The Matchy
When I was a teenager, my mother had a habit of waking me up on Sunday mornings by asking what I was wearing to church. “Ummm, probably my pink Laura Ashley dress,” I’d say groggily. Mom would flit off somewhere and I’d rub my eyes and stumble into the shower, emerging fully dressed from my room an hour later to find her also wearing a pink outfit… one that just happened to perfectly coordinate with mine.
“Mom!” I’d say incredulously. “You’re matching me. You did that on purpose!”
“Did what?” Mom asked innocently. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
She did, though. My mother has always been obsessed with dressing alike, from when I was a child, to my teenage years, to… now.
“Look what I got for Punky,” my mom said yesterday after we’d arrived at my parents’ house for a visit. She was brandishing an armload of boutique children’s clothes. Proudly, she laid them out in front of me and I murmured my admiration. She had, indeed, outdone herself. Mom had coordinated Bruiser’s pastel polo shirts and khaki shorts with Punky’s flowered dresses. Better yet, each of Punky’s dresses came with a matching dress for a doll mom had bought that looked just like my daughter. It was awesome- at least until Mom turned to me.
“I bought a few things for you, too,” she said excitedly. She held up a few tops and a dress and at first, I was thrilled, but then she said something that made every one of my dress-alike memories come flooding back.
“I want Punky to wear the blue dress to Dad’s office tomorrow,” Mom began, “and I want Bruiser to wear the blue polo, and I want you to wear this blue shirt.”
Oh. My. God. The Matchiness.
My voice said, “Okay,” but my tone said, “Hellz no.” When I told Hubs afterward, though, he didn’t show much sympathy for my plight.
“Oh, just do it,” he said. “Do it for your mom. It’ll make her happy.”
He was right. What did I care if everyone at my father’s practice thought I was one of those mothers, who dress like their kids and wear their hair in a poufy MomBob and carry Junior League lifetime membership cards in their wallets? It would make my mom happy.
And so this morning, Punky, Bruiser and I emerged from my room one big, matchy-matchy family. And to be honest, when my mom turned to greet me in the kitchen, I really shouldn’t have been surprised.
“Well, hi!” she exclaimed, with a brilliant smile on her face. She was wearing a matching blue shirt. I swear to God.
I inhaled. I exhaled. And then I smiled. Because, you know, if this is the extent of my family’s dysfunction right now?
I’ll take it.
>Oh shiza! I, too, hate it when moms dress to match their kids! Yuck! And I hate it when moms dress their boys in feminine-looking outfits! You know — all smocked and short pants and crap! Yuck!Kristina
>Okay, that’s hilarious. I love that she showed up matching as well. 🙂 Beckyhttp://www.stinkylemsky.typepad.com/
>I want to see a picture! My mom made outfits in the 70’s (I was thankfully not yet born) and my mom, brother, dad, and sister all had clothing pieces made from the same yellow and white checked pattern. My brother’s was a vest and bow tie and my dad’s was a tie. Mom and sis wore dresses. Hilarious. Those pictures always make me smile, thinking of what must have been going through my 22 year old dad’s mind. :0)
>All I wanna know is where are the pics and why didn’t you post them ?
>Oh yes – if that’s all – TAKE it. And where are the photos???? HAHAHA we need photos, bad.
>DO we have the same mother??? I have photos of my 10th birthday. My mom made me wear a dress that she made which coordinated with her dress! Thanks for bringing back the memories.
>neeeeedddd phhoooootttoooossss
>MUSTHAVEPICTURES!Hilarious!
>Laughing WITH you, not AT you!
>Haha! That’s amazing. You made the right choice…sometimes you have to swallow your pride in order to make a family member happy. (I know I do it with my mom ALL the time!)
>Oh my, I can’t believe you went along with it. If it had been my stepmother (my mother knows better), I can assure you I would have intentionally spilled something all over my outfit at breakfast.The only way we’ll ever have mother/daughter outfits in our house is if my children wake up one morning and suddenly embrace the color black. Lots of it. Because there’s no way I’m going to wear Lily Pulitzer like one of my girls or all purple like my other girl is doing these days.
>OMG! You totally have to post pictures! 😉
>You are a kind and loving woman, and I a cold hearted mean mama. THere is NO WAY I would want to be all matchy like that.In fact, MIL wore a brown and white dress on Sunday and when I saw it, I refused to stand near here… I was also wearing brown and white….
>Hey! I resemble this remark. But I don’t consider coordinating color schemes to be matchy.When you are wearing the exact. same. dress. as your daughter then it is matchy. At least I don’t go that far.
>We need photo evidence!!
>NO PICTURES. I can only endure so much humiliation, friends.
>Picture, perhaps? Please.
>My husband will not let us leave the house if we are even remotely wearing the same shade. And it’s so frustrating because sometimes I’ll have what I’m planning to wear in my head, but I don’t say it out loud and then he puts his on first and then I have to figure out something different because I didn’t get “dibs” on the color.
>To be honest, I do this when we’re going to someplace like WDW…and I bring his little photo id. Because if God forbid he gets lost I can say, “Here’s his information and he was wearing an outfit just like mine.”
>Okay, I think there’s something weird and a bit creepy about that – is it just me? You’re one hell of a good daughter to go along with it though, I’ll sure give you that one!
>When I used to work at a pre-school there was one parent who dressed her two non-twin daughters exactly alike everyday!
