random truths – Day 1,003 (Thursday) – ugly Christmas sweater

In 2009, I wrote a blog about how much I hated Christmas sweaters. I wrote (in my best movie announcer voice), “They are everywhere. It's like a science fiction fashion nightmare. They came from nowhere … soon they were everywhere … of Biblical proportions … it was the annual plague of the Christmas sweaters…”

Then, I continued with, “I refuse to go there. If my options were wearing a Christmas sweater or going naked and freezing at Christmas dinner, I'd choose freezing. Or skipping dinner altogether. There are very few things I take a hard stand on. This is one of them. It might actually be the only one. I swear (and I beg) if you ever, ever, see me in a Christmas appliqué sweater adorned with ornaments and/or Scottie dogs in berets and/or Christmas trees and/or little jingly bells, please, please just shoot me on sight.”

By 2012, my harsh stance on all things Christmas sweaters had softened. Maybe I became more mature or something. Or maybe it was the invitation to an Ugly Sweater Party that had me searching for one. I wasn’t going to attend a themed party and not play along. Any sweater at all would do, but none could be found where there had been entire racks of the things a couple weeks earlier.

DIY Ugly Sweater.

The solution ended up being a DIY project involving a green cardigan from a thrift store that looked like it landed there straight from the community room of some nursing home. I could picture the previous owner bundled in the sweater, rocking in a chair near a picture window. 

Thanks to Mom teaching me how to sew when I was a kid, the cardigan was decorated with a red bra from the same thrift shop and festooned with white yarn for candy cane straps, strings of Christmas tree beads and red glittery tree clips that said “Ho Ho Ho.” The effect was something like a geriatric belly dance hooker on the loose. 

The monstrosity was worn to a house party on December 15, 2012. Luckily, nobody had read or remembered reading the plea to shoot me on sight if seen in a Christmas sweater, or they weren’t feeling especially violent. And I came in second in the prize awarding, behind a quite amazing sweat pants, sweatshirt combo that was fully wired with Christmas tree lights. My mad design skills earned me an adult alcohol and hot cocoa kit.

Another party guest admired my sweater and asked to borrow it for another party. I gave it to her. I was going to be moving soon, and it was one less thing to move. It was a night of lessons. Opinions can change. Christmas themed sweaters can be worn and I won't burst into flames. I can be generous. That's quite a lot from a thrift store cardigan.