Maxi Dress or MuuMuu? You Decide

I noticed the Maxi dress trend last summer. Maybe the long, flowing sundresses were around before, but my fashion awareness went down a notch with each child I bore, leaving me not so much oblivious as simply late.

Anyhoo, I liked the idea of a long summer dress. I’ve always liked dresses, except for during that stint working for They Who Must Not Be Named where I was required to wear dresses and nylons every day. Can I just mention here that I’m pretty sure nylons are the handiwork of the devil?

I got excited about the Maxi dress because this dress, unlike most sundresses, would cover my ankles. Specifically my right ankle, which looks like an about-to-burst water balloon.

For reasons I can’t quite pinpoint, I did not buy, or even try on, a maxi dress last summer. And so it is that my first Maxi Dress Encounter occurred a few weeks ago when I was out shopping for Easter clothes for my boys.

A brief rant: Why don’t the stores carry anything cute for boys around Easter? I had the hardest time even finding an interesting button-down shirt that wasn’t boring old blue oxford cloth. Hello! Moms of boys want to buy cute clothes too. Turns out, I needn’t have bothered. It snowed soggy cotton balls all day on Easter Sunday.

Back to the Maxi dress: Chunky and I had already hit the boys’ section of the department store, and I felt it couldn’t hurt to swing through the ladies’ area. Despite the fact that winter lasts till May here in Colorado, the store already had an optimistic selection of summer wear on display. And there, on the rack, was a flirty, Bohemian-style Maxi dress.

Chunky agreed that Mommy should try on the pretty dress (after I promised to visit the toy section later.) In the changing room, I slipped the long dress over my t-shirt and jeans. Chunky, who is prone to flattery, said “It looks bewful, Mommy. You should buy it.”

While I hate to dampen any form of shopping enthusiasm in a male, especially a young and impressionable one with such potential to be molded into the perfect, indulgent future husband, I had to disagree.

What I saw in the mirror was not myself in a slimming, graceful ankle-length dress, but rather, me in a floral tent. And then I knew that, like so many things that claim to be flattering to curvy girls like me (ie., stretch pants), the Maxi dress is really an imposter.

Designed for skinny girls who don’t have to hide their sausage ankles, the Maxi dress can still accommodate those of us who are more substantial. But the truth is, in its expanded form, it closely resembles its ugly cousin, the MuuMuu.