Memory Lane – Clothes Edition

ODD and I have been fighting some miserable bug for the last week and have been mostly out of commission because of it so I’m sorry I’ve been MIA. I’m finally able to be upright for an extended period of time, though, so I’m happy to be back posting again even if my brain isn’t back to working at full capacity yet.

As previously mentioned, Em is letting me borrow her maternity clothes right now. She brought over two big totes full and when I finally got around to going through them I realized I was going to need more space in my closet to put them all. So I pulled out everything that can’t possibly fit me for another 6 months so I could throw them into storage.

While pulling out each piece I came to a sad realization. Most of my Sunday clothes and/or nicer clothes are 10-15 years old. Yikes! Most of them date back to high school and early college. They’re still pretty which is why I’ve hung on to them for so long but oh, my. When I actually look at them I see they have become a bit dated. I was so shocked when I realized 1998 wasn’t “just a few years ago” but was, in fact, 14 years ago(!) I had to show ODD. Then call my mom and tell her how sad and surprising and funny I found it.

And now I’d like to share a few of my findings with you. Allow me to take you on a little trip down memory lane. If I weren’t pregnant I’d take pictures wearing them. As it is, you, my dear readers, are being subjected to scanned photos from the past. My apologies. At least you can laugh. Some faces have been blocked to protect the innocent.

This is probably the oldest dress still in my collection. It’s a purple-blue color  with a scoop neck front and v neck back. I think it was my winter dress in 1997-98. I wore it to Homecoming in 1998 and again to the Valentine’s dance in 1999. It was floor length and very simple with a slightly lower Empire waist. And aren’t my bangs awesome? By the way, we’re posed backward because it was a girl’s choice dance and my friends and I almost never posed “normally” for dance pictures. My mom hates the group picture from this dance because my date and I were facing the back wall so our faces couldn’t be seen. It’s still one of my favorite dance pictures.

The Renaissance renaissance. I was in high school when the Empire waist came back in. This was one of my most favorite dresses from that time. And probably my most expensive before my wedding dress. It was made of blue velvet with two kind of gold ribbon. There was also a wrap that went with it. The dress weighs about a thousand pounds. It was sort of inspired by Marguerite’s peacock ball gown in Ever After which came out the fall before I wore it to Prom. Photos are from some glamour shots kind of place that isn’t in business any longer.

This dress is the same pattern as the peacock dress above but made with different fabric. It was a home decor fabric which my mom threatened to also make curtains out of for our living room so we refer to it as my curtain dress. Again, it’s floor length with the Empire waist thing going. I wore it to Homecoming my senior year. This was taken by my mom later that fall. There are also some awesome pictures of my little sister at 7 years old in this collection of photos which I will refrain from posting so as not to completely embarrass her. She was a cute, little thing, though.

This skirt is a double layer linen look fabric. My mom made it to take with me while I was a nanny. I also have a spring version in a minty green color. This was taken on the day I received my temple endowment in 2002. Again, it’s a long a-line.

Ah, an engagement photo (yes, I have the rights to them). The days of horizontal stripes in boxy sweaters. Not to mention the long, boxy skirt with socks pulled up and Docs. Yeah. ODD’s clothes are all a bit big, too. What can I say? We are children of the 90′s when everyone wore things 3 sizes larger than necessary. I can’t even talk about ODD’s hair. It took another 3 years before he let me cut it shorter and he stopped combing it to the side. Aren’t we clueless and cute, though?

Oh, yes. The plaid. Everyone had plaid button-down shirts and baggy or flared jeans. This photo was for a local fashion show at the mall. Again, the photography business that took the photos doesn’t exist anymore as far as I know.

And, just for fun, these photos pretty much illustrate my uniform for most of high school and college. Lucky’s Peanut pants (still a favorite even if wide leg isn’t really the thing anymore), polos, sweaters, and horizontal stripes, with Docs.

It’s hilarious to me to remember being in high school and thinking my little sister (ten years younger) could totally wear whatever dress I was having made because the style couldn’t possibly be that far out of date by the time she would be going to dances. Oh, how little did I realize how quickly and vastly styles change. I’m sure she wouldn’t be caught dead in many of my old dance dresses.

Some of these dresses and skirts have sentimental value to me so I’ll probably always hang onto them but they will be removed from real circulation. The rest have either already been let go or soon will be so I’m not unintentionally clinging to the 1999 look. My every day clothes get purged fairly regularly but for some reason my Sunday/dress clothes don’t get overhauled as often. I’m happy to say I don’t wear floor length skirts or dresses very often anymore and have embraced the idea of acknowledging that my body does, in fact, (sort of) have a shape. Thinking about it more while dressing in maternity clothes is making me also think about how I want to dress for church and other nicer events once I don’t have an enormous belly anymore. So while I still look back with fondness (and a lot of cringing and giggling) I’d like to take this moment to say I’m letting go and moving on.