Not Your Daughter's Jeans, For Sure

What are the first three things that come to mind when you hear that there’s a product out there called Not Your Daughter’s Jeans?

For us: high waisted; light wash; pegged leg. Think Lands’ End catalog, women’s section. Beautiful models in unattractive, form-covering, age-increasing pants.

And this goes right to the heart of our perpetual question - is this where we’re at? Are we denying the fact that it is time for Lands‘ End jeans, and that we look embarrassingly inappropriate in our Forever 21 jeans? Are we wearing our daughter’s jeans, and should we get the hell out of them? Or, given that all of our daughters are pre-school age and we aren’t wearing jeans from The Children’s Place, is this even an issue?

We’ve been hearing rumors of jeans that might bridge the gap, giving nods where necessary to the fact that we aren’t 16 years old, while still looking good. And stylish. And affordable. Does it seem like too much to ask? So when we got wind of Not Your Daughter’s Jeans, we shuddered a bit at the name and went through a whole routine’s worth of mental gymnastics working ourselves up to finally admitting that we had to try them. Maybe they’d surpass our expectations, and we could wear them and look fabulous while also secretly re-naming them Daughter? What Daughter Jeans. Or, better yet, I’m Hot Jeans. Forget about the daughter altogether.

So off we went to our local Nordstrom’s, one lovely morning when all our kids were in school. We were skeptical, especially when a young and very hip saleslady we’d asked for directions shooed us out of her section towards the back. The rows of clothes we walked past got frumpier and flowery-er, like we were slowly headed into a bad neighborhood where we clearly didn’t belong.

But there they were - the NYDJ, racks and racks of them, tucked in among other older-lady gear like sweater-sets. Dark, light, black, white, skinny, bootleg, highly-rhinestoned back ends or regular plain rears, they had an impressive selection. The lovely saleswoman advised to go small, because they stretch (2% spandex) and, in her words, give you a tummy tuck. DING DING! Like magic, those words. We were on the (preschool) clock so we took a fast pass, grabbed a bunch, and went in.

First thing, they were tight. Real, real tight. But in a good way, not in a hanging-out-over-the-top way, or a can’t-bend-at-the-knee way. More of an I’m-being-cradled-gently-in-all-the-right-places type of thing. You will certainly want a small size, and nothing more than a small meal before trying them on.

Second thing, they were high.

They were the highest jeans I’ve had on in decades, pretty much since the minute my mother stopped dressing me. They fully covered my belly button, and I’m a tall person. This makes everyone back away slowly, we know. We were skeptics initially, too, and the high-waisted jean is, generally, a bad thing. But this highlighted a difference in our bodies - I am tall and big-waisted, and Denise is small and big-hipped. For her, they were so high she would want to cover the waist with a long shirt, which means she loses a good part of her bod - her tiny waist. But for me, it was surprisingly good, like all the benefits of maternity pants on top with all the jazziness of good jeans below. I always wear long shirts anyway, because my waist is never something I'd care to highlight. Plus, check me out testing the bend-worthiness of these babies - no crack! All the parents at preschool will rejoice and buy stock in this company if it gets me to cover my bum.

Third thing, they were comfortable. The 2% spandex is a big helper on that one, though there was some legitimate concern there might be a bit too much of the stuff...we didn’t want to cross any lines into jegging-territory, nor did we want them sagging after one wear, and we worried a bit that they were so stretchy it wandered into elastic-waist-land. But they were very snug without pinching or restricting, and believe me when I tell you again that we were in some unusually small sizes. Denise put the comfort issue to the test by locking herself out of her dressing room:

Fourth thing, they looked pretty damn good. We did hit a snag with the white jeans, which (as you know) Denise has gotten a bee in her bonnet about. She tried, she really did, but they were VERY TIGHT and VERY SEE-THROUGH and VERY BUMP-HUGGING, though not in the cute baby-bump way and more in the bumpy-thigh way. This, again, was a difference for us. Denise wanted more structure in the hips and thighs, slightly less cling so they flowed over her curves rather than snuggling up to them. For me, there's no such thing as too tight on the hips and legs. So the white were out, sadly. The other colors, though, looked real good, especially the darker they were.

Price tag is $100. We shrieked a bit at that, since we’re cheap Target shoppers, but allowed our minds to roam back a bit through the many pairs of thrifty but ill-fitting pants we’ve bought over the years trying to find the perfect fit, and wondered if our money might have been better spent in one place on one really good pair. It might be worth it, given how much we wear jeans.

Finally, to the issue of who these jeans are meant for - that is a tricky one. They are hidden way back in a spot in the store that screams “over 50.” The voices they use for their ads on the website aim directly at that same age bracket. The name - Not Your Daughter’s Jeans - does the same thing for us. And HELLO - we don’t even have children old enough to wipe their own butts, much less compete with us for clothes. But away from it all, in the dressing room, we liked them. We could imagine wearing them. We wished they would change the name of them, since we think we can honestly admit that we will never tell someone that we are wearing “Not Your Daughter’s Jeans,” but that seems more like a marketing problem for them rather than an actual issue for us. Hell, I buy a size 13 in the junior’s section if it’s something I like - surely that can go the other way, right? Why not buy a small size in something aimed at folks 15 years older than me if it looks and feels good?

But we know - WE KNOW - that buying in your mother’s section is flat out different than buying in your babysitter’s section. So you have to decide if you can make the walk to that dark and scary part of Nordstroms for the jeans that might be right.

Next up - to compare, we’re heading to Target to try out their Merona “Fit Solutions” jeans, which are also known as their “tummy panel” jeans. Can such support be found for a third of the price?