I’m surely not the only mom who’s been doing the Mom Walk of Shame, which means I walk everywhere wearing clunky, ugly tennis shoes.
What else are moms supposed to wear to carry a 30-pound toddler across a crowded parking lot? To run up and down the steps fifteen times in a rush to clean the house? To zig-zag a mall looking for bathing suits with real, actual ties in the front (and not those cruel-joke faux drawstings)?
By the end of the day, wearing flip-flops kills my back. Wearing any shoe with a heel pinches my feet. Tennis shoes, in all their awkwardness, were the only shoe worthy of the marathon that is mothering.
Until I found a cute shoe that also supported my back and feet.
Cole Haan has ingeniously integrated Nike Air soles into everything from their flip-flops to their wedges to their high heels.
Moms everywhere, rejoice! You can schlep your kids around and look a little less schlep-y.
These beige wedges are so comfortable, match everything, look great with skinny jeans, and are so much better than tennis shoes. I’ve worn them just about every day since I bought them three months ago.
Actually, admitting that I only wear one pair of shoes is another Walk of Shame.
But at least this Walk of Shame is in cute, comfortable shoes.
Here’s what I’ve been wondering: what do other women use to make their legs and arms look so nice? Lotion, yes, of course. But there has to be some reason that my knees are ashy, my elbows are scaly, and theirs are not.
Then Costco (of course, COSTCO! ALWAYS COSTCO!) started carrying this Egyptian Magic moisturizer that Kate Hudson and Madonna and everyone who does not have scaly elbows uses.
You should give it a try. This magic ointment of olive oil, bees’ wax, and honey unscale and unash the driest skin. A little goes a long way, which helps, since it’s kind of pricey.
Clinique Under Eye Concealer and Anastasia Brow Wiz
By now, you’ve discovered that motherhood is about taking care of everyone else more than you take care of yourself.
The ugly consequence of this is that your life becomes a giant attempt to convince the world that you actually did shower this morning. And that you are, in fact, not wearing the same pair of shoes every day.
Anyway, here are two products that will make you look a little more cared for, even when you accidently wear your pjs to a PTL Breakfast.
Brow Wiz…
If you’re like me, you’ve had an ugly history with your eyebrows. I ignored mine for the first couple decades of my life. But then! I discovered plucking! For the next decade, I plucked my eyebrows into thin lines.
Then I saw serums to grow thicker eyebrows. Which…what? What’s the point of more eyebrows? To fulfill some plucking obsession?
But actually, thicker eyebrows help you look younger and, ironically, well-groomed. You heard it here first! To look more well-groomed, stop plucking your eyebrows!
But also use this eyebrow pencil to fill in the thin spots where you damaged your eyebrows for all those years.
The Clinique Airbrush Concealer also helps you look a little more put together. I can get away with not washing my hair and with wearing the same shorts for three days straight. But when my under-eye circles get really bad, other moms start asking if I’m not feeling well. Or if our family has caught the stomach flu.
Clinique’s Undereye Concealer does the job of covering up the most bruised-up eye sockets. It’s also thin enough that you don’t look like you’ve pasted brown Pla-Doh around your eyes. Double bonus, a tube of this stuff is cheap enough that you can use it a few times a day without spending a fortune.
With the combination of these two products, I can seem a little more cared for during a season when that just isn’t happening.
Even though I’ve had a love/hate relationship with Lululemon (I love their clothes but hate paying so much for athletic clothes), I don’t mind paying for the Tracker II Shorts.
If you buy these shorts, you will wear them for the next week straight. You’ll fall in love with the thick material that also wicks and breathes and is somehow both durable and also cool.
The short’s thick leg openings are supposed to be for “athletic quads.” For me, extra-wide leg openings make my flabby thighs look a little thinner.
Most importantly, the shorts have this ingenious, thick, stretchy waistband. WHY DON’T ALL PANTS HAVE A THICK STRETCHY WAISTBAND?
Thick, stretchy waistbands might make you think Garanimals, but it’s so comfortable. Turns out you can look a lot more sporty when your work-out clothes are comfortable enough to, you know, WORK OUT IN.
**Some disclaimers… Just to be clear, you won’t wear the athletic shorts everyday WITH the beige wedges. But you will love both of them so much, you would like to wear both everyday and together. Also, I’m sorry so many of these are so expensive. Turns out that when you don’t have time, you sometimes have to spend more money. Also, also…no one paid me to review these items. That would be awesome, though.
Great blog entry hon. And to think all these years I thought your eyebrows were just naturally beautiful.