transretrogurl

Ooo, this is an odd post for a couple of reasons; the first being I have just had a lovely day doing “something new (TM)”. I’ve hiked up to Manchester, a place I have managed not to actually go to in anger for all of my 53 years. Granted, I still had the 1980’s/1990’s opinion of Manchester (and yes, I know that’s living in the past) and wow, the city is joyously fun, especially staying, as I did, at the BrewDog hotel. Each room has……. a Beer Shower Fridge. I kid you not. And a fully in tune acoustic guitar for the quests to mosh out with (which I did, and left my hands red raw because thrashing an acoustic guitar, albeit with the standard fun tracks like Baker St and ‘Times Like These’, after a couple of beers makes you ignore the pain of using your own nails as plectrums.

As per normal I digress. I was up here to try the fantastic WowGals. I’ve always admired Patti Baston’s work from afar but never considered having a session as I was so far in my comfort zone I could barely get out of the cushions. But during Covid, courtesy of yet another Covid Midlife Crisis, I promised to try new dressing services and when she said she was taking new clients I jumped at the chance. That and a brand new BrewDog hotel sealed the deal and hence I was there earlier today (May 4th) for a luscious session; the picture at the top of this blog post is a squee-ful selfie taken before we started.

And the reason this is an odd post is that there won’t be any pictures from that session in it. Not for any serious reason; we did some gorgeous retro looks that blew my mind. But it occurred to me I had forgotten, in a couple of weeks of intensive real life work and the usual drab blah stuff, to write up the other session I did last.

Hanging my head in shame here. Well, not really, as after raiding the Beer fridge I think if I tried to hang my head in shame I’d fall over. But you get the idea.

I did a second session at Cinders’ following on from the lovely one I described in the last blog post. This was a shorter session for me at least. Ten hours is excessive; as much fun as whopping on twelve to thirteen outfits and posing the hell out of my aged hips and back is, following it up with a four hour or so drive is a very good way to be muscularly uncomfortable, so I decided, gasp, to be ‘adult’ for a bit.

Anyway, this session was a short, cough, seven hours, which was just about right given I was a little knackered after the one before. But we ended up doing perhaps my favourite look of all time, which was an amazing surprise.

Also, I’d treated myself to a new ‘seven months up the duff’ prosthetic. In English, I’d purchased a simulated baby bump for a lady seven months into the cycle, and took that along for some fun. Unlike the other one I normally use I actually removed the plastic sheet on the contact patch on this one; again, in English, this means the heavy prosthetic sits directly against the skin with an adhesive, making it bond disturbingly comfortably against the skin. After five minutes of wearing it it was at my temperature and just felt, well, like I was carrying child.

We did two looks with this, both delightful maternity full-length dresses from New Look. The first was a casual shirt dress with an odd but fun design; basically it was a black under-dress, about the size of a slip, covered in a sheer green patterned shirt-dress outer layer. It felt gloriously fun to wear; proper expectant mother-wear. We combined it with a sensible collar-length bob and did a set of prim and proper pictures. The second dress was more of a ‘mothering’ outfit; dark blue with white polkadots and a removable ‘feeding’ patch for breast-feeding the little darling post-birth.

I’ve written, a little too extensively, about my little fetish around dressing as a pregnant woman; it’s a hard one to explain (at least without getting the warm fetish giggles) but I think it’s explainable thus; it’s the one thing, at the moment (even though it is physically and medically possible, it’s been defined as not ethically possible to transplant a living female womb into a male recipient), that we can never do. So to dress in that attire, with an appropriate prosthesis, is almost the ultimate emasculation (for those who see it as such) or the ultimate tribute. Either way I love the way it feels to waddle around with a bloated and heavy baby belly.

Moving on.

We followed that up with a cute little white ‘mumsy’ dress, again from New Look. I’d bought this because a: I don’t think I’ve ever worn a white with black polkadots and b: I loved the sleeves on it; they were that delightful little ruffle effect. It was a mid-shin length dress, at least on a hulking 6ft 2in me. And I loved the feel of it; a proper ‘your best friend’s mum’ look. I’ve always thought I should dress age-appropriate, if not biological-sex-appropriate.

Then came the first of the ‘fun’ frocks. I bought this little green minidress from HellBunny; I loved the collar and button effect, and the frilled skirt. It felt cute and we played that up with some poses with Cinders’ ever-suffering little pink teddy bear. There’s a deep part of me, probably shacking up in Sarah’s pink flat in the back of my brain, that always feels protective and sorry for furry things, even if they aren’t actually alive, so any chance I have to give that little bear some girlie love I take it. Plus the fact he (she?) has a little fluffy heart saying ‘It’s a girl’ always makes me chuckle for all the best reasons.

Then a new Kitty! Granted, I did go through a, well, excessive Kitty phase but it’s been a while, and the pattern on this was to die for. Cinders did her usual magic with a Victory Rolls hairstyle and I played it up for the camera; off the record (and I am 100% sure Viv of Holloway doesn’t read this blog) I’ve always had a secret wish to be a model for VoH’s website. Given their target clientele probably doesn’t include the obsessive 53 year old retro crossdresser that wish will possible never be satisfied, but it doesn’t stop me producing website worthy poses. And floral Kittys always do it for me.

Going to skip ahead one now, as the next outfit was actually the contender for the OH MY GOD IT’S ADORABLE award; we finished on another new Ted Baker Cindy had managed to acquire from eBay. It was a lovely sleeveless pink skater dress and the fact it was second-hand was a bit of a joyous kink. The idea someone had bought, loved and sold on this frock I was now modelling was a lovely feeling. It was, being honest, probably two sizes too small for me but like all ever-optimistic party going girls I was up for squeezing myself into it.

But back to ‘that’ outfit. Again, unsurprisingly, a Cinders ‘dealer’s choice’, this one was a figure hugging, cut-at-the shoulder gold dress that we styled as a 1930’s movie starlet. From the moment I put it on I had that electric-like buzz that felt brilliant and told me this was something else; I may not have written about this before but there are some looks that, when you zip yourself into them, just work and posing is incredibly easy. This was one of the best examples of that; the minute I saw myself in the mirror I actually fell in love with the girl there (possibly something I would need to discuss with a shrink sometime in the future but still, a lovely feeling).

Posing was so easy; I just drew into myself and let the joy flow outwards, We combined the outfit with a (false!) fur stole, and then a lovely fascinator and it just simply worked. The cut of the dress was ultra-flattering, the choice of hair perfect and, yet again, a dealer’s choice that wouldn’t have been something I would have even thought about.

On that positive note, combined with the buzz I have from a absolutely incredible retro session today with WowGals (pictures incoming) and SHOWER BEER (thank you BrewDog Doghouse Manchester) it’s time to turn off the lappy and chill. With perhaps another beer from that fridge.

Stay beautiful and try something new. It’s like a breath of fresh air through the soul…..