Friday, July 10, 2009

The unspoken Motherhood dress code


Lets be real for a few minutes. When you're walking through Walmart or Target, how often do you find yourself gravitating towards a sale rack loaded with patterned lounge pants? You run your fingers through the fabric, close your eyes, take a deep breath, and imagine yourself chasing after your toddler in a brand new pair of pink heart covered cotton crops with an adjustable drawstring perfect for various levels of bloating. You pick up a pair, drape it over your arm, in case you walk past the fitting room later. Just in case though, because you really don't need them, and $7 is too much to spend on yourself anyways. OK, you're not actually going to try them on, no matter how good that daydream was. If anything, you should be buying jeans, like adults are supposed to. Or really, you should probably be buying jeans for your kid. But, maybe... just maybe... you do have $7. And maybe... your kid doesn't need jeans today. If you play your cards just right, by the end of this shopping trip, these pink lounge pants... they could be yours. You could hurry the kids into the car, so excited about the forthcoming comfort that you ignore that kid #1 has chocolate all over his face and hands, and float home on a cloud reminding yourself that soon you'll be out of your awful day trip pants, and sliding into something much more heavenly. After the twenty minute drive, you shuffle the kids out of the car, into the house, flip on the TV to distract them, throw the grocery bags on the counter, dig through them at warped speed looking for anything that resembles the color pink, grab the pants so fast that the tag flies across the room (you weren't planning on taking them back anyways, since we're being honest), run to the bathroom, unbutton and unzip your tight fitting jeans that are somehow soaked in sweat from the exhaustion of a single shopping trip, and then 3... 2... 1...

You are at peace.

The unspoken Motherhood dress code is one that we all know backwards, frontwards, and upside down. Our husbands however, they don't understand. TLC with all of their "What Not to Wear" shows, they don't understand. The neighbor lady with her cute tube top and fake boobs to hold it up, she doesn't understand (although you'd think she would, since she did have a kid, or at least claims to have). Shes obviously not one of us. The UPS guy doesn't... OK wait, no... he does understand. He sees enough of us to be in on it. Hes off the hook.

Taking care of kids is hard. Like... really hard. We're not about to do our hair, and put on makeup, and psh, put on clothes, if all we're going to be doing is getting covered in bodily fluids that don't even belong to us, and chasing after diaper lacking butts (god knows where the diaper went). We're not about to take a flat iron to our hair, just so our 6 month old can grab a hold of our freshly straightened locks and pull on it like its a freakin' kite string. And if we're not going to straighten it, why re color our roots? We'll question whether we should put on makeup or not, and usually settle upon "not". We're most likely going to be covered in sweat and tears within a few hours, some of it being our own, some of it belonging to them. Why set ourselves up for failure? Earrings are a thing of the past. Just like necklaces. Bracelets. Jewelry in general, actually. Even a facial piercing is an easy target. "Ooh, that sparkles, GIMME!", they say. Painted fingernails? ...No. Fancy smooth and yummy scented lotion? Probably not. We're lucky if we remember to brush our teeth.

And why are they called "pajama pants" anyways? I take offense to that. They are obviously "lounge" pants, thankyouverymuch, lady down the street wearing the tube top. I'm sure it was you and half of the under 25 years old male population that came up with that.

Moms; rock your lounge pants and pony tail.

And um... thats not me in the picture. Really.

23 comments:

  1. hahaha, SO TRUE! I'm currently rocking the work out shorts... the only workout since I bought them has been chasing after the kids and getting the mail. But they were on sale! And they are cute! And why bother putting on something uncomfortable, when its just going to be covered in sticky peanut butter from Annelie's face, and spilled juice??

    ReplyDelete
  2. Tia Tia Tia. My dear sweet sister in law. Today I am rocking my husbands sweats, that he has never worn, and a to short light blue tank that I have had for to long with my to short hair stuggling to be held be a pony tail tie. It is always a treasure to read what you have to say. today hit home. Loves.

    ReplyDelete
  3. OMG, I want those those pants that the person that isn't you in the picture is wearing! I adore all of the cute lounge pants at Target. I seriously haven't seen added anything new to my wardrobe but a few new t-shirts since having the two kids. I keep expecting Stacy from WNTW to show up at my house and ritually burn my entire closet. Texas is bizarre though, both you and Marisa can back me up...the moms here rarely go to the grocery store without making themselves up and doing their hair all high. I always get snide looks at the store!

