Turquoise + Burgundy

What I Wore: To the Mall

blue collar red lipstick; Boden dress; Boden floral dress
Dress, Boden (via eBay); sweater and belt, J. Crew Factory; scarf, Aldo Outlet

Another reason why I love Boden dresses is that they are super easy to layer under my omni-present J. Crew sweaters; the colourful patterns give me lots of scope to mess around with various versions of “colour soup” – a.k.a. throw a bunch of colours together and see what sticks. This time, we got turquoise and dark burgundy. Yum?

Can we talk about my hair, again, for a minute? For one thing, I did not set out to have these bangs. I started with cute little side-swept ones, which grew out; I tried to remedy the situation by cutting them myself and … here we are. Straight and uneven, reminiscent of the radically sloping blunt bangs my grandma gave me when I was 5. They are driving me crazy. The other thing driving me crazy is my continued failure to master the sock bun. I got one of those mesh thingies and everything, but every attempt seems to be worse than the previous. I feel like I’m regressing because I’m pretty sure I used to be able to do this. The side view is truly tragic. Le sigh!

blue collar red lipstick

Frenchified

What I Wore: Errand-ing

blue collar red lipstick; talula; old navy striped henley
Blazer; Talula (via Kijiji); top, Old Navy; jeans, Cleo (via consignment)

Do you feel like you’ve seen this already? I feel like I’ve worn this already. But I checked and … not quite. I subbed in a blazer this time, and it looks a bit more pulled-together, no?

Recently I was reading this article on how to put together a French style capsule wardrobe, and thinking to myself (and commenting) that as much as I admire French chic, I love colour and prints too much to embrace that kind of minimalism. (Plus, I’m starting to think that I actually look Corpse Bride chic terrible in head-to-toe black.) But lo and behold – I managed to put together a monochromatic outfit, using a French-approved print (bonjour, stripes!). And, listen, I do love its simplicity. I really do. But if I wore something like this every. single. day. I would spend my days in a narcoleptic daze.

 

Chambray + Florals

What I Wore: Out and About

blue collar red lipstick; pilotto for target; old navy vest
Vest and skirt, Old Navy; top, Target; boots, Hunter

I don’t have much to say about this. A while back I decided to try a version of capsule dressing, and now I feel like I have to try to make the most out of the pieces I picked for spring. Which sometimes results in outfits that feel … a little half baked.

Can we talk about my hair for a minute? On the plus side, it’s growing. Like, bona fide, finally-getting-past-the-shoulders growing. Yay! On the down side, I think I’m liking it better straightened these days – which is ironic considering that I paid cold, hard cash to get a perm not that long ago. But! I think the underlying perm does end up giving me a volume boost so, even when straightened, my hair actually looks better than it would if it was not permed. Does that make any sense? Or does it sound like a lame attempt at justification? A little bit of A, a little bit of B.