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thefourthvine) wrote2011-10-06 11:27 pm
thefourthvine) wrote2011-10-06 11:27 pm
Sartorial Assistance Needed OMG Please
I am seeking advice on two clothing problems. One is mine, one is the earthling's.
The Trousers Must Stay On!
The earthling has a very, very narrow waist. (He is not underweight. Just - narrow.) This makes buying trousers for him difficult; he generally grows into the waist around the same time the cuffs hit his mid-calf. With some brands, he doesn't grow into the waist until the cuffs are just below his knee, which would make them good shorts, except he doesn't like shorts. I have seen clothes labeled 9 - 12 months that have waists too big for his 40-month-old body.
And the thing is, the earthling has preferences. He doesn't like clothes with stiff or scratchy fabric or anything he deems poky, and he expresses his objections in no uncertain terms when things do not meet his standards. But for his age group, the only option for the narrow-waisted is adjustable-waist trousers. Which are, in the earthling's judgment, unacceptably poky, and in any case they only come in jeans and cords and stuff - all fabrics that are too stiff. He will not wear them. (And even if he did, on the tightest setting they still slip some.) He wants to wear elastic-waistband trousers made from soft fabric.
This takes us to pajama pants and sweatpants. Both of which, when they fit his length, fall off his narrow, narrow body unless we roll the waistband at least once, often twice. (We own exactly one pair of trousers that fits him in every dimension. One. This pair came to us as part of a pajama set. If I could, I would clone it.) This has worked for most of his life, but now he wants to get dressed all by himself. He does not want help, no thank you, Mama, I do it, I do it. He can get the trousers on, but he can't get them properly rolled, and the result is that he spends a lot of time walking around on his cuffs hauling up his waistband every two steps.
So does anyone have any brilliant ideas? I need either:
So, basically, we are looking for a solution that does not require us to be crafty and handy and - stuff. This has ruled out everything I have come up with so far. Help? The earthling is running out of trousers. And tripping a lot. It is very sad.
The Boobs Must Be Free!
Before I got pregnant, I wore bras that took their design inspiration from the Bastille. My bras were things that you could, in an emergency, use as moderately functional body armor, filled with ribbing and nine million hooks and many wires, with a general aesthetic somewhere between "bondage device" and "cruel and unusual punishment."
Then I got pregnant, and soon I had a stomach in the way of many of those bras. Then I was nursing, and it turns out those sorts of bras block various critical ducts, not to mention that they don't fit the ever-fluctuating boobs of the breastfeeder, so they don't make them in nursing versions. I mean, yes, I have an underwire nursing bra, but it's entirely wimpy. One tiny wire under each boob! That's not a true underwire bra as I know it.
So, the earthling is now officially weaned. And, see, I've spent the last two years assuming that would happen any day now (and look! I was right!), so I've been wary of purchasing new nursing bras. As a result, I now have a total of four of them: one that is so stretched out it is more like a tank top, one that has a giant hole in it (making it ideal for any three-breasted breastfeeder, but less ideal for me), one that is way too loose, and one that actually fits and works.
Obviously, it's time to get out the old bras. They are the same size as my boobs currently are (or, okay, some of them are). But my boobs have lost the knack of wearing them. Used to be I strapped them into their wire cages and they did not protest, but after four years of freedom, they have decided they don't like captivity. They whine all the time - "A wire is poking my sensitive underparts!" (Used to be I could get an open sore on my boob from an exposed underwire with only minimal boob protests.) "This is really tight!" "Why is the cup only big enough for half of me?" (I said only some of them fit, right?) It's pathetic, seriously. Somehow having and nursing a baby turned my boobs into wimps.
Basically, they want to stay in nursing bras. I, on the other hand, would prefer to have cups that don't come randomly unhooked when I move too much, largely because there is nothing more wonderful than fishing around in your shirt for a stray cup, unless it is the charmingly lopsided look your boobs have when one is in a cup and the other one is on top of its cup.
I need recs. For bras. Bras that are not fierce contraptions of steel and strapping, bras that are somehow comfortable. (Underwires are optional, but fine. I mean, I do have underwires in my best-fitting nursing bra. Just - I guess not really aggressive underwires.) And these bras have to come in an H cup. Is there anything like that out there? Do any of you large-breasted persons out there know of a bra like that? Help my boobs! They are yearning to breathe free!
