At Ease With An Iron (aka Domestic Goddess)

I am a terrible ironer. I seem incapable of getting the temperature right to get the creases out whilst ensuring my clothes don't take on that shiney look that a too-hot iron creates.

I bought a new top before going on honeymoon. It's terribly smart - and I need to look terribly smart for work tomorrow. So, despite the fact that because I bought it before honeymoon, when I didn't have a belly that has expanded like a balloon the minute I show it a two-week good time, and now I have exactly that belly and the top therefore look horrific, I am going to wear it tomorrow.

It is a shirt though. With a great big tie-up bow. It's from French Connection, which I think you'll agree makes me pretty posh (I had a voucher). But given that it's from French Connection, it was foolishly expensive for a short sleeved shirt with a large tie-up bow, and therefore, I do not wish to ruin it on it's first iron. Shirts are made to be worn - they are not made to be burnt at the ironing-board-stake the minute they are unfolded from their posh French Connection tissue paper. The shirt cannot die a virgin, is what I'm saying.

The shirt tells me it likes to be ironed at only one dot warm. My Iron doesn't have dots on. Great. I presume one dot warm is pretty tepid though, so turn the iron almost down to the stage where becomes just a cold, heavy object that I'm pushing back and forth over the fancy shirt. The creases are stubborn. I am more stubborn. I whack the iron up to just under dangerous and sit watching it while it warms up and creates that sort of wavy look you see rising from hot tarmac.

I am not stupid though, let's be clear. I have turned the shirt inside out. But it's one of those shirts that is pretty thin (note to self - must wear non-patterned, boring-coloured bra), so actually any burnages or even shinyness would probably show through. So maybe I am stupid after all.

But I apply the molten iron to the material - and hey presto - those creases ain't so stubborn any more, are they? However the shirt is shiny. And the end result still has crinkled sleeves. But I find people without crinkled sleeves dull. Honestly - who has the time to work around all that darting? And I can live with shiny. And crinkled sleeves. And if these bigwigs I'm dealing with don't want to see that I have a tartan bra on under the shirt - what the hell's wrong with them?