The Rookie Moms Challenge #35 is Buy some new jeans but I switched it up because I needed a swim suit. I should also probably claim credit for taking a baby swimming, but I’ll tell you more about that later.

Ok so I confess, I headed out to Old Navy about week 2 postpartum because I simply could not handle wearing maternity clothes post baby but I didn’t realize it was a challenge and I didn’t take any pictures or really document anything. I wanted in and out as fast as possible and luckily I succeeded and found a pair that has lasted me these past 17 weeks (although they are super cheap and leave blue dye everywhere I go). But since I didn’t take any pictures and I don’t need another pair of interim jeans I thought I’d put a little spin on this challenge and talk about the time I had to go bathing suit shopping.

Yes. Bathing suit shopping 3.5 months after I had a baby.

We’d had our Maui vacation planned for quite some time and a few weeks before we were to leave, I thought I’d try on my old bikinis just to see if there was any chance I’d fit into them. Um. Yeah right. While the bottoms weren’t horrible, the tops were completely inappropriate. I normally have a B cup and wear a small/medium. Now, breastfeeding…well, lets just say in my old bikini tops, I looked like I should have been filming a porno. There was no way I could wear them in public so off to Target I went, 3 days before leaving for vacation.

I knew I wanted to stick with a bikini. I have never been a once piece suit fan and I wasn’t about to start now. My body may not be where I want it to be, but I had a baby so there’s no reason to be ashamed of it. So I start grabbing suits…I figure a size large in bottom and top should cover it. I also grabbed some shorts and skirts for vacation in a variety of sizes and by the time I got to the fitting room I think I had about 30 things to try on. Thank goodness the fitting attendant let me take it all in!

So it became pretty clear from the start that my boobs were not fitting in a size large top. At first I thought it was just the suit I was trying on but after trying on about 5 different kinds it became very clear that it wasn’t the suit, it was my giant milk machines. Luckily I had brought in one size XL top because it was on sale and low and behold, it fit! And I actually felt pretty good about myself in it – major plus! None of the shorts fit which was disappointing but I found two skirts.

I also went back out and grabbed another suit in size XL and bought it without trying it on. It was the same brand as the one that had fit so I assumed I’d be good to go. I got home and got the approval from the husband and packed up my bags.

When we got to Maui I proudly rocked both of my bikinis and felt awesome. I’ve never been a gal with big boobs so it was kind of fun to get to walk around the pool deck and get some stares hahah. I even got comments on my Instagram account about how good my boobs looked! Little did most people know these were just temporary and I was really just carrying around lunch for my daughter, but man it was a nice confidence booster.

By the time we left I felt so confident that I even walked around with no cover-up! Although not sure if that was all due the great fitting suit, or the happy-hour mai tais but does that really matter??

[Photo credit: Whitney Drew — all rights reserved]

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