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http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Carine_Nadel
Friday, April 02, 2010
Here's my story about a very worthwhile joint Mother's Day event here in OC's The Senior Reporter. It features Leeza Gibbons and Nancy Jackson:
http://www.sunset-publishing.com/issues/April-2010-autry.PDF
http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Carine_Nadel
http://www.sunset-publishing.com/issues/April-2010-autry.PDF
Shopping, ick
Sigh. I had to do it. I hated absolutely every single second of it too. I’m also pretty darn sure Steve hated it as well. But I felt it was only fair he be a part of the process-after all I went and did it with him.
I had to go shopping.
If you’ve read any of my blogs-you know that I really hate shopping.
But what’s a Mother of the Groom supposed to do? Attend her baby boy’s wedding in a denim sundress from about 12 years ago?
No, I have to save that for the “grandma” cruise I leave on the next day.
Thank you to my rotten thyroid for at least making sure that somehow I never change size enough to warrant throwing out my retro clothing.
Except for this-I had to go look for a dress. Nothing in my worn out repertoire of pre-1990 outfits were going to “pass muster”.
Sigh.
When hubby went-he saw an ad in the paper for a suit on sale for $100. He went in and found his size, put it on and he looked as if it were tailor made for him. We found a nice matching shirt and tie and shoes. All on sale. Almost a match for the groomsmen tuxes.
We were done in less than an hour.
Now me, lordy, lordy, lordy.
I started out going to SteinMart. No size 4’s. So I decided to try a few of the possible size 6’s, figuring they might be cut “small”.
It was awful.
Bear in mind that I’ve been having issues with a pinched nerve in my neck and the weakness in my hand and flares in my rotator cuffs. You are probably seeing that not only was the idea of shopping repugnant-it was downright painfully blinding.
So we left SteinMart, moved on to TJMaxx, Ross, Nordstrom Rack, Loehmann’s, Ann Taylor and Ann Taylor Loft, Anthropologie, Macy’s, Express, Limited, Cache and then the regular Nordstrom’s.
It was there that a wonderful, patient young woman named Lindsay came up and greeted us and asked if I needed help.
I told her what my needs were: appropriate dress for a morning wedding/reception in the desert. Preferably nothing “loud”, under $150 and something that I wouldn’t look either matronly in or have people laughing at me wondering what I was thinking when I put it on.
At this point, I could barely use the weak hand, I was literally nauseous from the pinched nerve and I’m pretty sure Steve looked as if he were in H-E-double hockey sticks.
Lindsay brought be 15 dresses. Which one by one were being either totally rejected or put in the “well if nothing else comes along” pile.
After all this it was down to 2 dresses. One had all the right colors, but looked more like a dress you’d wear to a job interview (which at this point had some merit to it) and the other had the style and fit I was looking for-with a caveat.
The caveat? The color yellow. It has a very nice fitted top with a nice deep vee neck in the front and a scoop in the back. The waist is nicely fitted and the skirt is perfect for comfort and hiding hips. It has a nice cream color in the background with the browns of the wedding colors, some black and then-yellow flowers.
Yellow? Come on manufacturers-would it have killed you to make this same dress with maybe the same material but with some beige flowers? Or even red or deep burgundy????
But no, just yellow. Lindsay brought over a little black short-sleeved sweater. It did help draw the attention up to the top of the dress where there was less of the offensive color.
I decided the fit was good, the sweater helped immensely and I’d better buy it before I died of pain and Steve left me for the woman who tried on two dresses and bought them both in 10 minutes.
This would be my “back up”-in case I really couldn’t find anything else.
A few days later I was spending the day with the soon to be newlyweds and they very kindly went shopping with me to see if they could help in the search. We wound up at Black Market/White House.
Found 2 possibilities! But one looked more appropriate for a luau or for a casual night on the cruise and the other was a nice pair of dress pants with a lovely top-that of course would have only fit me if I suddenly grew about 5 inches.
Since we were near the Nordstrom’s-I took them over and showed them the dress. They both agreed it looked better than the umpteen outfits I had just tried.
