If you want to feel fat, look at wedding dresses

Why am I looking at wedding dresses? Am I getting married? What? Renewing vows? Nope... I'm looking at them for a possibility for a Halloween costume!

Every year, we make nice Halloween costumes. I sew some, buy some and do consigned stuff as often as I can. Sewing your own is great, but it's often the most expensive route! However, I've gotten picky with Halloween costumes. I want them to feel and look good and not be the cheap, thin fabrics you can find most places.

My mom started that. When most other kids were getting costumes like this: plastic costume, I was getting homemade costumes.

There have maybe been a few years I haven't dressed up for Halloween  and probably just when I was exhausted with babies. Halloween is just so much fun! But... finding costumes is not easy. It was not easy when I was heavy because of the ones you could buy, I would have to have that cheap, awful fabric that looks 100 times worse on an obese woman. Of things I could find in consignment shops, very little is available for plus size. So, every year I was either a witch or a man to get around the sizing issue. I could find men's clothes that fit.

The year that my husband and I got married, Halloween was just two weeks after we got married. I had my husband dress up as a bride and me as a groom. (I need to scan that photo in!) I found a used wedding gown at Goodwill, but it was too small for me - OK for him. The year my husband went as Gandalf and my young son as Frodo and the baby as a baby hobbit, I went as a peasant woman - who would believe in a fat Arwin or Galadrial or Eowyn?

Last year, being much thinner (not much heavier than now), I went as Jessie from Toy Story. It was the first time in my adult life that I didn't have to go as a man or chubby character. While I wasn't thin, I didn't look ridiculous as an average built character. (Though, Jessie is a string toy and is quite skinny in the movie!) But still - a svelte character - like Jessica Rabbit? Probably not.

So, this year we are thinking of costume ideas. My son is still undecided on what he wants to be, but we like to do family type of dress ups. Right now he is thinking of being Puss N' Boots from Shrek. That would make my husband Shrek and me Fiona. My older son can either be Donkey, if he's willing, but he's really into My Little Pony right now (a Bronie) and I promised him I would make him a cosplay costume for that if he wanted it.

Anyway, Fiona wears dresses like a princess, as she is a princess. She dresses much like Cinderella or Sleeping Beauty, etc. In the first movie she is rescued wearing a green dress.

 Later, she is getting married to Lord Farquaad when Shrek rescues her, so she also wears a wedding dress in the movie. In the second and third movies she wears other dresses - in blue and lavender. Though, I think most people know the first movie best. Need to refresh your memory on all things Shrek? Check out here: http://shrek.wikia.com/wiki/Princess_Fiona

So, I went looking for dresses. I now wear a size 10 or 12 dress - mostly depending on the cut of the bust. Most 10s are too small in the bust for me as I have a large rib cage and then a large bust on top of that rib cage. 12s are too big in the waist and hips, but fit the bust.

I can get this dress: green dress. I would need a size large. Or, I can go for a wedding dress. Finding a used wedding dress can be cheaper. And, I've never worn a wedding dress - it might be fun! I got married in a short sleeved suit jacket and skirt.

But I forget that in formal attire, I'm not a 10 or a 12. I'm a 16 or 18. I'm plus sized! Again, try to find a plus sized wedding dress? And to make it more complicated, some things say 16 and would fit, and others wouldn't. There is basically no way to order a used one and to know it would fit. And when I look, you can find all sorts of cute things if you are a bridal 10 and smaller, but if you are a bridal 16 or 18? Yikes!

So, even at a much better weight, I still would feel icky in most Halloween costumes. Notice I'm not thinking of being Princess Fiona as a human - but as an ogre - who is plump! And plump equals ugly.

Stats for 9/3/12:

Highest weight: 275  Now: 181.2