>how lucky are you? LOL… my mother used to dress my two sisters and me alike all the freakin time and I vowed I’d never do it to my own. LOL…
>Oh my gosh. I think your Mom is the Queen of Matchy Matchy after this event…
>Oh please say you’ll post a picture!!!!NOT that I would laugh at you…nope…
>Oh that is too cute! You should feel flattered that your mom wants people to know she is with you 🙂 I wish my mom had the money or the desire to go out and buy stuff for me whether she matched or not. LOL
>I think my mother made matching dresses for her, myslef and my younger sister once. i destroyed mine and have rarely worn anything but jeans nad black tee shirts since
>My mother and I often show up wearing the same color. We’ll both be in red with black pants or all in black or some such thing. It happens less often now, but it happened all the time when I was in high school and college (even when I didn’t live at home).It’s not surprising, I suppose, since we have similar coloring and like the same colors for clothes. But oh boy, would I be embarassed as a youngster. Now I just think it’s funny.
>At least they didn’t all have monograms on them… or did they? (Talk about Junior League!)
>HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHA!!Pictures? PLEEEEASE???I do not laugh AT, I laugh WITH. REALLY. heehee
>ohmigod!!!! hahahahhahaSo where are the photos, for proof?? Come on, you know we need to see photos of this ridiculous-ness….
>Pictures Plaaaaaaaeeeeessssseeeeee
>NO FAIR! Photos are a necessity with a post like that!You should have made hubs wear a shirt like that too.
>At least she didn’t lay out a matching ensemble for your husband!
>I would settle for “The Matchy” disfunction any day over the crap that we got. I now it is gag inducing, but just think you are making a REALLY OLD LADY happy.
>Okay… I hate it as much as the next mom… but every year, right before Easter, I lose that sensibility. I coordinate the family so that our candid photos will all come out like a spread in Don’t You Wish You Were Us Magazine. I have to admit, I was never like this until I met friends from the MidWest and the South. California Girls usually keep it real. At first I thought, How Cute! Now, it’s like too much pressure, Omigod! Like totally.
>I shouldn’t admit this, but I think it’s adorable to dress alike! I will be the first to blurt out that I have no fashion sense whatsoever, but that is probably obvious. I’m from the midwest so maybe with sugar’s comment above me, that explains it.
>You mean you’re NOT in Junior League?(Kidding!)
>We need pictures!
>I actually do like the kids to match when they are little……Gurl, you have to show us!! At least take a picture of the outfits!! We are dying out here!!!
>There are quite a few photos of my sister and I in matching outfits my mum had made when we were young. She never dressed herself to match us though.It does tend to happen to us sometimes, but only inadvertently I assure you! Like the day I got Santa photos taken on impulse and had to sit with the kids because one of them was terrified of the scary man in the weird outfit. It was only when I received the prints in the mail that I realised we were all wearing t-shirts in varying combinations of yellow and orange.My 11 year old has been known to check which geeky t-shirt dad is wearing so he can wear his matching one. Fortunately duplicate Trogdor shirts are funny rather than freaky.
>It could be worse. Your mom could have found one of those extra-special T-shirt sets instead. You know the ones–where the daughter’s and son’s T-shirt/onesies say something like “Don’t ya wish your mama was hot like mine?” and yours says “Don’t ya?”Classy.
>OH MY GOSH – better you than me! :)And I agree with the others – where’s the pics?!
>O.K. I’m with everyone else. I want pictures! But the pictures I really want are the ones where she gets matching outfits for your teens as well as the rest of you. Maybe gets them in a Laura Ashley dress? I’m sure she’s saved yours.
>Pictures please.
>>>if this is the extent of my family’s dysfunction right now? I’ll take it.Totally. But I’d still want to see pictures.
>Thank you for starting my morning off with a great laugh. Mom sounds like a handful. But, the dressing alike would drive me nuts. However, if that is the extent of your family’s disfunction, you are truly blessed!
>With all the responses, I am surprised that I am the first to ask:Did your dad have blue on when you got to his office?Laughing with you, my dear!
>Oh my. OH MY! Props to you for playing along in the matchiness.
>You MUST share a photo! I’d be more humiliated to share that my son at his own poo than to post a pic of the matchy-matchy grandma made us wear.
>Share a photo – you mom would be so proud of you!
>Okay the matchy thing has to stop!!! I have a sister in law who used to match her kids outfits and there’s a 3 year difference between them. I also felt sorry for my nephew cause he was the older one and always being dressed in baby girlie clothes to match his baby sister. The matchy thing ranks up there with the grown women who wear the shirts with cartoon characters on them and the holiday themed clothing.
>OK, you know we need PHOTOS!
>I would just humor her. Does anyone really notice what other people wear? Or maybe it’s just me. I honestly can’t tell you what someone wore on any particular day.
>wait…no pictures? FAIL!!!!
>This would have been a great post had you included a photo
>LOL…yeah, you could have much worse family dysfunctions than matching outfits 😉
>Dressing to match your kids is bad. Dressing to match your dog is much worse!
>Does your Mom read your blog? Were her feelings hurt, or was she okay about it?
>Yes, pictures! You are so right, such a small thing to do in the grand scheme of things. And who the hell knows what kind of crazy stuff we’re going to ask our own kids to do when we’re that age!