Manolo for the Big Girl

Our internet friend Laura asks:

Could you please post some advice for the hourglass girls? I am not a pear or an apple. I’m 5′10″ and even on top and bottom with a big dent in the middle. For some reason, designers don’t seem to think that women like me exist. We do! I’d like to find jeans that don’t gap in the back, a dress that fits at the bust without fitting like a tent around my waist and hips and maybe just one or two dress shirts that fit me correctly without having to go to a seamstress to get them taken in.

Oh, the travails we women face! We come in so many wonderful shapes and sizes and proportions! The mass-production of clothing is not conducive to actually dressing real women. Oh for the days when we all knew how to sew our own clothes, or knew how to hire someone to do it for us!

Laura does not wish to continue seeing the seamstress, but in fact for those of us with special, unique, non-mass-produced shapes, the seamstress is our best friend. Francesca’s advice is to stop thinking of the seamstress as a necessary evil, and to think of her as a blessing, think of her as the woman who is helping you to look superfantastic in all your uniqueness and womanly splendor.

After that, Francesca turns to the readers. Who among you is the superfantastic hourglass woman of height who can help Lauren, for once, find clothing that fits off the rack? Where do you shop?

xoxo!

Here is Francesca, with a run-down of sales and coupon codes for the coming week!

You still have time, for the rest of today, to save 25% and get free shipping at Talbots and Talbots.com as described a few days ago in the post here.

As described previously, there are still two days left to save 50% off any one item at Woman Within, by entering code WW17171 at checkout, and to save shipping costs on orders of $100 or more at Nordstrom by entering code HOLIDAY07.

Calvin Klein Stretcch Denim Boot-cut jeans, available at Nordstrom in Plus and Petite-Plus sizes.

Free shipping on all purchases at Coldwater Creek - no coupon code necessary. Additionally, jackets are currently 25% off, until tomorrow night.

Avenue is having a huge winter sale, and they give a free shipping upgrade to make sure you get your items before Christmas. Additionally, until the end of the day, Tuesday, you can get 20% off your purchase, or, if you buy at least $100 worth of items, you will save 25%. Just enter code 71318 at checkout.

Tie-dye peasant top available here from Avenue.

From now until December 24, save money at Lane Bryant! Enter code 025000481 at checkout, and save $25 if you buy $75 of stuff; $50 if you buy $150 worth of stuff; or $75 if you order $225 worth of stuff. Or go >here and print out the coupon, and get the same savings at a physical store.

Velvet babydoll dress from Lane Bryant.

Size Appeal is running two promotions which are of interest. One is a long-standing promotion which allows you to save 15% on your order by entering code HOTSIZE92. The other is a holiday promotion which allows you to earn something called “Santabucks.” Francesca does not know what this means. Is it a cute way of saying that you get a certain number of dollars off your order? Or a cute way of saying that you get a coupon toward a future purchase? It is a mystery. Details here.

Free ground shipping from Kiyonna.com if you order at least $150 of items and live in the USA. Francesca’s favorites from their new items here.

Lots of great plus-size clothes on sale at Liz Claiborne.

At Sydney’s Closet, through December 31: $15 off a purchase of $100 or more if you enter code HOLIDAY07.

Plus-size gown from Sydney’s Closet.

Happy shopping and happy saving!

xoxo,

Francesca

Our internet friend Sara writes:

Help me!

I live in upstate New York and I was not prepared for the winter weather they have here! It snowed over a foot in only a day, and I have to walk to and from classes and work in it! I need to find comfortable, wide-calf snowboots that can handle a foot or more of snow, and I need them affordable (preferably under 70$) because I’m on a tight budget. Do you have any recommendations at all?

Sara

At Manolo for the Big Girl, we do not recommend boots for under the $70, because such boots are likely to fall apart in 3 minutes, especially under the abuse of heavy snow from the outside and sweat on the inside! However, Francesca understands that this is perhaps your first snow-boot purchase and you are a student and therefore you must do the best you can with what you have.

Here are a few wide-calf boots which are either waterproof or can be made so (bring them to any local shoe store and ask them to treat the boot with waterproofing material), and which have low or sturdy heels (since stiletto heels in snow and ice is dangerous and ridiculous). They are not under $70, but they will not break your bank either, and they will help keep you warm and dry until you can afford boots which will last for a lifetime.

The “Sharona” by Fitzwell (best if your feet are not too wide)

The “Gateway” by David Tate

And here is the cozy warm Hush Puppies Corvina, which have a narrower calf than the boots above but are worth a look for the Sara.

Best of luck!

xoxo,

Francesca

I don’t often pick up fashion magazines, actually. I’m more inclined to check out fashion week runway photos, wander the internet seeking pictures and clothing sites, and so on than to spend five dollars on the average magazine on the newsstand.

The other day, though, I was ready to take a break from my Christmas shopping and get some lunch and I didn’t want to sit alone with nothing to do but eat without entertainment. I decided to pick up a magazine to help me while away the time. Amazingly enough, the January issue of Glamour caught my eye with a headline about finding your ‘happy weight.’

