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Dress Up

\n\n\nThere are certain things I have no problem shopping for. Shoes being one of them. Shirts aren't usually a problem either. Jeans and pants are slightly more troublesome. But the thing I dread shopping for the most? A dress.\n\nPart of the problem with buying an outfit that consists of only one piece is the sizing of women's clothes. The assumption has been made by the clothing designers of the world that if your hips are a certain size, then your boobs must match. My part of the problem is that my hips are about 3 sizes larger than my boobs. Admitedly, some of that problem has to do with my weight (which I may talk about at another time, but I'm not quite ready to yet), but even if that were to change, I think there would still be a size gap between my top half and my bottom half. \n\nFor years, I've tried on dress after dress only to have them either not fit over my hips, or to find that once the thing is on there's enough room in the boob area to fit half a dozen grapefruit. But on Monday, after almost giving up on finding a dress, I had an epiphany. EMPIRE WAIST. A few days previously I had tried on some tank top style shirts that had an empire waist thing going for them, and they fit! This revelation lead me to the conclusion that a dress with an empire waist may just be the thing.\n\nI grabbed a couple of dresses off the sale rack at the Gap (I'm reluctant to admit I spend way too much money there, but I almost always have good luck and there stuff just tends to fit) and headed to the dressing room. I tried not to get my hopes up, given how unsuccessful the previous hour or so had been, which made me that much more excited when one of them actually fit! AND it looked decent on me! Also, totally on sale. The strapless bra I had to buy to wear under it ended up costing more than the dress itself. \n\nFor the first time ever, I have a little black dress. It's cotton, strapless, and knee length. It's perfect.