Dress shopping (and dinner) with my daughter

Yesterday I met my daughter, Gina, aka The Bride at King of Prussia Mall in well... King of Prussia, PA.  We were shopping for a  dress for me, aka Mother Of The Bride.  I had $350 in my wallet and was praying it was enough.


We wanted to go to KOP Mall because KOP had 2 malls in one.  One is The Court. They have stores like Bloomingdale's and Macy's.  Pricey stores that have evening wear departments.  There is also The Plaza, which has stores like Sears, JC Penneys, but they also have Nordstrom and Lord and Taylor and Neiman Marcus .


We checked out Nortstroms and Macy's.  I really didn't see much that I liked.  We were on our way to the other stores and passed by JC Penney.  I said, "let's go in.  Wouldn't it be funny if I found my dress at Penney's?"


We started looking and low and behold, we pick out 5 dresses for me to try on!  And they were on the sale rack!


I have to be careful what I get because I'm built kind of lumpy.  Saddlebags at the hips from carrying 3  8+ lb babies and delivered via C-section, round in the torso (I'm an apple).  I inherited my mother's wings, so I can't wear sleeveless.  On the other hand, long sleeves in July?  OMG!  I'd be dying!!  Turn up the AC!!!!


So we find this dress.  It's green and white, with a green sweater over top.  And it's on sale.  For $53.99. And it looks okay on me... IF I wear something over it to hide the wings.  Not crazy about the sweater it comes with.  And it needs a little altering, which my favorite future-son-in-law's mother can and will do for me (Jane is the best!!!  I love her!)  We decide this is the dress, but we'll be getting a little jacket to wear with it rather than the sweater.  This dress is not your typical MOTB dress.  No sparkles, no glitter.  But it's cute!  And we send a photo to Dani, who is in Pittsburgh to see and she approves! Sorry, no pics of my wearing it.

Then it was off to the Intimacy store to get fitted properly for a decent bra.  OMG!!!  I'm so wearing the wrong size!  I get fitted and try on several bras.  The one I WANT is $165 (yeah, no shit!!!  I don't even own a dress for that much!).  The one I bought was $100.  But now I know what size I need and can get bras elsewhere, but this one is for the wedding.  Apparently I have to wear it a few times and wash it a few times to "break it in".  No pics of me modeling the bras either.

Then I had a complete brain fart.  I bought a pair of Spanx.  Modern day torture chamber.  But it smooths all my lumpy parts out.  I just hope I don't have to pee too much that day because I'm going to have a problem if I do!  At least, the Spanx isn't like the contraption I had to wear for my brother's wedding, back in 1995.  I told that story here.  Gina will never be the same after that day!

We did continue to look, but didn't really find anything.  So we went to Rock Bottom Brewery for dinner.  Then we checked out Nortstrom Rack (discount Nordstroms) but didn't really find anything there.


After a little Cold Stone Creamery, we headed our separate ways.


I told Gina I was going to look online to see if I could find something there and this morning I found a dress at JC Penney's online that's more of an evening wear dress.  I ordered it.   It was also on sale and I found a promo code for free shipping!  Thanks to Garret at Rving Living With Jim and Garret for copying the photo for me and sending it to me!

I've decided if I like the blue dress, I'll wear that one to the wedding (it is more what I was originally wanting to get), I'll keep the green dress for the dress rehearsal.

Random Tuesday Thoughts

I haven't been here for some weeks now.  The desire to write about anything just hasn't been there.  Ah well.

Today is a big day for me!  It's shopping for my Mother Of The Bride dress with my daughter!  I hope we find something today.  I'm hoping to find a nice green dress.  Green is my favorite color.  So is red, but I think that would not be a good choice for a wedding.

The bridemaids' dresses are purple, the groomsmen are wearing grey suits.  Guess what color Maleficent chose? Yup.  Plum and grey.  That's OK.  She'll blend in.  **I** will stand out!  But I certainly will not outshine the bride!  She will look magnificent!

John and I went to Cabela's on Sunday.  It was like going to the zoo, only all the animals were very cooperative and posed very nicely for us!  Every shot was perfect!  

Polar bears and caribou!  

John bought socks with batteries in them to keep his poor always cold feet warm.  I bought fudge.  Probably should have skipped that since we have a wedding coming up in less than 4 months.

I kept losing John in the store.  There was so much camouflage in that store and he was wearing his BDU aka field jacket from his time in the army.  He blended right in!

This one is short and sweet because I'm short on time today!


Why not visit Keey at The Un-mom for more fun randomness?

In A Word: Cheap

I'm a member of NaBloPoMo  (National Blog Posting Month)  The goal is to write a blog post every day, and each month, there is a theme.  The theme for March is In A Word.  I went to a site called One Word to get my word for the day.  Today, the word is Cheap.


This isn't as easy as it looks!!!  It's making me wonder.... am I a cheapskate?  In some ways, yes.  That's because my job makes it so.  My lifestyle is much more modest than it was when I was married.  I can no longer afford to get a new car every few years.  My car is 8 years old, runs well, but I keep full insurance coverage on it because, if I get in an accident, I'd need to be able to replace it.   I can't shop at Macy's and stores like that any more, but that's okay.    JC Penney works for me.  


I have one major credit card.  I've learned to only buy things when I can afford them.  


I manage to be able to go to the beach for a week each year.  John and I save all year and my friend rents her little place in Ocean City, MD to us in the fall for about $250 for the week.  I can't afford to go in summer when my friend has to charge full price, but tSeptember is lovely and warm!  I don't really swim in the ocean any more, but I love going to the beach and taking a nap do some reading and people watching.  


In other ways, I agree with the term "You get what you pay for".  I rarely buy store brand foods.  I can tell the difference between name brand frozen veggies (and other products) and the store brand equivalent.  I discovered years ago that even if you shop in a quality department store, like Macy's, if you buy something that says "Special purchase", it's usually cheap items to get you into the store.   Clothing loses it's shape or will shrink or fall apart or fade easily.  Better to spend the money and get a product that will last a few years.  


What I really hate are people who come into the restaurant and have no problem spending money on themselves, but are real cheapskates when it comes to tipping. We've been overrun with folks who got their taxes done and use their refund card to treat themselves to a nice meal but then leave a really lousy tip.  Soon tax season will be over and they can all go back to eating at McDonald's.  


I had 2 women who came in yesterday.  They both ordered Baby Back Ribs.... NOT the half rack.  Just the ribs.  When you say ribs, I think full rack.  When the bill came, they had an issue with paying $38 for their 2 orders of ribs (which they took home with them when they couldn't eat all of it).  They assumed I'd order the half racks for them. (I'm not psychic.  If you want a half rack of ribs, you need to tell me)  They talked my boss into crediting them for the half racks.  They tipped me fairly, but these women own a restaurant of their own!  And their place is NOT inexpensive!!  I think they knew exactly what they were doing.  They paid for 2 half racks of ribs and went home with a full rack FOR FREE!!!  Cheap bitches.  You can be damned sure I will not be going to their restaurant.


So there you have it.  My take on the word CHEAP.