Every year Someone To Whom I Am Very Close organizes a Big Festive Deal for her work. And while I can’t be terribly detailed about the Big Festive Deal, I can tell you that it takes place in Nashville.

And I think we all know that Nashville is really famous for its, you know, peas.

OH, I kid.

Anyway, Big Festive Deal is coming up soon, and for the first time ever, I’m getting to go. I’m not a real guest or anything, oh heavens no; I’m going to be STWIAVC’s official gopher for the evening. But it is a dressy event, and this is going to be quite a challenge for me considering that I haven’t donned what I like to call “them fancy clothes” since I went to a Christmas party in Louisiana in 1999.

(As you can tell, D and I are really plugged into the social scene.)

(But if you ask me, a huge problem with dress-up parties is that nobody wants to watch TV. I mean, why would I dress up to NOT watch TV when I could stay home in my pajamas and watch TV ALL NIGHT LONG?)

Anyway, I do have some very fun, wide-legged black pants that Mama gave me after I had Alex, and initially I thought I would wear them and try to find some sort of dressy top. So today I headed to the Steinmart(s) and tried on eleventy five different versions of dressy / silky / cocktail-y tops and jackets, all of which left me sufficiently underwhelmed.

I brought home (well, I mean, I BOUGHT it – I didn’t just walk out of the store with it) a very pretty long, celadon-green jacket that wasn’t especially dressy but could be passable with the right jewelry and shoes, but on the way home I kept thinking that since the jacket was made of a pretty thick material and had long sleeves and required an additional shirt underneath, I would no doubt be BURNING UP HOT at the Big Festive Deal, and y’all know that I do not enjoy being BURNING UP HOT, and really, what’s the point of wearing a pretty new jacket if you’re just going to be BURNING UP HOT the whole time?

So I decided the green jacket was out. And I also realized, in a moment of horrified clarity, that being properly attired for the Big Festive Deal was going to require something of me that I try to avoid at all costs: a trip to the mall.

Now the good news is that Mama is here all week, so I knew she would be great reinforcement at the mall in terms of helping with the little man AND helping me pick out something to wear. Because those department stores have A LOT of clothes, y’all. And I get a little overwhelmed.

We decided to start our search in Macy’s because I love their INC line, and by the time we made a half a loop on the main floor I had ten or twelve things to try on. I also had removed my child from at least two mannequin stands and reminded him no fewer than six times to use your inside voice, please since most shoppers aren’t really hoping to find a forty-two pound four year-old doing his best imitation of a ROARING LION when they’re trying to make their way through Better Sportswear.

Sweet memories.

We eventually made our way to a dressing room, and Mama sat down in an area where people can relax and watch television while their daughters or mothers or wives or girlfriends are trying on clothes. Now this idea is great in theory, but I would just like to point out that when the TV in the waiting area is blaring “The Montel Williams Show” and the sound system in the dressing rooms is blaring Corinne Bailey Rae’s “Put Your Records On” and a four year-old is running up and down the dressing room hallway blaring various renditions of “RAAAAAAAAAAR STINKY POOOOOOOOOPY HEAD RAAAAAAAAAAAR,” the Macy’s shopping environment ceases to be even a little bit relaxing.

This is not a criticism. It is merely an observation.

Anyway, after at least an hour of trying on clothes and soliciting the opinions of no fewer than three complete strangers and hearing Corinne Bailey Rae sing, “Just go ahead, let your HAIIIIIIR down” over and over again in my head, Mama and I settled on a very simple black dress that I’ll be able to wear forever. I have big plans to sassy it up with some fun shoes and jewelry. And here’s a picture:

In the interest of full bloggy disclosure, you should know that, well, I haven’t been the size of this model since I was thirteen. And I don’t think it’s the exact same dress because mine has a wider neckline, isn’t cut quite as low, has more of an empire waist and is just a smidge longer.

But other than those things, the picture is completely accurate.

