This is my sister, her new baby, my husband and me a few weeks ago at Q.’s baby blessing.
Ever since I finished Fascinating Womanhood I have been pondering how I can dress more femininely, with a youthful appearance. The hip, pretty girly girl look. It’s a tricky balance to find clothes that are relatively inexpensive, feminine without being out of style or frumpy, conducive to nursing (no zip up the back dresses), and attractive to me. Oh, and did I mention modest too? And that flatter instead of emphasize my, ahem, curvaceous figure. What about clothes that are Fair Trade from organic cotton or silk, made without slave labor. We won’t even go there because, unfortunately, it’s not in my budget. It’s pretty easy to find feminine things for Sunday dress, but finding feminine casual clothes for everyday challenges me. My default is jeans with a knit top but I’d like to improve on that.
Over a year ago I was bemoaning that my little girl Princessa never wants to wear dresses. We’ve had Sundays that have been a battle because she doesn’t want to wear a dress to church. My husband replied that why should she want to wear a dress, since she hardly sees me wear a dress, only on Sundays. I wanted to pinch him! I basically told him that it’s not that easy to wear a dress every day, and feel like I am dressed to work and not go to church, and be stylish.I would love to wear girly girl outfits every day but the only real girly girl stuff I have is for going to church.
I had to somehow figure out a diplomatic way to say the following: “I don’t wear dresses or skirts because I can’t find any that fit our budget (translation: give me more money) that are casual looking for everyday and are not frumpy. Give me more money in the household budget and then sure, if I had hundreds of dollars I would buy tops from Motherwear and Expressiva and One Hot Mama and Lands End (all places where I’ve seen girly girl tops), and some skirts from Lands End and be done with it.” Big sigh. Men have it so much easier when it comes to dressing according to their gender. Stylish men’s clothes don’t seem to change that much.
My sisters and me with baby Q. Who pinched her?
But I don’t have that kind of money. Ten years ago I did have money to buy brand-new clothes and I bought lots of nursing tops and some skirts. I even paid my sister-in-law to sew me two dresses with nursing openings using patterns from Elizabeth Lee. (I have this love/hate relationship with a sewing machine…long story. I handed the project over to my sister-in-law because she could get it done a lot faster). But now those clothes are all out of style. So I quit wearing them. Plus when you wear dresses and skirts in the winter you get cold legs unless you wear tights and I felt like I didn’t have the money to buy tights any more or the time to look every winter for the best place to buy cotton tights (those are best because they are warm)..
Then I came across this quote (see below) from FW. I also read in the FW book about how to ask for what you want. I decided it was time to improve my “feminine manner and dress” and also try out my asking skills. He agreed that I could have some of the household money to buy some feminine clothes, new to me, from D.I. I found some blog posts on how to revamp basic knit tops to make them more girly looking. I also started thinking that I could take my knit tops and add some lace to the neck like the hand-me-down knit top I got from my neighbor and then pair them with skirts. That would make for easy nursing. I also got the idea to find vintage tablecloths and bed sheets at the thrift store with floral or other feminine prints and use those to make skirts.
Helen Andelin talks about how dressing more femininely brings out more manly qualities in your husband towards you, that he will be more willing to do more things for you. She tells this story of a woman who started wearing a hat that made her look more girlish and how fun it was for her. Another story tells of a woman who would help her husband in their lemon orchard. She started wearing more feminine, “crisper” looking clothes and then her husband didn’t expect her to do as much outside work. Mrs. Andelin says that men will respect you more and cherish you more if you dress more femininely. Sounds like “dress for success, in the home.”
Here’s the quote about dressing femininely from Helen Andelin, Fasincating Womanhood pp. 295-296 (original edition):
“To achieve a youthful appearance the first thing to do is avoid looking matronly (aka frumpy). Now what are matronly styles? They differ from generation to generation, but you can count on it that they are the styles which are out of date. .(my post-ten year-old wardrobe comes to mind).
