How To Look Good... - Planet Penny

…but NOT naked!

One of the best pieces of advice I gave my daughter when she was growing up was knowing when to stop. And she did, she stopped at a nice, manageable 5′ 6″ with size 7 feet. Clever girl! I on the other hand grew like a weed, reaching 5’9 (and a half) at 14 and I have never, ever had any confidence in how I look. This was compounded when shopping for clothes. Anything which would fit over my coathanger shoulders billowed out round my skinny lanky body like a bell tent. The sales girls in shoe shops would pale and recoil when their careful measurement of my feet revealed I was a size 8 and a half AA fitting. Norfolk in those days was not ready for a skinny giant, which was how I came to regard myself.

I look back at old photos and wish I’d realised then that I was absolutely fine, not bad at all, and enjoyed it. Even though these days being tall is more and more common, outside London (and Long Tall Sally shops) it’s still really hard to find clothes that are long enough in the leg, the sleeves and waist. Although I left the beanpole stage behind after the first baby I latterly ballooned after developing M.E. so there has never been a time when clothes shopping hasn’t been a nightmare.

But, it’s never too late to change. I’ve been tackling the weight problem for a while now with Weightwatchers and it’s plain to see that the whole weight/M.E. thing is a vicious circle of tiredness, lethargy,depression, comfort eating, weight gain causing the tiredness, lethargy etc, etc… Not carting around three and half stone of extra weight means I’m more active and so burning off more calories and the spiral starts to go up not down. Years ago I used to make my own clothes, and now I’ve slimmed back down to the size of my dressmakers dummy!

(Admittedly it’s at it’s largest setting at the moment but THIS WILL CHANGE!) I’m getting my confidence back by tackling the shirt in this month’s SEW magazine, and have spent the afternoon cutting out a toile in calico so I can add the inches in the length I need.