Grace's wardrobe choices

I've decided that next week I'm going to take a picture of what Grace wears to school each day of the week for posterity purposes ( and to show later on). Since she was very small ( like 2) she has had a DEFINITE opinion of what she wanted to wear. We ended up with 2 rules- (1) It has to be in season (2) It must fit modesty standards.Everything else goes, and I think these rules are pushed almost daily. My sister often says, "How can you let her leave the house that way?" I just say, "Hopefully by now, if people are familiar with Grace, they must figure out that she dressed herself, and I have no influence", and really its not worth the fight. We struggle about a billion other things, and I've decided this is not one I'm going to get totally invested in.

This week as we're into the second week of school, we are once again forging the oh so familiar territory of what is appropriate to wear to school. Now, things could be worse. I could be worrying about her wearing something that was showing too much skin etc. But, it seems that is not our problem. In fact, it might at times fall into the opposite category- of really bizarre combinations, and too many clothes. For example, here are a few from this last week-

Tuesday: I think Tuesday may have been semi normal
Wednesday: I went into Grace's room- now the temperature was a bit more chilly in the morning ( 50 degrees or so), but I assured her that it would warm up by noon to 75 at least, so dress accordingly. At that time she had on a pair of hot pink pants and shockingly a shirt that was short sleeved and actually matched. Fabulous! I thought to myself, maybe this year will be different. But, no, that lasted 2 seconds or less. - Because she was then laying out a shirt that was completely different than what she was wearing- and come to find out, she was planning to wear that shirt OVER the short sleeved one. I at this time recommended that she wear a light jacket or sweatshirt or something. Well, it turns out that was incorporated. As this conversation continued she got more upset because of course, I'm making comments about what she should wear, and this is an area that is really touchy-

Me: Why are you wearing that shirt on top of the short sleeved one, it will be warm enough today, just wear a sweatshirt. ( The 2nd layer shirt looked like this: it was pink and looked like a long sleeve V-necked shirt, but then it had a SATIN texture busy material sewn around the cuffs and neck to make it look like 2 shirts)

G: Helen wears 2 shirts, I can wear 2 shirts too.

ME: Helen does not even go to your school anymore, and I think that was in Preschool or Kindergarten, you are now in 2nd grade.

G: I don't care. I want to layer my shirts.

Me: Fine, but it may look a little silly, and you may get hot- ( I left the room, I'm obviously not winning this one)

Later she appears and of course she has on the short sleeved shirt, then the second layer of the "faux 2 shirt pink thing", and then on top of that, she is now wearing a bright hot pink sweatshirt that is zipped up all the way to the top. I think in an attempt to not show me how many shirts she was wearing. She also has added hot pink socks.... A bit over the top. I let it go, and she continued on her day.
After school- SHOCKER- she is only wearing the short sleeved shirt. Of course I asked if she was hot, and at what point in the day did she start to "unlayer" and take off the top 2 - I think the answer was sometime before lunch- which is at 11am.

THURSDAY: Today was the school picnic and back to school night- I of course also brought this up this morning. ( I just have to.. I'm a control freak- and I swear she knows that not wearing matching clothes drives me completely CRAZY!)

After some deliberation, she comes out in a long sleeved pink sweater-type shirt, and hot pink ( again!) shorts that look kind of like "gym" shorts- they aren't really tailored, and they have a bit of a rough edge at the hem. They also go down to her knees and tie at the waist. In addition to this wonderful combo, she has also added a pair of knee high socks that are bright hot pink/pink striped. Another odd combination, but I didn't really say anything because I was thrilled she was only wearing 1 shirt.

I also hope at this point that its obvious that I don't have any influence. Pictures should be entertaining next week if its our typical wardrobe.