‘Tis the season when various venues are searching for Plus Size Models! You know you’ve always wanted to do it . . . go for it!

Information at the following locations:

According to Thick Misses, Seventeen magazine is looking for unsigned plus-size models ages 15-22 in the New York City area. Francesca could not find confirmation of this, but it is worth a try.

If you live near Orlando, FL or Redondo Beach, CA, you can go to upcoming events where Torrid.com will choose their 2007 models.

According to Plus Size Clothing Scoop, Size Appeal is looking for models who are at least 16, live in traveling distance of City of Commerce, CA, and wear size 12-20. Francesca was not able to confirm this on the Size Appeal site, but Plus Size Clothing Scoop seems to know what they are talking about!

Igigi picks a new model every month! Apply here!

Shoes aren’t like vacuum cleaners or children, you can’t just put them in the closet when you’re done with them; they need special attention in order to be their best. For the fat-footed girl whose firm understanding of the ground sometimes leads to a painful situation in re: the little piggies, this is doubly true.

So here, from my closet to yours, are the indispensable tools that will make your Pradas less painful.

High Heel Shoe Stretcher

Shoe stretchers are like martinis, you can never have too many. I have two for heels and two for flats. The ones for heels are especially nice, with two you can pop these bad boys in a pair of pumps before for work in the morning and they’ll be prêt-à-party by the time you get home. Use with Shoe Stretcher Spray and they’ll work wonders.

Footpetals Stiletto Survival Kit

The Swiss Army knife of DIY shoe-doctoring, these are far and away the best cushions and pads I’ve ever used. A little spendy, but in my experience each kit usually pads two or three pairs of shoes. Besides, a flawless shoe is just an expensive paperweight unless you can actually wear them.

Extra Long Shoe Horn

Sure, the short ones work, but sometimes –especially for us tall gals– it’s a looong way down. These stop mashed-in heels just as well and are much more fun.

Duster Bags

Most high-end shoes come with dusters already but at less than two dollars each from Amazon, there is no reason you shouldn’t have a bag for each pair of shoes. It keeps your pretties protected and take up less room than boxes.

So there you have it, those are the tricks to the trade. If you have any hints or tips to make your heels less horrific, let me know!

Hang onto your hairnets ladies, I’ve finally found them. The well-made wide-calved tall boots of superfantasticness.

UK-based Duo Boots has 27 styles of mid-calf and tall boots that can be measured to your exact size with heels that go all the way from flat to 4 inches and calf widths in “every centimetre from 30-50cm.”

It gets better! Even with the weak dollar and the crazy-go-nuts expensiveness of London (where Plumcake as recently as last May paid 9 American dollars for a glass of tepid canned grapefruit juice that didn’t even have cocaine* in it) all of these boots are very reasonably priced.

I’m pretty sure I’ll need at least three pair for my trip in December.

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These kitten heels will come in handy when I’m single-malting my way around Scotland. The bag is Vivienne Westwood –in plum of course– and big enough to hold a haggis.

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After a highland fling, I’ll be in the hallowed halls of Cambridge University, applying for a Masters program and trying to find that elusive creature –the strapping young buck who made it through 12 years of all-boys public school and still like girls. I’ll keep it strictly classroom with these trim riding boots and a Falchi bag I bought on sale.

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Finally when I’m in London it’s all about bringing post-punk sexy back with these stilettos and this great Viv Westwood handbag which just happens to be part of my personal collection.

Fabulous boots that fit curvy calves? Talk about anarchy in the UK.

*Plumcake would never touch the stuff. Don’t do drugs. Stay in school.

Reading the responses to our Big Question brought tears to my eyes. Indeed, if only Francesca had known then what she knows now . . .

Look! Here is a new, very young, very large, very superfantastic celebrity on the scene! Yes, I’m late on this one, but Nikki Blonsky deserves celebrating no matter how many minutes ago her movie was released. I haven’t seen “Hairspray” yet, but you can be sure I’ll report as soon as I do.

Here are interviews which show that at the tender age of 18, Nikki has already learned how to be superfantastic in her attitude AND her attire. She is sweet and charming and happy and self-confident and unafraid to show her talent. And she knows she deserves to lip-lock with Zac Efron (though he later told a reporter that he sees her as a sister. Yeah, whatever. She’s a superfantastic sister!) Go, Nikki!

