Sometimes I wonder if there’s ever a time in life where my style preferences will be perfectly aligned with my budget. So far, they have been deeply, deeply misaligned… especially now that we have three kids. When it was just Evie, I would buy her a $100 holiday outfit without blinking (okay maybe I would blink a couple times). I would always tell John it was $50. These days I am having to get more creative about how I afford my taste.

My favorite brands for babies are Kissy Kissy, Little English, Pixie Lily, Nella Pima, and Magnolia Baby to name a few. Their styles are so delicate - mostly neutral and pastels - and when you put them on your baby it just reinforces that they’re a delicate little snuggly bear. However (!!) most of their footies and jammies are $30--$50+ and while I definitely splurge on at least one nice pair of footies to bring the baby home in, I can’t justify buying everything from these brands because the cost is astronomical.

This gives you an example of items from these brands that I love. Just so you’re aware, I’m eligible for a commish on everything that’s linked. No cost to you :)

Lux Baby Clothes

When the kids are old enough to have an opinion, they can wear whatever the hell they want. If you don’t believe me, re-watch some of my Instagram stories and look at the insane things my kids wear today. But when they’re babies, mom gets to call the shots!

Unfortunately, the stores that are most affordable are also the stores that tend to have clothing that don’t really fit into my style guide. However, I have actually gotten pretty good at finding things from these affordable stores that are close to the look that I love about the baby clothes featured above. What you’ll notice from this brief little snapshot: no loud colors, dainty patterns, no dinosaurs or alligators, small florals for the girls. That is my checklist when I am looking for cute clothes for my kids.

Lacey’s Rules for Baby Clothes

So I am a reformed Sad Beige Mom when it comes to girls clothes - I am all in on pink, purple, rainbow, glitter, unicorns, etc. For boy clothes, I am getting there slowly but surely but still love to buy the things that at least look like they might be from a boutique and not Walmart (although Walmart has some good stuff these days…). To accomplish this, I only have two rules for finding higher-end-looking baby clothes at lower-end prices: 1) solid pastel colors, 2) dainty designs (no large-scale applique or whatever you call them, nothing bigger than a thumbnail for me), 3) no dinosaurs, 4) cotton, bamboo, or knit if you can (I verrrrry rarely buy clothes from Amazon or Temu-type stores).

I’m kind of insane so some of these rules take on a life of their own when I’m shopping. For example, my kids own very little clothing in loud colors like red or yellow. A burnt orange, maybe, a soft yellow, sure, but I would really struggle to find a piece of red clothing that isn’t sports (UGA)-related. Stripes are okay with me as long as they are thin stripes. Thick stripes are generally a no unless they give off a Nantucket-y vibe. See what I mean? I’m crazy. I’m also not really into black or orange but maybe because all of us are ridiculously pale and those colors would never do anything for us.

McFam Approved Baby Clothes

This post will be focused on baby clothes and I’ll circle back to toddler. I don’t know about y’all but when my kids are babies they spend 99% of their time in footies or other types of pajamas, so you’ll definitely be seeing a lot of those throughout. Again, the inspiration for these choices are what you see above with the higher-end brands. Solid colors, pastels, dainty designs. So let’s get into it.

Shopping at Carter’s

Shopping at Little Me

This is one of my best-kept secrets that I’ll tell you as long as you don’t tell anyone else. Kissy Kissy has a sister brand - Little Me. A lot of overlap in the styles (although the colors are just a tad bold for my pastel wishlist) but at a fraction of the price. Here are some recent favorites I know you’ll recognize because it’s all Mills wears. Now I’m not saying all of these patterns fit 100% on my wishlist but I think there are some great pieces and some great knit items for $25! That can’t be beat.