Diminishing wardrobe

I gained around 50 pounds over the course of my pregnancy. You know that old aphorism, nine months on, nine months off? I suppose it must be true for some people, but Isaac is 19 months old and I am only now within spitting distance of my pre-pregnancy weight. (Yes, I am grateful anyway.)

Currently I'm just a little bit bigger than I used to be overall, and still a whole lot bigger in some places. Despite this accomplishment, my old clothes don't fit me. (Well, maybe I can wear one or two cardigan sweaters that I used to think of as loose-fitting.) Anyway, it doesn't matter, because I already gave away most of my pre-baby clothes back when Isaac was eight months old. I figured that even if I could fit into them again, which seemed unlikely at that point, my shape, my taste, and my lifestyle had changed forever. That might sound extreme, but it's turned out to be mostly true -- I don't miss many of my old clothes. I do miss, however, having clothes.

As my shape has changed over the last 19 months, I've had to buy all new clothes several times. This might sound like fun, but in fact it has been strangely infuriating, as it feels like a waste of time and money. I resent dropping $50 on a pair of jeans that are going to be too big in six months. (What am I supposed to do with the postpartum jeans that are now two sizes too big? Should I save them for the next baby, or will low-rise bootcut jeans be totally out of style by then?) So I tried to put off shopping for new clothes until the previous batch were much too big (or were completely out of season), and I tried to buy as few items as possible. For instance, I only allowed myself one pair of jeans that fit at a time.

(Unfortunately, I haven't had the luxury of the time required to go second-hand shopping, or else I could have saved money that way.)

Considering all this, and factoring in the inconvenience of hauling a small child into the dressing room, I've actually only bought clothes on four occasions since Isaac was born -- first in November 2005, two months postpartum, when I felt like my weight had stabilized; then six months later in May 2006; then in November 2006; and now in April 2007. It turns out that I buy myself new clothes approximately every six months, which also corresponds with the change in seasons (we have two: warm and cool).

But this time I've been on a bigger shopping spree than usual, and I'm finally replenishing my dwindling wardrobe. Since I feel like my weight is finally back to normal, or what's going to pass for normal from now on, I might as well buy more than one pair of jeans at a time. I bought two!

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To be honest, I bought ten -- six from the Levis Store, and four from the Gap. I shopped online, and since I wasn't sure what cut of jeans I was going to like, I ordered five different styles. And since I wasn't sure what size I was going to wear, I ordered two sizes of each pair. As it turns out, I need to return eight pairs of pants.