Shopping mania!
I figured I needed to get off my ass and do some actual female bonding for once so I delayed my bike ride and went bra shopping with my friend Kim. That was 5.5 hours ago! With maybe 15 minutes total driving, we shopped for over 5 hours. And I brought home not a single thing.
I’m not much of a shopper, I hate it honestly. And bra shopping is the worst. I went with my friend pretty much for moral support, comradery and to get out of the house. I tend to hole up at home to much and sometimes have to remind myself to get out and be social. I didn’t need to do any shopping for myself or my family. First stop was to JcPenny for an appointment with a bra sizer. I imagine their official titles are something like Lingerie Consultant or Intimate Apparel Apprentice or something all haughty like that.
They didn’t have it set up very well, just a sign in book and 1 lady to cover at least 5 people there for a fitting. It was very unclear what was needed to do to sign in and get started. The poor, single “consultant” there had 4 people show up in the middle of her taking care of one already there. I asked at one point if they had to go to school for this or what and she let me know that they in fact do have to take a class before they can do this.
Scince I wasn’t there for a fitting, I got to see how it was running. The “consultant” had 1 lady in a fitting room, took my friend into another and measured her, selected a few bras for her to try on and took my friend’s mother in to another fitting room for measurements. After all the measuring was done she just went back and forth between women with more bras but somehow she forgot my friend’s mother and left her with nothing but the first bra to try on. My friend demanded more of the consultants’ attention than most, she had to have tried on at least 10 bras if not more.
While they tried on bras I ran around after my 4 year old godson. He’s cute but he’s a handful and everytime I am with him I remember why I only had 1 child. At least he only crawled under the dressing room door of his grandma and not a total stranger!
After all this effort neither my friend nor her mother ended up buying anything. The lack of actually doing anything for the mother was what kept her from finding anything. The fact that the “consultant” really didn’t convince my large breasted friend she was a 34d kept her from buying anything. Every bra that she tried on that the consultant brought either made her fly out if she bent over or hiked up if she raised her arms. Any woman buying a bra knows that just won’t go, specially with a 4 year old to chase after.
So Nanna took the 4 year old and Kim and I hit Fredrick’s of Hollywood. I remember looking at the Fredrick’s catalogue when I was a kid and it was very sexual, very scary and NOTHING our mothers would wear. The Fredrick’s of today’s generation is much more friendly than that.
We walk in and the sales lady asks if we need fitted. We decline, stating we justh had one down the road from “the other store.”. After trying on a few bras the size the other “consultant” recommended the Fredrick’s lady brought over a few DD and even an F. Believe it or not, the bra that fit the absolute best was the 34 F…. much to my friend’s amazement who’s been a 36 D all her life. But I guess after 3 kids, mid 30’s, and motherhood makes for the bigger boobies! She’s never going to hear the end of it from me that she’s an F.
After a while of trying on bras and having the sales lady actually check fit and make suggestions my friend walked out with 2 bras. 2 very pretty, feminine, lacy bras too! If you’re big breasted you find out fast that the cute bras are only made for size C and under. It’s like the bigger boobs you have the more you’re relegated to ugly bras. Ahh but not at Fredrick’s, they seem to cater to the bigger breasted woman with pretty bras!
Next time I actually suck it up and go bra shopping I’m just heading right for Fredricks!