Thanks to a group of fashion-minded mom bloggers, this week’s Mercedes Benz Fashion Week in NYC is going to include its first ever fashion show for moms on Thursday -- Strut: The Fashionable Mom Show.

Peter Kramer / AP

Model Mom: Iman is hosting a mom-centric fashion show at New York City's fashion week. About time!

That’s right.  A fashion show for moms. When I heard about this I jumped for joy.  “Yay!  It’s about time!” 

But will somebody please tell me why the fashion industry relegated moms to the back of the proverbial minivan in the first place?

Yes, I’m a mom.  But I’m a woman too.  I mean, I understand their confusion: as a 40-something-year-old mother of three I couldn’t be further from what the fashion industry recognizes as a woman. I have completed puberty; I weigh more than a medium-sized dog (even a wet one) and the time I spend on my hair is limited to the length of the red lights I encounter as I drive my kids to school.  I fear that if a fashion insider encountered me on the street they might call in a Yeti sighting.

But moms have as much right to dress well and feel good about themselves as anyone else.  Even more so, if you ask me! 

Why are people so surprised that moms love fashion, have style and want to look good?  Society simply assumes that once we have children, we as people (let alone fashionable human beings) cease to exist.  For thousands of years, women have been expected to hang up their hotness once they have children. And it’s not OK.  Not with me!  After all, I didn’t push out my fashion sense along with my baby.

I want style!  I want glamour!  I want clothes that make me feel like a million bucks (without spending a million bucks…) but it’s not as easy as you’d think.  The industry just doesn’t see moms as being stylish or profitable.   After all, high fashion is not exactly kid-friendly (I tell you this after attempting to wipe ketchup off my cashmere Carolina Herrera dress at a party last weekend). 

And the biggest perpetrators of fashion crimes against moms are designers who think moms don’t care how they look, or worse, see themselves as an extension of their children -- this would certainly explain the invention of the bunny-covered diaper bag.

But I see enough moms every day at school, at gymnastics, at basketball, at the park, and out on the town on date night or with girlfriends, and I can assure you that style is alive and well among the mommy crowd.

Being a mom is a huge part of who I am, but it doesn’t define me.    Not by a long shot (I can hear the collective gasps out there).  I love my children with all of my heart and with every fiber of my being.  But being their mom is not all I am, and quite frankly, I want them to know it.

Why is it so strange that I would want to celebrate who I am as a woman AND a mother, by looking good?  After all isn’t 40 the new 30… but with better accessories?

Changing society’s conception of moms is not going to be easy.  But I see this fashion show as a step in the right direction.  So what if it’s just one catwalk.  I have my own runway, and it’s never-ending road dotted by school yards, supermarkets, offices, soccer fields… and a little bit of ketchup.

Sarah Maizes is the founder of www.MommyLITEonline.com, a parenting humor site, and the author of  “Got Milf? The Modern Mom’s Guide to Feeling Fabulous, Looking Great and Rocking a Minivan”.  She is a freelance writer, speaker, comedian and mother of three.  In her spare time she… wait… she has no spare time.

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