Momedy

Every morning I wake up at 6 and tell myself “Today, I’m going to be perfect at this parenting thing.” By 6:45, I’ve failed miserably. Staying at home day in and day out with two youngsters realllllly tries the patience, and I’ve always had the patience of a horsefly to begin with. So it’s not long at all before I screw up the whole perfection thing. But really that’s good, because I then get to teach my kids by example how to humble yourself, admit to your mistakes, and ask for forgiveness.

Then there’s another promise that I make myself every morning, one that I can’t seem to find a silver lining in the failure of, and that rule is “Today, I’m going to put on real clothes. Actual, human clothes.”

Because that’s another thing I find difficult about staying home with my kids — motivating myself to change out of my pajamas when I’m looking at a long day spent in the toy room getting puked on, pooped on, peed on, and otherwise abused by my employers. Plus the only other adult I see some days is the Amazon Prime delivery man, who sprints to and away from the door as quickly as possible thanks to Pippa.

As a result, I now own a pair of “nice sweatpants.” You know … I have my sweatpants, and then I have my “nice sweatpants” that make an appearance if we’re having people over for a playdate or if I’m cooking a romantic dinner for Eric.

What. has. happened. to. me?

I guess I have to admit that haven’t always had the best fashion sense to begin with. In High School, the outfit I thought looked the best on me (and wore for any dress up day) was as follows:

These sandals. (We’ll start at the feet and work our way up.)

Under these, I wore TWO, count them, two pairs of control-top reinforced-toe nylon stockings. Color: Suntan. There are so many questions here, so I’ll try to address them. Why suntan? Well they made my legs look tan, always a plus. Why two? Because two pairs of Suntan stockings makes your legs look even tanner than one pair, and who cares if this makes your lower body look like an oompa loompa while the rest of you looks like:

Why control top? Because silly, ridiculous 115 lb. Melissa thought she was fat. I want to travel back in time and hit high-school Melissa in the face with these very stockings. Finally, you might be wondering – why reinforced toe? Well, this one I don’t have an answer for, but maybe someone could tell ME why I thought no one would notice this sticking out of my open toed sandals.

At least twice a day the nylon-on-sandal combination would get so slippery that I’d completely step out of a shoe and have to go back and retrieve it in a hallway full of actual well-dressed high schoolers. You think this would have deterred me.

Okay, next we had a black mini skirt, because that’s always the best pairing with athletic sandals. Next, a classic blue button down shirt. That’s not so bad, right?

Well, over that I layered a hooded wool sweater, and over that I layered a white Old Navy Performance Fleece. All of these I left unzipped or unbuttoned, which in hindsight I imagine left me looking like this:

On my face, beige glitter eyeshadow, and on my lips – concealer. That’s right. Concealer. Why? I thought it made me look more tan. (It seems that my quest to look tan was the demise of my high school look, yes?)

It’s an absolute wonder that a high school sweetheart didn’t scoop me up and put a ring on it.

Which actually turns out well for me because I got to marry Eric … but it doesn’t work out as well for Eric because unfortunately for him it looks like I’m sliding back toward these kind of pairings.

On Sunday I went to pick up our mail and realized when I got out of the car that I was still in my slippers. The outfit I paired them with was actually not sweats because I had a baby shower to go to later, but when I put on my actual shoes, it had been so long since I’d worn heels that Evelyn would have done a better job walking in them.

I tell myself it will get better. Once my kids are capable of entertaining themselves long enough for me to take a shower, once I leave the house more than once a week, once I am done having children and can get back to a point where clothes that button actually fit me.

In the meantime, at least I’ve done away with the beige glitter shadow and concealer on the lips …

Because waking up in the morning and telling myself my makeup will never look like this again is a promise I know I’m capable of keeping.