I was chatting with Baby Sis and we were lamenting over our shape, or lack of it, when it occurred to us that...
When we were young we had no shape, and no money.
Those were the days when we were skinny as a rake and we only had one new dress a year that was sewn for us by our paternal grandmother. We had no say in the choice of material nor the design of the dress.
There was a year when she bought a lovely rose pink material and she sewed us dresses with lace on the bodice. I really loved that dress and my memory of it remains as fresh as if it is still hanging in my wardrobe.
Unfortunately we weren't always so fortunate. There was a year when she sewed us dresses from a piece of ugly, brown cloth. I hated the colour and, to make things worse, the cloth was very scratchy.
Those were the two dresses I remembered out of the many that she sewed for us over the years when we were growing up - the one I loved most and the one I hated most.
In those days we hardly ever bought clothes. Most of the time we wore hand-me-downs that friends and relatives gave us which our mother would send for alterations before we could wear them.
As we grew older, we had the shape, but no money.
We filled up as we grew older even though we were still on the skinny side. That made it very easy for us to buy clothes and to look good in them. However, money was still tight because we were starting in our careers and our pay was low. Moreover, being a sandwich generation, we had to care for both our children and our parents.
Now that we are in our golden years we have the money but no shape.
Our parents have passed on and our children are already working, except for my nephew. We are now able to indulge ourselves but, unfortunately, we have lost our shape. The pendulum has swung from being too skinny to being too fat. And all in the wrong places. :(
We used to wear S, XS or even XXS size but now we have to request for L, XL or XXL size. To make matters worse, some of the clothes are imported from Korea and China where people are really tiny. To our chagrin, there are countless occasions when there isn't a size big enough for us to fit in!
Of course, we can always have our clothes tailored but one thing I've learnt through the years is that dress-makers often fail to deliver. The beautiful dress I picture in my head seldom ever materializes at the hands of the dress-maker.
So why, oh why, is it always a no-win situation for me when it comes to clothes?
When we were young we had no shape, and no money.
Those were the days when we were skinny as a rake and we only had one new dress a year that was sewn for us by our paternal grandmother. We had no say in the choice of material nor the design of the dress.
There was a year when she bought a lovely rose pink material and she sewed us dresses with lace on the bodice. I really loved that dress and my memory of it remains as fresh as if it is still hanging in my wardrobe.
Unfortunately we weren't always so fortunate. There was a year when she sewed us dresses from a piece of ugly, brown cloth. I hated the colour and, to make things worse, the cloth was very scratchy.
Those were the two dresses I remembered out of the many that she sewed for us over the years when we were growing up - the one I loved most and the one I hated most.
In those days we hardly ever bought clothes. Most of the time we wore hand-me-downs that friends and relatives gave us which our mother would send for alterations before we could wear them.
As we grew older, we had the shape, but no money.
We filled up as we grew older even though we were still on the skinny side. That made it very easy for us to buy clothes and to look good in them. However, money was still tight because we were starting in our careers and our pay was low. Moreover, being a sandwich generation, we had to care for both our children and our parents.
Now that we are in our golden years we have the money but no shape.
Our parents have passed on and our children are already working, except for my nephew. We are now able to indulge ourselves but, unfortunately, we have lost our shape. The pendulum has swung from being too skinny to being too fat. And all in the wrong places. :(
We used to wear S, XS or even XXS size but now we have to request for L, XL or XXL size. To make matters worse, some of the clothes are imported from Korea and China where people are really tiny. To our chagrin, there are countless occasions when there isn't a size big enough for us to fit in!
Of course, we can always have our clothes tailored but one thing I've learnt through the years is that dress-makers often fail to deliver. The beautiful dress I picture in my head seldom ever materializes at the hands of the dress-maker.
So why, oh why, is it always a no-win situation for me when it comes to clothes?
