For Better or For Worse by Lynn Johnston for August 23, 2021

typical, no?

Liz, to get unsupervised shopping privileges you need to demonstrate while supervised that you can make the choices that Mom wants made. Once you have earned that chance you need to keep demonstrating it so that you can keep the option. By Jr. High, Mom decided that she could trust my judgement when clothes shopping and let me do it alone knowing that I would not pick out something that was not suitable for those places that I needed to go. While I was spending my own earnings she knew that I would not waste them.

Your mom wants you to have clothes you have to ware out, Not clothes that are already worn out.

Candace is coming

Lizzy, one day you’ll appreciate the value of function and durability over fashion.

Well, it is HER money, Liz. She gets to decide what to buy for you. When you are older, you can get a job and buy clothes you want to wear.

This is great, and so real too life, love your strip Lynn.

Most of the comments above prove that the readers of For Better or For Worse are much more older people than teenagers, who probably don’t understand today’s punchline.

I used to love going back-to-school with my mother. However, I’ve only ever taken my older daughter back-to-school shopping once: for Kindergarten. After that, her Godmother has taken her – AND her younger sister – every year! And I’m talking the whole shebang: lunchboxes, backpacks, pens, pencils, notebooks, binders, clothes (including special First Day clothes)…everything. Oh, and her taste in clothes makes me AND the girls happy.

It’s a very delicate age…

I had the misfortune of having a mother who bought clothes to last. She never took me shopping. I simply got the clothes she bought 10 years earlier that were still in good shape because my brothers hadn’t worn them out. All my pictures have me dressed like the Brady Bunch kids. Unfortunately those pictures date from the late 1980’s, not the early 1970’s.

I have the pleasure this week of taking my two granddaughters out to lunch and then shopping for back-to-school clothes (on separate days, of course). It is a task/pleasure started by their late grandmother, so I am keeping the tradition alive. The oldest, 15, is a fashionista (expensively ripped apparel), and the youngest, 12, is athletic and requires clothes that allow movement. It should be a blast!

Going through that now with the youngest. Don’t blame her.

I was a professional seamstress when my daughter was in school in the 80’s. Most of her clothes were one-of-a kind and she got me customers from school, including teachers.

Why clothes that last and last? She’ll just outgrow them. I have loved fashion since an early age. We dressed modestly in those days, so dress codes were easy. We did have to wear skirts and dresses in public school. My mom was great with back to school shopping. We went to Penny’s.

Though I understand the pushback, this is why I like school uniforms. Good ones are durable and you only need enough shirts for the week. Far less crap clothes, far less fuss.

Haha…My friend got a call from the school one day that his daughter was being sent home for violating school dress code by wearing some skimpy outfit. He realized later that she changed into it after she got to the school since she was properly dressed when she left the house

I finally gave in and gave my daughter the amount I was gonna spend on her and let her go buy her own clothes. she returned with practical clothes and an awe at how much the things she thought she just had to have cost. was the best decision I made that day and has translated over the years

And she’s going to come back with the awfullest clothes that Elly will make her take back…

Lynne, I am so thoroughly enjoying the “revamp” of your comic. What a great idea. Thanks so much

The start of school bring teen issues?

Who will wear them?

Just let your Mom shop for you. If she guesses right you’re a fashion icon, if she guesses wrong, it’s her fault.

I hated shopping with my mother. She wasn’t so much into the “won’t wear out, practical” stuff as she was trying to get me to like exactly what she did. She loved paisley. I still hate it, and that’s probably why.

My wife used to take the grandkids school shopping every year. It was fun for her. As they grew older, she let them pick out their own outfits. Prior to that she made suggestions.

I started shopping for my back to school clothes when I was about 13 years old. I knew what mom would approve of and the costs, and I did even better by buying in the bargain basements of the big stores. She was more than pleased, enough that she gave me a letter of approval so that I could charge future purchases to her account. (back in the day of charge accounts, and not credit cards). It was very liberating. My older sister got her chance, but completely botched it by buying silly, expensive things and mom didn’t let her shop alone again, not until it was her own money.

WELCOME TO REAL LIFE, HELLY PATTERSON!

Have you not realized by now that Liz is not your personal Barbie Doll!? She has a brain, a sense of fashion(which we all know YOU are lacking), and a desire to decide for herself! Nobody in their right mind cares what YOU want!

i remember taking my step-daughter and she wanted a pair of Guess jeans so bad, this was in the 8o’s. i broke down and got them for her long with some other items. they were $50, more than i have paid for any of my jeans. when her dad and i saw her a couple days later we were informed she was sent home form school because she had sliced them where you could see her underwear…….lesson learned!!!!!

You can’t shop by yourself, Elizabeth, you need a friend along to tell you what you like.

My oldest sister used to drive my mother nuts over clothes shopping. She used to tell how she and dad took her out every night for a week trying to find a dress for her grade school graduation. Dad finally took her alone and she found a dress she liked right away. Mom just started giving her the money and let her shop alone. Luckily all of us went to Catholic school so it was strictly uniforms for school.

Had fun at the END of my senior year. There weren’t any more classes for seniors, and we were bored, so my friend and I wore tank tops so that we’d get sent home. The principal t1old us, of course, to change clothes and come back to school. We went to the friend’s house to goof around and had no intention of going back to school. The principal called to ask why we hadn’t returned, and my friend pretended to be her mother. The principal knew she wasn’t, but she kept insisting she was and that we weren’t there, so there was nothing he could do!

Sounds like a good argument for school uniforms.