Intrigued, I bought the magazine and flipped to the article in question. I then read several other related articles about weight, health, and nutrition. For once, I was delighted to find that I wasn’t reading yet another fad diet/admonition that women weigh too much no matter how thin they are/self-punishing philosophy of (not) eating. No, what I read was a lot of sensible advice based on feeding your body properly and finding what makes individual women feel happy, healthy, and hot.

For one thing, several women profiled in the Happy Weight article were looking to gain weight rather than lose it - including one woman who discovered her ‘happy weight’ was 175 pounds. More than that, in a related article about figuring out how to reach your weight goals, two of the women profiled had goals not of numbers on the scale, but how they wanted to feel. One wanted simply to feel healthy, while the other was looking to discover more energy within herself.

If you’re looking to improve your overall health - whether or not that includes an attempt to lose or gain weight - it might not be a bad idea to head over to glamour.com, read the articles right here on the web, and take advantage of a variety of useful tools for managing your diet and nutrition.

Is it fat friendly? Well, it’s not fat unfriendly, and it recognizes a far greater range of sizes and shapes than the average fashion magazine. It’s promoting general good health and proper nutrition over an artificial image few can achieve without starving themselves. If you ask me, that’s way ahead of what’s in second place.

Last week I presented you with this photograph:

and I asked you to come up with captions to go with it.

You came up with some great ideas, but in the end there can be only one winner, and that winner is Amy for this gem:

“I’m sorry. I understand that it’s unusually loud, but we just can’t accept any returns without a receipt.”

Congratulations, Amy! And thanks to everyone who played.

It has been a while since we have visited Anna Scholz, and in the interim she has added some fabulous items (as well as a few strange ones) to her collection.

One can purchase Anna’s plus-size designs at a variety of stores around the world. The list of retailers is here. American readers can order some of her designs online at Cherished Woman or through Neiman Marcus.

Cowl-neck top and crocheted suede skirt - so luxurious!

Crepe Jersey top with gold piping, and matching pants or skirt. For the tall plus-size woman of style and means!

Photo from AnnaScholz.com.

From Annascholz.com. The jacket which says “here I am, I now enter the room, I am a woman of confidence and style — enough style to know the difference between couture and a wrinkled jacket– and you may all now aspire to kiss my well-shod feets.”

If you are one of the readers who insists on seeing Talbots as stuffy, then move along, move along . . . these are not the droids you are looking for . . . (who will be first to name the reference?)

For the rest of us, and for those of you who are saying “I want to be like Francesca!” here is a wonderful coupon code for you:

Take 25% off the price of your purchase AND get free shipping from now through Sunday evening! This will work at Talbots stores, by phone order, and online here. Not at outlets stores, though.

Just follow these instructions:

1. Enter offer code DEER on the payment page.
2. Click “continue.”
3. Choose the “Oh Deer Savings” offer.
4. Click “continue.”
5. Click “place my order” to complete your order.

From their Woman Petite selection, Francesca plans to purchase this outfit, so nice for the semi-casual office,

and use the savings to throw in this jacket:

Happy shopping!

xoxo,

Francesca

Take a walk on the wild side with these super-cute, super-comfortable low-heeledleopard flats by Stuart Weitzman. They are made of haircalf, with suede piping, leather soles, and a leather lining!

Francesca notes that they are called “Obladi,” which makes her want to sing “Oblada, life goes on”! Indeed, have a happy weekend!

With Christmas approaching, perhaps your in-laws, your own parents, your kids, your brother, and your Uncle Merve are “driving you crazy.”

Put your problems into perspective with these three moving, classic books which explore the emerging world of clinical psychiatry:

I Never Promised You a Rose Garden (1964) by Joanne Greenberg is the semi-autobiographical, first-person tale of Deborah, a 16-year-old diagnosed with schizophrenia, who is institutionalized. Can her doctor help her quell the many cruel voices in her head? What sort of world will she re-enter when she eliminates the swirling ones in her mind?

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey (1962) Remember this book from high school? It may be time to revisit it. Francesca recently did, and found that it was richer than she remembered. Kesey was inspired to write the book based on his experiences as an orderly in a psychiatric facility. The story, narrated by one of the patients, tells of Randle McMurphy, a sane man (played in the 1975 film by Jack Nicholson) who has himself transferred from a work farm to the mental-health facility thinking it is an easier way to wait out his prison term. There, he enters into a power struggle with the control-hungry Nurse Ratched, and helps the other patients regain their sense of dignity in ways their doctors fail to do.

Dibs in Search of Self (1964) This fictionalized story of a real patient, by psychologist Virginia Axline, inspired countless readers to become play therapists. Five-year-old Dibs is silent and withdrawn, refusing to play with other children or to speak. How can his doctor bring him out of his shell? (Francesca says: when reading this book, keep tissues nearby.)

Happy reading!

xoxo,

Francesca

at 6:00 p.m. at Off The Record, the bar at the Hay-Adams. You know the Hay, right? It’s the posh hotel right next to that big White House.

You’ll have to forgive me for my lack of posts, it’s a gypsy life for me in the last few weeks of the year. Ooh, speaking of which, hoop earrings…trashy or no?