After seeing it again on the mannequin, I decided the yellow isn’t too bad and it won’t make me look too peaked.
The good part of the dress is that it fits, some of the wedding colors are in there and I do like the way it feels.
Sigh-now I have to go look for comfortable and cute shoes. Piffle.
I had to go shopping.
If you’ve read any of my blogs-you know that I really hate shopping.
But what’s a Mother of the Groom supposed to do? Attend her baby boy’s wedding in a denim sundress from about 12 years ago?
No, I have to save that for the “grandma” cruise I leave on the next day.
Thank you to my rotten thyroid for at least making sure that somehow I never change size enough to warrant throwing out my retro clothing.
Except for this-I had to go look for a dress. Nothing in my worn out repertoire of pre-1990 outfits were going to “pass muster”.
Sigh.
When hubby went-he saw an ad in the paper for a suit on sale for $100. He went in and found his size, put it on and he looked as if it were tailor made for him. We found a nice matching shirt and tie and shoes. All on sale. Almost a match for the groomsmen tuxes.
We were done in less than an hour.
Now me, lordy, lordy, lordy.
I started out going to SteinMart. No size 4’s. So I decided to try a few of the possible size 6’s, figuring they might be cut “small”.
It was awful.
Bear in mind that I’ve been having issues with a pinched nerve in my neck and the weakness in my hand and flares in my rotator cuffs. You are probably seeing that not only was the idea of shopping repugnant-it was downright painfully blinding.
So we left SteinMart, moved on to TJMaxx, Ross, Nordstrom Rack, Loehmann’s, Ann Taylor and Ann Taylor Loft, Anthropologie, Macy’s, Express, Limited, Cache and then the regular Nordstrom’s.
It was there that a wonderful, patient young woman named Lindsay came up and greeted us and asked if I needed help.
I told her what my needs were: appropriate dress for a morning wedding/reception in the desert. Preferably nothing “loud”, under $150 and something that I wouldn’t look either matronly in or have people laughing at me wondering what I was thinking when I put it on.
At this point, I could barely use the weak hand, I was literally nauseous from the pinched nerve and I’m pretty sure Steve looked as if he were in H-E-double hockey sticks.
Lindsay brought be 15 dresses. Which one by one were being either totally rejected or put in the “well if nothing else comes along” pile.
After all this it was down to 2 dresses. One had all the right colors, but looked more like a dress you’d wear to a job interview (which at this point had some merit to it) and the other had the style and fit I was looking for-with a caveat.
The caveat? The color yellow. It has a very nice fitted top with a nice deep vee neck in the front and a scoop in the back. The waist is nicely fitted and the skirt is perfect for comfort and hiding hips. It has a nice cream color in the background with the browns of the wedding colors, some black and then-yellow flowers.
Yellow? Come on manufacturers-would it have killed you to make this same dress with maybe the same material but with some beige flowers? Or even red or deep burgundy????
But no, just yellow. Lindsay brought over a little black short-sleeved sweater. It did help draw the attention up to the top of the dress where there was less of the offensive color.
I decided the fit was good, the sweater helped immensely and I’d better buy it before I died of pain and Steve left me for the woman who tried on two dresses and bought them both in 10 minutes.
This would be my “back up”-in case I really couldn’t find anything else.
A few days later I was spending the day with the soon to be newlyweds and they very kindly went shopping with me to see if they could help in the search. We wound up at Black Market/White House.
Found 2 possibilities! But one looked more appropriate for a luau or for a casual night on the cruise and the other was a nice pair of dress pants with a lovely top-that of course would have only fit me if I suddenly grew about 5 inches.
Since we were near the Nordstrom’s-I took them over and showed them the dress. They both agreed it looked better than the umpteen outfits I had just tried.
After seeing it again on the mannequin, I decided the yellow isn’t too bad and it won’t make me look too peaked.
The good part of the dress is that it fits, some of the wedding colors are in there and I do like the way it feels.
Sigh-now I have to go look for comfortable and cute shoes. Piffle.
