Cape Town - Like most working women, I have a sort of a uniform that I wear to the office every day.
IOL is fortunately a relaxed workplace, so I am not required to turn up in a power suit and high-heeled shoes.
But Cape Town weather, a modest clothing budget and a practical turn of mind dictate the following: skirt or pants (can be jeans); smartish blouse (can have a T-shirt underneath it when cold); sandals or boots or lace-up shoes. Coat in winter. Pretty scarf or pashmina always. Done, and out the door.
Dresses don't feature: not because I don't like them but because they just don't do the frugal job that mix-and-match separates do.
So what I was thinking when I agreed to the Milk Matters Dresses for Lives Challenge is beyond me: I am apparently going to be wearing a dress (no skirts!) for the entire month of December.
It could only have been the persuasive powers (and they are considerable) of my friend Jenny Wright, a passionate advocate for the Milk Matters breastmilk bank.
It is undeniably a good cause: in short, Milk Matters supports breastfeeding mothers and collects and redistributes their excess milk to needy premature babies. Milk Matters staff screen donors, pasteurise milk and make sure it gets to the hospitals where it is needed for really small babies - those who weigh under 1.5kg. For those very tiny babies, this milk can often mean the difference between life and death.
Jenny says Milk Matters has had wonderful support over the years. They have grown from supplying one doctor with donor milk for a handful of babies in 2003, to supplying life-saving donor milk for hundreds and hundreds of babies a year at 27 different hospitals. But they have reached a ceiling in terms of how much milk they can pasteurise a week with their current equipment and that in turn limits how many babies they can feed.
"The only solution is to expand both our capacity to pasteurise donor milk and to increase how much donor milk we receive," she says.
And that's where me wearing a dress comes in.
Milk Matters's biggest awareness and fundraising campaign of the year is Dresses for Lives. The concept is simple: people wear dresses in December and get sponsored for every day a dress is worn.
So I am going to haul out the only two dresses I possess, and wear them for 31 days in a row. I think I may have to do a little shopping.
I'll be tweeting a picture of myself in a dress every day that I manage it, on @IOLlifestyle, using the hashtag #dressesforlives.
It would be wonderful if IOL readers - individual or corporate - felt moved to sponsor me. To do that, email your pledge to [email protected] and keep a beady eye on IOL Lifestyle's Facebook and Twitter accounts, where I will be posting my progress.
You deposit your pledge money using my special reference number which is: 2015D12. Nitty gritty bank details will be provided later... when it appears I have managed this feat!
IOL
@reneemoodie
* If you would like to take part (either by wearing a dress, dressing your baby in a dress or by sponsoring someone who is wearing a dress, email [email protected]
* Website: milkmatters.org