Mix-n-Match, and a Little Flash

Bathing suit shopping is never fun. Anyone who says differently is lying. But I figured today was the perfect day for me to run out and get a new one for two very good reasons:

(1) It's after July 4th, so Old Navy should be selling swimsuits for next to nothing, to make room for corduroys and sweaters.
(2) Tai and I have a mamas-n-babies playdate at a local swimming hole on Monday, during which other people will actually have to see me in my bathing suit. This is a problem because my current bathing suit was purchased for my pre-pregnancy body. That body is gone. The pregnancy weight is off, but things are all shifted around and now my boobs are too big for the top and my ass cheeks hang out the back.

So today after work, I decided to run a bunch of errands. After I popped into one store unsuccessfully seeking waterproofing spray for our new tent, I decided to quickly run into Old Navy for a new bathing suit. But in today's mix-n-match society that proved impossible. They don't actually sell two-piece swimsuits anymore....they sell separate tops and bottoms to be mixed and matched. And that's great because you can get two different sizes for top and bottom. But it's not so great this time of year when the suits have been all picked over. Not only were the prices not marked down, but almost none of the tops and bottoms matched each other...and certainly none that did match were available in my sizes. All I could seem to find were small and extra small tops and XL bottoms, none of which was going to work for me. (So...are there lots of women running around out there with big boobs and small bottoms? I thought I was the only one....)

During the 15 minutes I spent pawing through the racks, I found a few very cute tops, in my size....and then matching bottoms in XL. The one or two bottoms I found that looked like they might fit had no matching tops left anywhere in sight. And I don't even mean strictly "matching"--I would have gladly paired a plain purple top with the multicolor-striped bottoms. But no, even that was not meant to be. I started out being selective, looking at the sizes only on the cute suits. But soon I grew desperate, nearly talking myself into trying on the ones with macrame straps or faux wood beads. I stopped just short of even looking at the sizes on the shiny silver suits that looked like they were made of tinfoil. I never even made it into the dressing room.

Leaving Old Navy, I felt defeated and started to wonder whether I am too old and mom-ish to even be shopping there...and for a skimpy two-piece bathing suit, no less. Wondering whether I could even pull a suit like that off, I decided to check out my profile in the window as I walked by. Looking pretty good in a shirt that artfully hides my squishy tummy and sporting my Skinny Jeans, I started to think, "Yeah, I may be a mom, but I still look good. I'm not an old fart one-piece-swimsuit-with-the-attached-skirt mom yet." Feeling better, I turned to head into EMS (still in search of the waterproofing spray) and looked at myself head-on in that window. That's when I noticed that the button on my shirt right between my boobs was undone...no doubt from my last pumping session at work. Oh, how very not cool. Oh, how not young and sexy and with-it at all. Oh, how very fuddy-duddy-scatterbrained-mom-ish.

So here I am, no new bathing suit. Just a word of warning....if you find yourself at Puffers Pond this coming Monday you may catch sight of far too much side-boob and ass cheek as I emerge from the water. Oh well, one good thing about mommy-hood is that I'm just to tired to care....much.