dress shopping

I hated dress shopping when I was in high school. Honestly, I have always and probably will always hate clothes shopping. Puberty found me years before my peers. Stopped growing in seventh grade at 5 foot 7 inches. The rest of my body has been in flux ever since.

Clothes shopping is also difficult for my girls. They are super short and super curvy. They think they are fat, but there is really hardly any meat on their bones. All these things they see in the media and what their friends wear just do not work for my kids.

It has been a very difficult trial to try and encourage them towards styles that would compliment them and not let them focus on copying everyone else. It is hard when they look so dejected in the fitting room mirror. They do not like the vision of them in their dream clothes being reflected back at them. The clothes they want to wear just make all their criticisms about their body even louder. I have to redirect and show them with different fits or cuts that they look so much better. Clothes can create optical illusions and my girls have not yet learned this.

I think I have finally devised a system that kind of works:

1. They go and pick up the clothes that they want. I have no input on what they pick up to try on. While they are looking, I am also going around and picking up what I think they would like. I think about flattering cuts, colors, softness of fabric, the actual length of the clothes, and what they could use in their wardrobe.
2. We take all the clothes to the fitting room and they try everything on. We usually do “like items” to quickly compare between cuts and styles. This last trip for winter formal dresses, we started with form fitting cuts, then low cut, and finished with billowing skirts.
3. We only put definite rejects to the side and keep everything else in the mix until all are tried on. As each item is tried on, we check the fit in all the trouble areas: shoulders, chest, stomach, hips and rear. I have them tell me what they like about what they are wearing and then what they do not. I agree or disagree, and then we move on to the next item. I try to be informative during this process and not opinionated. I show them how the lines work with their figures , adjust the clothes into the right place, or explain why different choices were made when designing the piece. Typically it is because they are short and whatever they picked out was designed for someone with a longer torso.
4. After everything has been tried on, we then reduce the pile. Usually most of them are easily moved to the reject pile. They can usually get down to two or three options. Now if it is an item that I absolutely loathe, I will step in and say I am not buying that one, so the other is the one we are going with. Usually the last couple options are okay.
5. When we are down to the last two or three, they sometimes try them on again after we clean out the fitting room. I try to keep my opinion to myself and let them pick what they like best. I will tell you that they always pick a dress that I have chosen for them to try on. It might not be my favorite one of the ones I picked, but my dress is always the last one standing.

The important thing is to really keep your opinions out of it. They do not need to hear that you hate what kids wear these days. That is not helpful. (I really hate the crop top fad.) I do lay out my rules of what I will not buy: anything indecent and anything with pre-made rips. I have explained to them what I mean by indecent and it is mainly going by the school dress code. Our schools are pretty lax with the dress code, especially the enforcement of it. However, the actual written down dress code is something I agree with. Nobody should see your underwear or what is under there.

Shopping together has gotten a lot easier since I have let them pick out what they want to try on. It makes trying on what I pick out much more pleasant for everyone. In the end, they almost always pick the options I chose, but occasionally they will get one of their own choices. After a few washes, their choices usually become uncomfortable and they end up only wearing everything I picked out anyway. You have to let them win some in order for them to learn from their mistakes.

Almost time to start thinking about prom!