The Trousers Must Stay On!
The earthling has a very, very narrow waist. (He is not underweight. Just - narrow.) This makes buying trousers for him difficult; he generally grows into the waist around the same time the cuffs hit his mid-calf. With some brands, he doesn't grow into the waist until the cuffs are just below his knee, which would make them good shorts, except he doesn't like shorts. I have seen clothes labeled 9 - 12 months that have waists too big for his 40-month-old body.
And the thing is, the earthling has preferences. He doesn't like clothes with stiff or scratchy fabric or anything he deems poky, and he expresses his objections in no uncertain terms when things do not meet his standards. But for his age group, the only option for the narrow-waisted is adjustable-waist trousers. Which are, in the earthling's judgment, unacceptably poky, and in any case they only come in jeans and cords and stuff - all fabrics that are too stiff. He will not wear them. (And even if he did, on the tightest setting they still slip some.) He wants to wear elastic-waistband trousers made from soft fabric.
This takes us to pajama pants and sweatpants. Both of which, when they fit his length, fall off his narrow, narrow body unless we roll the waistband at least once, often twice. (We own exactly one pair of trousers that fits him in every dimension. One. This pair came to us as part of a pajama set. If I could, I would clone it.) This has worked for most of his life, but now he wants to get dressed all by himself. He does not want help, no thank you, Mama, I do it, I do it. He can get the trousers on, but he can't get them properly rolled, and the result is that he spends a lot of time walking around on his cuffs hauling up his waistband every two steps.
So does anyone have any brilliant ideas? I need either:
- Some mechanism by which the waistbands of elastic-waist trousers can be made permanently narrower, without interfering with the earthling's ability to get them on all by himself.
- A source for elastic-waist, soft fabric trousers for narrow-bodied toddlers.
So, basically, we are looking for a solution that does not require us to be crafty and handy and - stuff. This has ruled out everything I have come up with so far. Help? The earthling is running out of trousers. And tripping a lot. It is very sad.
The Boobs Must Be Free!
Before I got pregnant, I wore bras that took their design inspiration from the Bastille. My bras were things that you could, in an emergency, use as moderately functional body armor, filled with ribbing and nine million hooks and many wires, with a general aesthetic somewhere between "bondage device" and "cruel and unusual punishment."
Then I got pregnant, and soon I had a stomach in the way of many of those bras. Then I was nursing, and it turns out those sorts of bras block various critical ducts, not to mention that they don't fit the ever-fluctuating boobs of the breastfeeder, so they don't make them in nursing versions. I mean, yes, I have an underwire nursing bra, but it's entirely wimpy. One tiny wire under each boob! That's not a true underwire bra as I know it.
So, the earthling is now officially weaned. And, see, I've spent the last two years assuming that would happen any day now (and look! I was right!), so I've been wary of purchasing new nursing bras. As a result, I now have a total of four of them: one that is so stretched out it is more like a tank top, one that has a giant hole in it (making it ideal for any three-breasted breastfeeder, but less ideal for me), one that is way too loose, and one that actually fits and works.
Obviously, it's time to get out the old bras. They are the same size as my boobs currently are (or, okay, some of them are). But my boobs have lost the knack of wearing them. Used to be I strapped them into their wire cages and they did not protest, but after four years of freedom, they have decided they don't like captivity. They whine all the time - "A wire is poking my sensitive underparts!" (Used to be I could get an open sore on my boob from an exposed underwire with only minimal boob protests.) "This is really tight!" "Why is the cup only big enough for half of me?" (I said only some of them fit, right?) It's pathetic, seriously. Somehow having and nursing a baby turned my boobs into wimps.
Basically, they want to stay in nursing bras. I, on the other hand, would prefer to have cups that don't come randomly unhooked when I move too much, largely because there is nothing more wonderful than fishing around in your shirt for a stray cup, unless it is the charmingly lopsided look your boobs have when one is in a cup and the other one is on top of its cup.
I need recs. For bras. Bras that are not fierce contraptions of steel and strapping, bras that are somehow comfortable. (Underwires are optional, but fine. I mean, I do have underwires in my best-fitting nursing bra. Just - I guess not really aggressive underwires.) And these bras have to come in an H cup. Is there anything like that out there? Do any of you large-breasted persons out there know of a bra like that? Help my boobs! They are yearning to breathe free!
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