May 15, 2008
I’m ‘fessing up to my $33 outfit transgression today. I’m going to need your *professional* opinions here. A and I were browsing the mall and mostly managed to avoid all shops that I didn’t have gift cards for … except for Papaya. Whoops. Occasionally they have the odd really nice piece on sale, so we checked their clearance racks. As usual, there was a whole lot of nothing, but I turned up this high-waisted, knee length pencil skirt that I couldn’t resist. In the history of pencil skirts, I’m sure I’ve put up better fights.
Sorry the pictures aren’t great; I haven’t figured out how to take better clothing pictures yet, but this is just so you get the idea.
The skirt’s form-fitting, with a few inches of lacing up the back to make it just a bit interesting. I plan to cover up that bit during the day.
(Front waist)
(Back waist)
And the white silky blouse could probably use another button up top to keep the top of the collar closed.
But, blouse tucked into the skirt with black closed-toe pumps and a black jacket to profesh’ it up… what do you think? Did I make a huge mistake here, or is this a viable outfit?
April 23, 2008
Closet, Part Deux
The lower shelves of the closet were my next job. This is populated by my jewelry boxes, and hatboxes with smaller clothing items and undergarments. I love the use of hatboxes for undergarments, by the way. They’ll be easily portable, and the boxes are attractive. I don’t have an abundance of any clothing in these categories, so I just sorted through to make sure nothing needed washing, and refolded or rolled each piece so it was neatly organized.
The jewelry box was a huge mess. As I sorted, I realized that I was slowly forgetting the stories of some of the necklaces. I like knowing where each and every piece was acquired, or who it was a gift from, so I know I’ve got too much when I can’t recall where a particular sparkly came from. This reinforces my conviction that I was right to ask BoyDucky to stop giving me jewelry. The necklace and earrings he gave me will always have a special place in my heart, and they won’t get crowded out by others.
There were some junk pieces I’d hoarded since junior high: stud earrings missing backings, earrings missing mates, etc. Those all went out. The rest were reorganized by category: precious metals, precious stones (uh, the one pair of earrings), sparkly but not actual gemstones, and just sparkly or casual pieces.
April 22, 2008
I know I haven’t said much about the impending move since my final decision earlier this month. Rest assured, I have not changed my mind. It’s simply been a very busy time getting used to the idea, dealing with work drama, not so incidentally trying to figure out if I’m going to have a job for much longer, etc. Lots of things going on all at once, lots to think about. But, I have not forgotten, nor changed my mind. More than ever, I understand the need to move out is valid, and my real problem is restraining myself from going buck-wild quitting my job, packing up the car and moving cross country in the middle of the night so no one can find me again. Yeah. Once you open the spigot, watch out!!
Anyway, I know that I need to save up money for first/last months’ rent, the security deposit, start up costs for utilities, and miscellaneous moving costs. The one thing I absolutely do not want to do is have to pay for storage because I have too much crap. Between that, and my need not to kill myself moving too much crap, I’ve begun taking one small area of my room a day, one day a week, and clearing it all out. Junk goes into the garbage, salvageable things that I don’t need or use regularly get donated. Items in really good or new shape (haven’t run into much of that yet) will either be eBayed or Craigslisted. That’s the plan, Stan.
My first step was the closet: the shelves, not the clothes on the bar. The upper shelves are set up with cubes for easier storage. And, of course, more convenient stashing of clutter. I worked my way through the excess Comfortable Clothing up there, jammies, sweats, old ratty jersey sweaters. How many sets of pajamas does one person need? Even better, I don’t even wear pajama sets anymore, a loose-fitting t-shirt and pajama pants or shorts are as fancy as I get. The cubes are still a little full because I was just getting started and haven’t gotten really ruthless yet, but I’ll come back to it again later.
April 21, 2008
Oh no, not me, and not today. My coworker! For the past few days in a row, C2’s been wearing some really cute sweaters, and I finally caught on that I don’t ever remember seeing them before. When I asked if she went shopping, she stopped dead with the guiltiest look I’ve ever seen: “Yee…eeess….. I couldn’t resist! All my clothes were in boxes and I couldn’t find anything! …. I shopped online ….. and I like everything I got!”
I swear, that girl is the funniest thing. She acted SO guilty! I’m not the budget police! Oh wait, I kind of am. But I don’t care if she goes shopping, that’s just more clothes I can borrow later š
So another dangerous way to fall prey to the shopping bug, and spend too much money, is to pack away your clothes in boxes for a few days. Who knew?
April 16, 2008
As usual, I didn’t watch the show, but some pictures caught my eye and I wanted to share them.
Carrie Underwood completely fascinates me these days. She’s this classically blonde beauty with rather age-appropriate, elegant and striking fashion sense. I’m sure not all her picks are home runs, but whenever I see photos of her, I can’t help but wonder how much of her beauty is from artfully applied make-up, and how much is glowing youth. The fact that I can’t tell impresses me to no end. (Or is a function of my own inability to apply makeup.) Either way, I LOVE her dress here. The color is so rich, and the cut looks wonderful on her. I’m not usually a fan of jewels on clothing because it’s easy for them to look tacky, but these compliment her dress.
Again, the blondes have it. I can’t decide if I like how the front of the dress flows outward in the front, but I think I dislike that style entirely. The color, however, is fabulous. I find Taylor Swift’s attractiveness is slightly more exotic than wholesome Carrie.
AUGH. Just … AUGH. Because it can’t all be beauty, we have cautionary tales as well. Or cautionary photos. Please never do something like that to yourself.
April 15, 2008
Walking out of my office yesterday afternoon, I realized that I’d been a bit of a poster child for vibrant colors lately, and had crossed the line over to far too much brightness for one person.
Behold, my 4-year old $3 bargain bag from Target:
And my cobalt (aka: Cookie Monster) sweater that I’d meant to get in forest green:
Separately, they’re not too bad, though I should really get a grown-up bag that fits the same amount of stuff that the pink bag can hold, but together? Whoo! What was I thinkin?? I definitely feel like a kid carrying around that pink bag. š
March 16, 2008
Where has Oxiclean been all my life?? It’s a $3 miracle!
Hypothesis:
On C1’s recommendation, I’d bought a jar of Oxiclean last week, but only got the tiniest size on the shelf because, even though the 6 lb. tub was much more economical per ounce, it didn’t make sense to be left with 5.9 lbs of product if it didn’t work like I’d expected.
Materials and Methods:
My white sweater from the New York trip succumbed to a combination of spilling half the juices from my leftover pork chops down my front, making a lovely brown puddle underneath the ruching, and a weird pattern of blue-ish gray spots that I’m convinced was from washing or drying the shirt in the same load of laundry as my new blue jeans. (I have since seen the wisdom in separating my single large load of wash into two small loads of lights and darks.)
I borrowed Boy Coworker’s white socks to go running around the tennis courts for an hour. Ab-so-lute-ly filthy.
My own socks were slowing turning blue from, again, being washed in the same load as jeans.
All victims of my hard-living lifestyle were soaked in a tub of Oxiclean and water solution for about three hours yesterday, and then washed in cold water with another scoop of Oxiclean added to the detergent, and voila!
Results:
The white sweater only has the faintest of blue-ish circles left, in a couple spots, and the brown pork chop stain is entirely gone! The boy socks are almost as good as new (they really were quite dirty to begin with) and my own socks are white once again!
Conclusion:
I’ve already used most of the wee tub, so I’ll need to add the 6 lb-er to my shopping list. I should probably stick to using it for laundry, and not try to clean every other thing with it to keep costs down.
