That is, in a nutshell, the result of this weekend´s laundry experiment. There used to be a time- and I guess I am dating myself there- when you would, if you happened to get a cotton blouse or a pair of jeans mixed up with items that required laundering at a higher temperature, end up with a rather minuscule version of said garments when pulling them out of the washing machine. Today´s fabrics are treated so that doesn´t happen any more, it seems.
I had, over the weekend, tried to get a blouse and some pants to shrink on purpose, because both were becoming a bit too wide for my taste, but even the hottest setting on my washing machine didn´t make them shrink, so all that got me was two very, very clean garments that are still too wide :(. Well, for the time being I´ll continue to wear them as they are almost new and it would be a waste of money to replace them now while I am still recondensing myself.
The calculation as to when to replace my wardrobe is as follows: From experience, I know that I have been going down a clothes size with about every five kilograms lost. Losing those, at the present rate, would take me about five months, so, by the end of this season I will be down another clothes size, and the next warm season coming around will probably find me two sizes down from what would be my exact size today. Two sizes is also what those too-big blouses and pants are too big by. So, what I have is a choice of postponing the purchase of fitting garments for a year- and then hopefully having my target size, or at least one that will fit me down to goal weight, or buying at once and risking to find myself in too-big garments again next year.
When I look at the prices they demand for clothes and at the poor selection they have this year in classic styles, the decision is actually an easy one. So, I´ll wear the existing blouses and pants for another summer and save the money I would spend on new ones for next summer and, hopefully, my target size. In the meantime, what I already have may be oversized, but then again, when I compare that feeling to what it felt like to be dressed in clothes that kept growing too tight, it ain´t half bad. Besides, just knowing that by now, I don´t forcibly have to buy new trousers every two to three months because the old ones have worn through from my thighs rubbing against each other is priceless. At that time, the too-big pants conundrum would have been impossible because pants, on me, simply didn´t last long enough for me to noticeably change in size while wearing the same garment. And when I had to replace them, it was easy to blame the rising size on manufacturers having changed the cut.
The extra fabric in the too-wide clothes, on the other hand, is a reminder of just how far I have come already this time, and a great motivator to keep up what I am doing.
Julia
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