Shopping for fancy dress -- Contributor post

I’ve known about my husband’s office holiday party since early November. It’s at a swanky downtown hotel. The invitation specifies semiformal dress.

I translates this as “suit and tie” for him and “cocktail attire” for me.

I’m going to throw up.



Me: Short, postmenopausal round with chubby retail feet and roadmaps for legs. My hair is streaked gray. I’m starting to jowl.

Wardrobe: Work uniform, jeans, t-shirts in the summer and long-sleeved t-shirts or turtlenecks in the winter, hoodies, sneakers. I usually pull my hair back with a clippie. I always wear fake gold hoop earrings because I tend to lose anything that’s real.

A few years ago, at my husband’s urging, I splurged on two “just in case” outfits – two tweed jackets, two matching tops, two pairs of matching pants, two pairs of matching shoes. I haven’t worn any of them in over a year, maybe two.

Clothing makes me anxious. Oh, I can window shop and say that X is cute or that’s a really nice cut/design/color, but you have no idea how anxious it makes me. I can’t afford nor can wear most off-the-rack clothing with any kind of panache. Younger overweight me’s vomit-inducting body anxiety eventually exchanged itself for full-blown panic attacks in the middle of our local mall or refusing to attend whatever-it-was because I needed this particular item and I didn’t want to spend the money or admit that I was THAT size.

I’m nowhere near as overweight now but the anxiety still clings. Nowadays I treat clothes shopping as a military mission. Browsing makes me anxious because what’s the use of browsing if most clothing, nice clothing, doesn’t fit you, especially if you have a disappearing waistline?

Jeans, t-shirts, sneakers. It’s easy and I don’t have to think about it.



So back to this holiday party. One day my husband and our housemate tag with me to Expensive Department Store With The Widest Selection Of Evening Wear.

I’m automatically drawn to the sleek uncluttered dresses made for six-foot stringbeans crooning standards in a Las Vegas nightclub.

They steer me toward the separates. “You’re smaller on top than the bottom,” my husband whispers.

“The trouble with tops,” says our housemate, “is that they’ll fit her at the waist but the shoulders will be too big, or vice versa.” She picks out several spangled tops and sends me into the dressing room.

This makes me feel like a sausage. Hate the color. Too low cut. I’d need a strapless bra (ack, MONEY) to wear this, Spanx (SPANX? ME?!?) to wear that. Too tight, too short-waisted, I’m swimming in this, too tight…

I feel queasy and sit down.

An hour later I’m staring at the floor trying not to cry, piles of shiny sequined bedazzled fabric at my feet.



They eventually find a top while I stare at the floor: It’s an explosion of rich red lace with beribboned roses sprinkled with small red sequins here and there. My husband knocks on the dressing room door and hands it to me.

Oh god no, it looks like something my GRANDMA would wear! No…wait a minute, it’s got some give. Oh, OK, it’s not THAT low cut. Three-quarter sleeves, narrow black ribbon makes it sort of peplum which means it’d give me waist, maybe? Hmm.

I slide it on and peek at myself in the mirror.

Ohhh, I LOVE this color! It’s not too low cut. It’s…holy crap, I HAVE A WAIST! OK, the shoulders are a little big, but maybe…if I pull it down like this maybe?

I keep gazing at my reflection as I turn one way, then the other. I don’t hear our housemate knocking at the door. She exclaims in delight and leads me out so my husband can see. He beams.

Suddenly my mouth feels very dry because OMG, I actually own a bona-fide evening-type fancy top…|ME?!?!?





Then there’s the tale of the skirt for this top, but I’ll save that for another time.



...

Kathi Bourke is a guest contributor on Parentwin.

Just Alike

On the average day, we get a lot of this: "They're close in age, aren't they?" or "Are they twins?"

I'm always a bit confused at this, since, to me, they're obviously twins, identical at that. I'll answer with a "Yup, just a minute apart," or "Yes, they are!" and the conversation goes from there, usually in normal adult tones at a normal adult sound level.

Yesterday, we got this: "Oh, look at the twins! They are so cute! How amazing! You are so lucky! Wow!" Louder than usual. In a higher pitch. More excitedly.

Why?