And here’s my question: if you were going to wear this dress to a Big Festive Deal, what would you do for 1) shoes and 2) accessories? I am wary of doing the somewhat expected black shoes and pearls because I haven’t dressed up in a really long time and would prefer to have a little fun with what I’m wearing.

Which may lead you to wonder why I picked a simple black dress.

But still.

So if you have any suggestions, I’d love to hear them, just please don’t tell me to wear hose because NO, NOT GONNA, SORRY.

And if you have specific stores you recommend for great shoe or accessory finds (CHEAP! I LOVE CHEAP!), all the better. Just know that if you put more than two links into your comment, it’ll automatically go into the moderation folder, but I will rescue it as soon as I can.

Normally I do pretty well with fashion stuff like this, but today’s mall-related adventures left me all shopped out. So thanks in advance for your help – you’re the best internets in the whole wide world (web).

Okay, before I forget, let me just say thank you for all your kind remarks about our, um, driveway.

I’m telling you: you just never know what will interest the internets.

So you may rest assured that the next time I go outside I’ll tell the driveway all the sweet things you said, and I bet the encouragement will make the driveway happy because it’s almost 34 years old and probably feeling a little run down.

Or run over, if you will.

BADABING!

Now. Several more things.

First of all, the LSU vs. Florida game last night shaved a solid decade off of my life. We were so happy that the Tigers won, but have mercy it was a nail-biter.

Second of all, D, Daddy and I went to see The Bourne Ultimatum this afternoon, and if you’ve seen the movie you know that the part in Tangier? When that man was chasing that woman and Jason Bourne was trying to find them so he could stop the man from killing her?

WORE. ME. OUT.

Seriously. I just wanted to put my head down and take a little nap. Mainly so my heart would SLOW DOWN, ALREADY.

And third.

About a week ago I saw a note on Alex’s school calendar that we needed to MAKE A POCKET for him to take to school tomorrow, and the pocket should be big enough to hold a small toy.

Y’all, it has been stressing me out for a week. I mean, you know how you used to feel when you were in school and it was late Sunday afternoon and you knew you needed to study because you had a huge test Monday morning? That’s exactly how I’ve felt for about the last four days.

OVER A HANDMADE POCKET.

Late this afternoon I clicked over to Bev’s and saw that she had made some absolutely adorable bibs, and as I was thinking about how cute they are and how it would take me WEEKS to finish even one of them, I decided that I needed to just sit down and GET THE POCKET OVER WITH so that maybe I could relax a little bit tonight.

But you know, funny thing: when you’re not crafty, you tend not to have any extra pieces of fabric laying around.

I looked in every single closet in this house, and I finally found about half a yard of fabric that I bought one time to make no-sew scarves for the dogs (PINKING SHEARS, PEOPLE! PINKING SHEARS!). So I pulled out the fabric, rounded up a needle and thread, and sat down at the kitchen table to make a pocket.

No kidding: I was so undone about the whole thing that I broke a sweat. And became temporarily convinced that our air conditioner was broken.

And as proof of my almost total lack of participation in your typical mama-type crafts, my child actually walked up to the kitchen table, surveyed all materials, picked up a round black thing and said, “What’s this, Mama?”

“Why, it’s a SPOOL OF THREAD, baby.”

“What’s it for?”

“Well, in some cultures people actually use it to SEW THINGS or perhaps even MAKE SOME CLOTHES.”

He’d never heard of such.

So I finally cut out a pocket-type creation on my third attempt to tame the unruly fabric, and I spent the next twenty minutes sewing up the sides. I did remember to sew it inside out because I have in fact watched Martha Stewart’s TV show on occasion (SEE? TV IS HELPFUL, Y’ALL!), and once I examined the final product I knew deep in my heart that it was really, painfully ugly (LOOK, KIDS! GRIMACING PUMPKINS!), but I was so relieved that the whole terrifying ordeal was over that I really didn’t care.

Handstitched with luv by yours truly.

And what a precious family heirloom the Scary Pumpkin Pocket will be.