Winter Is Coming

Our winter stash so far. 

Every few months I have to pull inventory on the clothes hoard that grows in the ladies' closet. Like every other mother perusing the aisle of target, I pick apart the clearance section at the end of every season. However this year promises to be our very last in the toddler section and since I'm not a fan of the little slut section, I grabbed everything I could get my hands on! Hopefully no one has a major growth spurt!!

So for my own record keeping:

19 Long Sleeve Tops (cringe at odd numbers)

8 Sweaters & Hoodies

1 Sweater Dress

4 Pair of Jeans (<-- Yikes!)

2 Pair of Tights

2 Pair of Fashion Boots

2 Pair of Winter Crocs [who else felt Rebecca cringe?]

It just occurred to me that my children a.) cannot tie shoes and b.) have never had the need. Mom fail. 

I have also started a bag of clothes for the following winter, but jeeze! It's soooo hard to shop in the girls section. Maybe it will be easier when I see them with older kids? I'm so not a fan of this growing up business. 

How far ahead do you buy? 

In The Basket

For the first time in their four short years my ladies are prepared for the coming fall! 

First. Time. Ever. 

It is even washed and sorted, ready to be switched over. Miracle!!

So yes I most certainly am giving myself a pat on the back. This was a major feat. Not because I was shopping for two, or with two, or even because of cost because this mama refuses to pay full price. Clothes shopping literally gives me anxiety. I'm terrible at matching clothes together and I get caught up with buying complementary and not completely matching clothing. There are unspoken rules in my head about only buying in pairs, I have to be fair! Now that the ladies are a bit older they have developed tiny styles of their own and this only adds to my anxiety. Claire loves skirts and dresses, but what can I buy Em to compliment? 

This year I took a different approach and encouraged their involvement-scary stuff! Four year olds picking their own clothes! It was great for me because I either approved and found a mate for it to comply with my pair rule, or flat out refused. I didn't have to choose. And thanks to the ladies understanding of numbers and Tarjay's freshly marked summer clearance, we were able to score an entire summer play wardrobe for next summer!

Ignore my unmade bed. 

However it also left me horribly anxious! I am face to face with the GIRLS DEPARTMENT. Oh. Em. Gee.

Tell me I'm not alone!!

Hopefully this year clothing becomes drastically less mature and suggestive. There has to be something on the clearance racks for me next year. But just incase I have a case of burlap sacks sitting next to my sewing machine. ;)

No really, I do!

Sizes

My new favorite thing to hate!! Sizes! How do you know what size you are?

You don't. Ever. Especially if you're a girl because the man likes to make life impossible. Saturday night I was able to go to the symphony with my mother. If you are keeping track this is the 4th time in the last 2 years that I've had to "dress-up" and for the last two years I haven't had a thing to wear! It started with the bloating from stiming and ends here with the post baby body. I have NO CLUE what size I truly am. I know that I am still shrinking to some degree because this time last year my flub was trying to make a break for it out of size 10 jeans which now fall off me. Sadly the flub is still around-so not fair!

Anyhow, the lesson I never learned as a girl is how to properly buy pants. Prior to having children my body resembled this:

I was a flag pole, in ever sense. But around these parts times have changed and so have I! VS can tell me what size bra to buy but who tells you what size pants to buy?? I am certainly not going to a tailor when I can do it myself, but I would love to find a proper fit. Another bonus would be to have my asset covered since Old.Navy seems to think it's totally acceptable for the world to think me a plumber.

So do you buy for your hips or your waist?

I'm not a belt girl, see previous flub comment, no one likes a roll!! But I don't want my pants so tight I can't sit and move, because movement is a big part of my day. That is unless it's nap time, in which case the pants have to be comfortable enough for my ass to sit around doing nothing! I also hate the 9 o'clock fall. The only pair of pants I have the fit reasonably well, a size 6 short, are suddenly too big come 9 o'clock. What the hell is this? Is my ass stretching the fabric soo much that my size 6 magically morphs into a size 8? Or do I need to buy a size 4 and be uncomfortable for the first 3 hours of my day?