“To accentuate your youthfulness in dress, visit the shops where the young girls shop…
“And if you want to create some youthful styles of your own, especially for housedresses, visit a little girl’s shop. There you will see buttons and bows, checks, plaids, pleats, stripes, jumpers, daisies, and even satin, lace, and velvet and many other girlish styles.All of their clothes are pretty to see.”
OK, two questions. First of all, what are some housedresses that don’t make you look frumpy, like Alice from the Brady Bunch? Hmmm, I’ve decided that the modern equivalent of what Ms. Andelin is saying is “flirty aprons,” invented by two BYU grads, as seen here. http://www.flirtyaprons.com/. I decided I could make some aprons for my daughters and me out of some of the torn flannel sheet set my mom gave us for Christmas years ago that are beyond repair. I’ve always loved this print, it always gave me one thing to smile about winter besides Christmas when it was time to pull them out. (Excuse the wrinkles. I don’t believe in ironing sheets and they’ve been stored in a bag. )
Second question: Do I really want to take another look at the little girl’s department at a clothing store? When Mrs. Andelin wrote this book, little girls’ clothing wasn’t designed to make them look like rock stars or vamps.
But then I thought of the Gymboree line. My friend Michelle and then my sister-in-law Jen told me about Gymboree. I then looked back and remembered my oldest daughter Virtue getting the cutest outfit when she was newborn. It was really thick comfy fabric, a cotton knit with a feminine print, cute style, and, it was Gymboree! That was the first time I fell in love with Gymboree. Their little girl clothes tend to have a stylish feminine touch that is not too cloysome, and not too frilly.They have that feminine flair that I just adore and that I think Helen was getting at. Here’s an example from their latest line up for fall and winter http://www.gymboree.com/shop/dept_item.jsp?PRODUCT%3C%3Eprd_id=845524446003610&FOLDER%3C%3Efolder_id=2534374306265124&ASSORTMENT%3C%3East_id=1408474395917465&bmUID=1320484575123&productSizeSelected=0&fit_type=
One time we were blessed with a huge box of outgrown baby girl and toddler girl clothes for my second daughter from same sister-in-law. That was a lot of fun to go through. Lots of plaids and flowers and polka dots and stripes in colors that I like. Here’s a picture (ignore the fact that we are standing by a coffin) that shows Princessa in my favorite outfit for her when she was a toddler, a cheery red plaid Gymboree jumper. The hand-me down box actually contained two of these jumpers in different sizes so Princessa got to wear the design for lots of years.
So since then I have been on the lookout for Gymboree whenever I go shopping at thrift stores. Here are some feminine clothes, the blouse is Gymboree, that we scored recently at a clothing swap that our ward had. My little girl actually will wear them, which is not always the case. I was very sad to learn early on that, unfortunately Gymboree clothes stop at size 12. I just love the sweater, can it come in my size please?
Then I found out that Gymboree did a line for adult women, from same sister-in-law, called Janeville, with the same elegant feminine touches that are casual enough for every day. Unfortunately, they discontinued the line, but you can still find Janeville items on ebay.
So, with the Gymboree idea of fun feminine prints, here’s what I came up with by going to the thrift store. It’s a fitted sheet with a coordinating flat sheet. Sorry for the lack of ironing before the photo shoot. Isn’t this the cutest set of prints? I love the happy colors.
Can’t you just see a reversible wrap skirt emerging out of these sheets with a coordinating ruffle?. Maybe I can squeeze three skirts out of the two sheets for my two daughters and me, and then Princessa will be more likely to wear hers. Since I have a conference to put on, this project is going to take me months, but that gives me another fun thing to look forward to in the dead of winter.
My daughter and I got to raid my sister-in-law’s craft room. That was a gold mine. She inherited her mother’s store of fabric when her mother passed away. We really had fun that night. I’ll have to blog about our finds another time. Lots of flirty apron potential for different holidays. Can a housewife have too many aprons?
If you want to join our online conversation on Friday Nov. 11 from 3 to 4 PM Utah time about dressing more femininely, please send me a message through the network or comment below. I will share the blog posts and pictures I have about how you can improve your wardrobe to dress more femininely without spending a ton of money.
Tree of Life Mothering 