter said: "My hands felt like they were holding an ice cube. And when the ice cube started to melt, they just picked up another." Her twin agreed.

Needless to say, they both dug out their winter coats & gloves the next morning.Yes!

But my eleven-year-old son is still wearing shorts to school. Despite the fact that there's frost on the ground! In Columbus, Ohio, yesterday, walking around outside in temps ranging from the mid-thirties to low-forties, all he wore over his short-sleeved shirt was a hoodie. Unzipped. He walked around shivering, but hey - at least he looked cool in his attire.

Or not.

I guess it's just one of those battles I have chosen not to fight. But I'm "not fighting" with gloves on. It's cold around here!