Maybe Richard.Simmons was on to something with the spandex! I bet his jiggly old ass doesn't have to pull his pants up all day! Rest assured that I will never be sporting his fro' though.

So someone, anyone, please tell me how to buy pants!

P.S.

To the kind, southernly people of Louisville, KY-

Please get off your asses and load my computer on to the first nothern bound truck! You've been holding my package hostage since 1:16 AM Saturday, November 6!! It is now Monday and my weekend of stalking has spilled over into the week. This is unacceptable. I even got excited to see the Fe.dEx man pull up to the neighbors' house thinking maybe Brown called it in sick today and asked Fe.dEx to handle his delieveries!

P.S.S.

To my beloved A.pple-

If you feel that this hold up in shipping is questioning my loyality and don't want to charge me for my most recent purchase I totally understand. I would greatly encourage me to purchase in the immediate future.

Oh Hailey...

Let me being by introducing Hailey. Hailey is my fat, flabby, saggy belly. I would say that at my best I've given all of 17% of my effort to move her along. Instead I indulge her and keep her happy, hence this bowl of chocolate pudding in my lap!

Hailey has started peaking out and reminding me of how much she needs to go. I was just browsing the bathing suits. MWHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Riiiiiight. Did I mention we love the beach? That we're there all the time? That our ultimate goal is to move there!? Is the problem obvious? Hailey is not one for fun in the sun! Well, I'm sure she would love it but I just don't want to be seen with her. I'm such a horrible friend!

I keep saying I'll work out. I'll do this and I'll do that. But when it comes down to it I find a million other things I could do and make up a billion excuses. Tomorrow is always a better day to exercise! In all seriousness, I am afraid that it won't make much difference. DH keeps harping on how I should change my diet (what's wrong with pudding at 11 pm?) and add some exercise and Hailey will instantly be a memory. But I've noticed that even after I tighten my abs and suck in, I have flab. It's just the loose sink, that doesn't seem to be stuck to me anymore if that makes sense. It doesn't look like the super saggy twin skin you see in googled images, and yes I do google to make sure I'm not that out of control with my weigh, but I don't want to put in a ton of effort for minimal results. Maybe it's a mild case of twin skin, or maybe I'm making another excuse...

Anyhow, Hailey + bathing suit = bad idea. My happy bikini clad body is gone.

This was 30 weeks, my anniversary, and my last bikini shot-boy was I rocking it! I could pull off the preggo look.

What will I wear now? Am I destine to wear a mom suit? Should I go back to looking for modesty suits? The girls are 7 months old already and I wonder how everyone else just shed their weight and look amazing! What is a girl to do?

I Can't Wake Them

The girls last ate at 8:30 and here it is 1:45. I should really wake them to eat so I can go to bed but I would rather listen to them breath. Never have I heard a sweeter sound!

Tomorrow we leave and I can't wait. I think I have everything listed that needs to be taken care of. I stayed up till 1 doing so and would have stayed up longer but my other set of girls were rather...ah hem...FULL! I'm am totally terrified that this will go poorly. This morning mother all but assured me it would. "You know it's suppose to rain all weekend with highs in the 50's" she says in her condescending motherly tone. Have bunting and bjorn-will travel!

However mother redeemed herself swiftly. This morning at 9 a.m. I received text asking my color preference for bumbos! We only got one, in yellow, and it's actually a bebe because she felt it was safer. All I could think was the strap holds them in the seat, it doesn't stop it from tipping...but hey I'm not complaining! Since Thursday are usually her day with the girls I invited her out with us. She's been down since finding out she'll be laid off and I knew this would brighten her day a bit. Luckily for us there is an Old.Navy next to the craft store. I asked if she minded if I popped in. I started out with a few things for the girls then started winnowing my selections. She picked up everything I put back and bought double what I did! The girls practically have a 6-12 month wardrobe now! Gotta love the clearance racks! I hope to make some shoes before we leave tomorrow but DH is thinking about leaving early so maybe not. At this point we are so close to be down at the shore I'm willing to let everything go!

Wish us luck this weekend!