    ReplyDelete
  4. I suddenly have a very big urge to head to Target.

    ReplyDelete
  5. You ROCK those lounge pants!

    (p.s. the kids will get older & someday those necklaces & earrings can come back out of their dusty boxes again. but only if you want them to.)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Hee-hee, I feel "dressed up" when I wear my jeans :-)

    Thanks for writing this!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Okay, I don't own any lounge pants! I need some! I'm all about the comfy shorts in the summer and sweat pants in the winter so don't be thinking my mom uniform is any kind of glamour.

    ReplyDelete
  8. awesome post!!! I remember those days and miss the comfy lounge pants...and whoever that is in that picture up there has got the CUTEST lounge pants EVER!!! I want them!

    whats funny is that even though my boys are now 16 & 13, I still wear my hair pulled back in a ponytail, usually with a baseball cap on, no makeup, jeans & a wife beater...why? because I work at home, alone, and I don't see people...why bother getting all made up only to cover it with a big apron, goggles & a mask lol

    ReplyDelete
  9. Hey! I resemble these remarks! :oP Except, normally I am in pajama pants because I don't even bother changing into lounge pants. It's a little too high maintenance for me.
    When Jim comes home and says, "Wow you must have been busy, you didn't even get dressed," I just nod and smile. :o)

    ReplyDelete
  10. Love it! Haha so true about the UPS man, he doesnt even blink! Congrats on not having crayon on the walls behind you!

    ReplyDelete
  11. At our house, for some UNKNOWN reason, they're called Floppies, as in, Floppy Pants. Long live the Floppy Pants!

    ReplyDelete
  12. My husband is a basketball coach and every year I am the most excited one when the warm up gear is ordered for the team because I get a set too. Gym shorts, sweats, t-shirts...all made for teenage boys are the main staples to my wardrobe. I am proud to be typing this while wearing the sweatpants from three seasons ago!! Great post! Thanks for the Mommy validation!

    ReplyDelete
  13. okay, so even though I don't have kids (I came here from Tia's other blog) I immediately change into my lounge pants as soon as I get home from work every day. My uniform for work? Jeans and a t-shirt with lab coat. Nothing fancy but I'll tell you, I look forward to those lounge pants all day. And the weekend? Jeans? No way. It's all about the lounge. When I was a nanny I don't think I wore jeans for an entire year.... ;)

    ReplyDelete
  14. hahaha, not only the UPS man! same goes for the mailman, the neighbors, and any other passerbys outside of my house.

    Lounge pants ROCK!

    ReplyDelete
  15. I, for one, am NOT wearing lounge pants. I NEVER wear lounge pants.

    Instead, I'm rocking men's gym shorts while wearing one of my husband's "the Air Force gave me this and I'll never wear it because it's too big" t-shirts.

    And my hair is up in a sloppy half-pony tail ensemble and a very sexy nursing bra. And, by sexy, I mean it has dried milk on it.

    Mom clothes rock. I can't wait to embarrass my children when they get older and realize that what I'm wearing around the house is probably not something they'd want their friends to know I wear.

    ;-)

    ReplyDelete
  16. i love those pants, tia! lounge pants, a cheap tank top from the clearance rack and $2 flip flops from old navy is my basic summer wardrobe.

    ReplyDelete
  17. I have noticed that I have a mom wardrobe now. Or maybe I'm dressing more age appropriate these days? I think I was shopping in the juniors longer than I should have been but dammit, I can't do the mom wardrobe. It's not even about the lounge pants because I haven't done that yet (ahem, yoga pants are NOT the same! HAHA) but I don't feel like I dress as cool as I used to. Meh. I blame my squishy post-baby body.

    ReplyDelete
  18. hi there,my name is talia and i live in uk at the mo. a friend passed this blog to me,i was reading it and loving it, i found this post so funny i posted it on a board in a mummies site, just to put somethinng humorous there (all u see is mums moanning all the time about the little things) and forgive me i forgot to put the credits at the time..forgive me it won't happen again!

    ReplyDelete
  19. hello there,a friend passed this post to me,bcz she said that i was exactly like that (always in my lounge pants) i loved it so much i posted in a site for mums and i did no put credits. i went backt to put the credits but thenit said i could not edit the post not even delete it, :-( i'm sorry.. it will never happen again

    ReplyDelete
  20. Oh my gosh. This is hilarious. I love it.

    ReplyDelete

We love comments! Please let us know you stopped by.