Dress, Joe Fresh; cardigan, J. Crew Factory; shoes, Old Navy; bag, MbMJ (via eBay)
This is such a cute dress – only $24 at Joe Fresh! pockets!! – and it really doesn’t deserve to be buried under this cardigan. But, them’s the breaks. I am hopeful there will be one day out of the next 30 29 when I’ll be able to wear this dress on its own. In the meantime … cardigan.
Oh, and also … unintentional mixing of black and navy. I’m probably hideously behind the fashion times on this issue, but I hate pairing dark navy and black because they just end up looking like mismatched shades of the same colour. A lighter navy and black? Yes. What’s happening here? Nope. No. Nooooo! This personal fashion low happened because (a) I wanted to wear this dress on a day that required tights, and (b) after getting dressed, I realized that I didn’t include my navy flats in the 30 x 30 line-up. D’oh! And sigh. So Adina of me. Anyway, I didn’t feel like messing about with my chosen clothes on the very first day of the challenge (how failure-riffic would that be!), so … there you have it. Mind-numbingly boring explanation and everything.
I haven’t done one of these shopping recaps/breakdowns in aaaages. Did you miss them? I enjoy reading other bloggers’ posts about their shopping budgets and choices (hello, Franish and her fellow budgeting bloggers) because I’m incurably nosy, but I shouldn’t assume that y’all don’t have better things to do with your blog reading time. So, let me know: yay, or no1curr?
I’m going to go ahead and talk about this month’s shopping anyway, because – stop the presses – I actually made a shopping list this month. And – stop the presses again – I managed to stick to it. Well, mostly. Here’s the score: I bought 11 items for a total of $272 (retail value approx. $1063). I also got a couple of gifts for Mother’s Day:
“Pants” are a perennial item on my shopping list; I’m still searching high and low for work-appropriate ones (and running out of time) but I found these instead and couldn’t resist. I would happily buy them in every colour of the rainbow at that price:
AG Stevie cropped cords
I also bought the Old Navy blue top I talked about here ($15), and this ring ($9) which was a total impulse buy. Mea culpa and all that.
I included 2 wildcard spots on my shopping list, because I know my Achilles heel, and its name is “impulse buy” (see above, and below). I set a $40 limit for each of these items, because otherwise there would be a strong possibility that my handbag collection would gain a couple more pretties – this month, any month. But I was good; I bought these instead:
Mel by Melissa Jelly FlatsOld Navy Chambray Dress
And then, right around the end of the month, I went off the rails a bit. I bought another pair of my fave J. Crew Factory Anya flats, because they were burgundy and a hella sale:
J. Crew Anya Suede Flats (Cabernet)
This blue was just too gorgeous to pass up:
Joe Fresh Ombre Tee
And so was this print:
Edme & Esyllte peasant blouse
And I bought this, because … I couldn’t not. The red/blue combo gets me every time.
Marc by Marc Jacobs Frida Flag Dress
Things I didn’t find, and I’m still looking for: Marc Jacobs Blake bag or MbMJ Mag bag (come on, eBay!), yellow sandals (utterly impossible quest, I’m convinced), and cropped cigarette pants a la Audrey Hepburn (might as well be hunting unicorns). And another magical thrifting find would be nice too. Mayhap a Burberry trench coat? Well, a girl can have her midsummer dream, yes?
Here’s the scoop. Last year, I decided I needed a shirt dress. Why? Well, somehow I became convinced it was a classic wardrobe staple missing from my closet, and that it was imperative that I redress the oversight. Don’t ask, just go with it. Initially, I had my eye on a Sophie Theallet for Limited dress, but the bidding on eBay went above my budget, so I had to reconsider. This J. Crew dress is … nothing remotely similar, save for meeting the generic shirt dress criteria. The photos on the listing were bad, but the price was pretty good, so I took a chance.
And then.
If you guys think this dress looks borderline dowdy now, you should have seen it when I first got it. My husband took one look, and proceeded to laugh for thirty minutes, give or take. Picture it about 5 inches longer, and firmly in Duggar family territory. Still, nothing makes me want to double down on questionable fashion choices more than my husband’s ribbing. Length issues aside, the dress fit well and had a nice hand-feel (seersucker-ish, perfect for summer). I decided to have the hem taken up above the knee to try to de-dowdy-fy it as much as possible. And there you have it.
At least we’re in hausfrau territory now. I’ll take it.
Here’s a closer look at the details, and my fifty shades of mismatched brown.