On the average day, we look like this:

Yesterday, we looked like this:

I don't often dress my kids identically. Even yesterday, as you can see, their shorts are different. There's something about identical wear I just don't really take to. I'll often buy them the same make of clothing, in different colors and patterns. That way, they're similar (which helps with clothing fights in the morning), but they're not the same.

Still, identical wear has many advantages. Many times, even if it's the same dress or shorts, the twins want the opposite color. They want whatever the other one has. The other one responds by clinging to that article of clothing, even if moments before they wanted what the other one had. This leaves us with one garment highly sought after and the other disdainfully tossed to the side. They still wear it, but they're aren't happy about it.

On a less practical note, it allows strangers to do the gushing they're wont to do without having to check themselves in doubt first. This opens us all up to a jubilation I don't quite know what to do with.  Babies are always fawned over, but, at almost three, my kids are well past the "aww, isn't she cute" phase. Twins, it seems, are a novelty forever. At least until three, anyway.

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Kids' Fashion: Deep as Any Paper Plate

I love fashion.  I follow several fashion blogs and shake my head at the unique and cutting-edge styles on the runway and in the celebrity world.  In fact, my high school prophecy was that I would grow up to be a fashion designer.  To which I laugh out loud since I don't have much fashion sense of my own.  But my lack of vision when it comes to putting outfits together is not why my kids consistently look ridiculous.  My kids consistently look ridiculous because they're kids.

When I first became a stay at home mom, I thought, yes! Now I will dress my babies in the cute wear that is available to them!  I thought that until the first $100 spent at Target and Baby Gap.  So reason number one my children look ridiculous?  Money.  I have two 2-year-old girls to dress every day, and they go through about three outfits a day. We would have to be pulling in a lot more money in order for me to have at my disposal six cute, stylish, matching, magazine-worthy outfits a day.  Instead, I get things as I can on sale.  We rely a lot of gifts from family members, who aren't particularly fashionable themselves (my mom has gifted us several sturdy and well-made outfits...flowered shirts with striped pants in purple and green, for instance).  My cousins and aunts have been kind enough to give us their hand-me-downs.  But most of their children grew up several years ago, back when rompers and cartoon characters were in style.  Perfectly good clothing with a lot of wear left in them. My children, being two, don't really mind.

Jackets: A gift from my mother.  Possible the babies' favorite articles of clothing.  I don't get it either.

The second reason my kids look ridiculous is that they grow.  They grow like they're little weeds.  Just three months ago, they fit easily into a 2T, and they could still squeeze into 24m wear.  I bought them new 3T nighties the other day.  They were too small.  I feel like jazzy, adorable outfits would be wasted on the two times the twins get to wear them before they are too small, and I have to give them away.

Vest: Gift from their uncle. Too small in this picture. She's wearing it because she asked for it.

The third reason I don't bother dressing my children like child-stars is that they are messy.  They don't wear three outfits a day because I love to change them.  I can't justify $25 baby jeans that are just going to sit in a pile on the living room floor as the babies run around pantless all morning.  I can't bring myself to buy a $40 or even a $20 white sweater that the kids will inevitably spill grape juice on...the first time they wear it.

Infamous Pooh romper: Hand-me-down from her aunt. One of her favorite outfits.

The biggest reason my babies look silly almost all the time is that I let them help me pick out their clothes.  They are old enough now to know what they would like to wear, even if they're far from knowing whether or not it matches.  I love watching them pick out a particular article of clothing and then get excited to wear it.  Even if it's this one:

Gift from my mother in law. It was a favorite from when it was this big on her until it finally got too small.

All that being said, being a fashion lover, myself, I truly appreciate a well-dressed toddler.  I just don't have any.

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Love is a Battlefield

Waking up each morning, I know that my day is going to go exactly how two little creatures decide it will go.  The tone is set the moment I walk into the room.  Each day it's a new game of logistical prowess.  Can I get them dressed and ready with no breakdowns?  Can I outwit their cranky tendencies and keep them interested in things that are fun?  Or will I be dragged down by petty fights, whining, crying and frivolous attack?  It's a toss up.

Getting dressed determines the day. I have learned the hard way that what might seem an innocuous request for a different jacket or pair of socks is really a trap.  I no longer give them options.  They cannot handle options.  And since we have very few exactly matching outfits, I will almost never win the "choose which shirt you want to wear" game.