Let me expand on what Francesca’s surely sainted mother said. Don’t leave the house without something that makes you feel fierce. If putting lipstick and earrings on makes you feel all stepfordy and weird, don’t do it. Plumcake herself, who’s got big ole Angelina Jolie lips, doesn’t wear much lipstick at all but I’d rather let Heinrich Himmler give me a Brazilian than leave the house without the eyelashes –extensions or individuals, depending on whether my fantabulous stylist friend has been over for Scarves and Sunnies Night* recently– that make my blue eyes bluer and lets me look pulled together and glamorous even if I wake up hung over, covered in bulldog slobber with 10 minutes to get to church which quite frankly, happens more often than you might think.

(Plumcake loves Dior Sunglasses, while hers aren’t available online here are a similar pair on big sale from Amazon.com)

It’s all about what makes you feel good about you. A wise old nun –seriously, penguin get-up and all (speaking of which, black and white is going to be all over the place for the next few seasons and I love it) — once told me to “always have more fun than anyone else” and I don’t know about you ladies, but it’s pretty hard for me to have fun when I’m tromping around feeling like the unfortunate and frumpy love child of a yeti and an Amish drag queen.

So wear earrings…or not. Wear lipstick…or not. But wear something, anything, that makes you look –and more importantly, feel– fantastic.

*Scarves and Sunnies Night: when Plumcake and her friends put on their glammiest sunglasses and scarves and pile into Stella, Plumcake’s fabulous-beyond-words classic Cadillac convertible, and drive around Austin, waving at the proletariat.

The mother of a friend of Francesca always says:

Never leave the house without lipstick and earrings.

These are wise words, by which Francesca lives.

There are few excuses for looking frumpy, especially if one is a Big Girl who wishes to appear as superfantastic on the outside as she is on the inside, but Francesca knows that it does, sometimes, happen. But no matter how frumpy one’s outfit might be, lipstick and earrings always bring one to the next level upward! Instant improvement! And it only takes 2 seconds!

If your eyelashes are blonde,  I would add mascara to the list as well.

Francesca’s friend’s mother hath spoken.

One of our many internet friends wrote to us with an impassioned plea:

Could you or Plumcake take on the arduous challenge of swimsuits for big girls? I love the beach, and once I get there I’ve learned to sort of forget that I am in fact wearing one, but I don’t think there’s a single thing that makes me feel unattractive and very un-fabulous than trying on swimsuit after swimsuit, especially if there is someone else in the dressing room shaped so as to remind me that all of these garments were certainly not designed with someone like me in mind. I’d love any insight you may have into what I am sure is a problem for lots of us.

The first thing that Francesca wants to say in response is good for you for putting aside your self-consciousness at the beach itself. As Nancy Sinatra would say, the beach is made for walkin’ . . . right into the sand and surf, with nary a care about our lumpy-squishies. When God created the beach, it was his (her?) gift to ALL of us. The beach is the great leveler, with salty air for us all. Especially when we are there with people who love us and want us to have a great time. And you don’t know anyone else there, so who gives a darn what they might be thinking?

Which brings me to an important point about being self-conscious, such as in a dressing room where one might feel ashamed to undress. I would like to introduce you to the concept of “self-ocentricism.” This is the belief that each person in the world is way more wrapped up in their own concerns than in yours. Just as you are, perhaps, obsessing over your own imperfect parts and feeling embarrassed, the other lady in the dressing room is thinking about her issues, and really not paying any attention to you. When we women obsess over whether our hair or makeup or fat is all in the right place, we forget that no one else cares about our looks as they do about their own, just as we are obsessing about our own looks, not someone else’s.

Understanding self-ocentricism takes a lot of the pressure off.

However! We still want to look superfantastic, for ourselves. And so I turn you over to our friends at Swimsuits for All, who have created a “shop by shape” feature for swimsuits (click here and scroll down), similar to the “myShape” feature at Igigi.

For Pears, I love this one-piece with the pretty sash showing just in the front:

SwimSuitsforAll has many wonderful designs for many wonderful shapes, through size 34W.

Happy shopping!

xoxo, Francesca