Having twins, I feel like the daily battles I fight must surely differ from that of parents of singletons or children spaced apart.  They may have different, equally antagonizing behavior, but having twins must present its own unique set of fights and problems.

Without further ado, I give you my morning:

"Good morning, babies!"

Whargaarble.  Oh, great, one of those days.

Natalina pipes up.  "Ojoon jacket."  Seems reasonable, except that we only have one orange jacket, and Dulce always wears it.

"Yeah," Dulce agrees.  "Ojoon jacket."

"Okay," I say, making a rookie mistake.  "Dulce will get the orange jacket and you can wear the pink jacket you always wear when Dulce wears the orange jacket."

Tears and tantrums.  No, I think.  We are not doing this today.  Not to mention, I'd already picked out the polka dotted outfits.




I think they finally broke my camera. Sorry for the low quality.


I tell them there will be no orange jacket today.  Perhaps tomorrow.  Today we are wearing the dots.  I attempt to dress Dulce first.  She usually wears the white.  Natalina, however, decides that today she wants the white.  Tears and tantrums.

Thankfully, Dulce is still caught up in the orange jacket desire.  I sate her with an orange shirt, and for some heavenly reason, she decides not to fight for the white polka dots.  I quickly switch the outfits with a sleight-of-hand skill I picked up when they turned about a year.  Everything goes swimmingly for about two minutes while I dress Natalina.

Then she realizes that Dulce is getting the guitar underwear.  This is my mistake.  Natalina usually gets the guitar underwear, but, remember, I'd switched the outfits.  I have to be strong and sternly tell her that she cannot have the guitar underwear today, even though I feel bad since it's my error.  If I attempted to make it right, I would have opened a can of worms from which there was no going back.  This one would want those pants, the other would want something from the closet, and it would all end in an inferno of wailing and screaming over no good reason.

Luckily, Natalina grudgingly accepted her guitarless fate, but started fights over Dulce's lovey.  Then Dulce stole Natalina's strawberry.  Then one of them got hit by the other one.  A group hug on the couch before Natalina breaks away and hides in her room, shutting the door on Dulce, causing pandemonium.  Dulce steals Natalina's fruit fork and puts it in the trash.

"Mama, my fork! Mine. Mine!  Mama!"

They have been awake for two hours, and, really, this morning could have gone much worse.  I feel quite talented for having avoided even more tantrums, even more extreme reactions.  Still, if I hear "mine" one more time today, I may not make it.

Good morning, babies!

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Toddler Tricks - 24

Ways to Trick your Baby:

Problem: Your kids throw a fit over whatever outift you pick out for them in the morning.  They will resist you, whine, cry, and run away.  If you have twins, they'll most often want whatever the other one has while simultaneously clinging to their own outfit.  But they can't wear two outfits.  Their demands are illogical.  You simply cannot wear two shirts, three socks and no pants.  How do you start the day right?

Solution:  Give them choices, but not too many choices.  This should be easier with a singleton because you won't have to deal with outfit envy as you're only dressing on child.  Give them two pairs of pants to choose from, two shirts, two socks, that's it.  Yesterday, in fact, the outfits I picked out were insufficient on their own.  In order to truly shine, one twin had to wear the pants of one, and the other the shirt.

Ways your Baby Can Trick You:

Problem:  No matter what choices you give your kids, it's not good enough.  They demand to go into their closet and ruin it while picking out three shirts and a hat.  Then they demand you find a way to help them wear all three shirts and the hat...on their arm.  Then they're mad at you because you won't let them go outside without pants.  It's an interesting world we live in here.

Solution:  Don't do it.  If they refuse to accept their clothing choices, it's time for a little tough love.  Because giving in to them here will only cause crazy mornings and forever unsatisfied babies.  They just don't know what they want.  So, what I do is compromise, like I did above, mixing and matching, so that no one twin feels like they got the short end of the stick.  If they're still upset, I repeat to them over and over how they'll have something different tomorrow.  If they mention a specific piece of clothing, I do not give it to them that morning (I've found they'll only change their minds).  I tell them I will pick it out for them to wear tomorrow.  This usually gets us out of the bedroom in a fairly good mood with no one feeling particularly slighted.



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