dress/belt and heels: Target
cardigan: thrifted
necklace: Jane
watch: secondhand (Coach)
Do you guys remember when pattern mixing was A Thing? A few years ago, it was all the rage with bloggers, right up there with color blocking and arm parties. I personally wasn't disappointed to see color blocking go the way of the dodo, as they say, but I think pattern mixing is a fairly classic trend.
I bought this dress back in early summer when it became apparent that I had five weddings on my calendar for 2015 and no appropriate dresses that hadn't already been seen by those particular social crowds. It's great for work too, though, and in the winter it's perfect with a pair of black tights. Although we're still facing unseasonably warm temps, so I feel like I could still get away with wearing this with nude hose if I wanted to. Craziness!
In other news, I now have a second blog (because maintaining one lately isn't enough). You can follow my adventures in portrait photography over at Elfie Photography, my business site. And hey, if you're looking for a newborn or family photographer in Columbus, Ohio, I'm your gal! Mention this blog to get 20% off your first session :)
For constantly being sick, apparently. Or at least, that seems to be the case for me lately.
t-shirt: Old Navy
cardigan: thrifted
skinnies: The Limited via Discount Fashion Warehouse
boots: Target
necklace: Express via DFWh
I wound up leaving work after just a couple of hours today; I developed a nasty cold at the end of last week that left me with what feels like a face full of cotton. Congestion and stopped-up ears, hurrah! I thought an ear infection was settling in too, but apparently it's not quite that bad yet. Just in case, I've been wrapped up on my couch all day with Star Trek and some wedding crafts to keep me company.
I always feel like my posts have too much blabbering about random stuff and not enough about the actual outfits I'm posting. This outfit was an unusual choice for me; I don't usually like to layer like colors, like I did with this top and cardigan. But I think I like it here; it's hard to see, but the darker stripes in the t-shirt almost perfectly match the cardi, without being too overt.
Welp, I'm also using today to catch up on start my Christmas shopping. Usually I'm pretty on top of it, but this year I've gotten an unfortunately late start. All I can say is, thank god for Amazon Prime, amiright?
tank: secondhand
cardi: Express via Discount Fashion Warehouse
jeans, heels: Target
necklace: Etsy
So a while back, my friend Hayley and her husband moved into their very first house (yay!). As she was packing, she mentioned that she had a bunch of clothes to take to Goodwill. Hayley has great style, so I told her to drop the clothes at my house so I could pick through them, and then take the leftovers to Goodwill for her. Imagine my surprise when she showed up with a literal carload of stuff--it was nearly 20 garbage bags of clothes, bags, bedding and random appliances. I couldn't keep most of it due to fit, but I did snag a few amazing pieces out of the bunch. Including this tiger tank.
This tank is one of those things that, if I saw it on the shelf, I wouldn't even consider buying it. But for some reason, it caught my eye as I was knee-deep in clothes in my living room (not an exaggeration) and I kept it. So glad I did! It's ended up being one of my favorite casual-wear items.
I can't think of anything else to write today without spewing a billion lines of wedding-related word-vomit (DRESS SHOPPING THIS WEEKEND OMG HOLY CRAP) so instead I'll end with the standard blogger-feedback-seeking question: Did you ever grab an item (purchase or secondhand) that you didn't think you'd wear but ended up loving?
I may or may not have stolen that word from Sydney, but I'm sure (I hope?) she won't mind. It's a pretty baller word. Anyway we had another (mini) climbing trip this weekend and it was pretty rad for only being a 36-hour trip. Matt and I met our friends at the Red River Gorge Friday night, climbed all of Saturday and then trucked out early Sunday morning so I could get back to Columbus for a dance rehearsal.
If you follow me on Instagram, you might have seen some of the snaps I took over the course of the day. I didn't get anyone to take any of me, which is unfortunate because I successfully climbed my hardest route yet. It was a 5.9 in Muir Valley--and if the idea of a "5.9 at the Red" seems familiar to you, that's because it was one of my 25 in 25 bucket-list items. To quote Minus the Bear: Booyah achieved! I actually didn't think I'd make it past the small roof about halfway up the route, as I am terrible at overhung climbing. (If you want some context, here's a shot of the route. The guy in the green shirt is working the roof, and the guy in orange is nearly to the top.) Anyway, I surprised even myself when I managed to pull up past it, and then had the conundrum of trying to figure out how to climb the rest of the route, which I hadn't really looked at because I didn't think I'd make it that far. That one route made my whole day.
Matt climbed an impressive 5.10c that totally blew my mind--the start was nothing but the teeniest little nubbins of rock and iron. Think half-inch nubs and smaller. I swear at one point he was hanging on with one finger on a Peanut M&M-sized hold and a couple fingertips of his other hand on an equally teensy little ledge. *PSHEWWW!* <--sound of my mind being blown again at the memory
And to those of you who aren't such climb-enthusiasts: fear not. I have an outfit post to entertain you as well :)
dress: The Limited via Discount Fashion Warehouse
cardigan: Express via DFWh
heels: Target
necklace: The Limited
bracelet: Etsy
I have been largely anti-peplum since...well, basically forever. But I saw this dress on a semi-recent trip to Discount Fashion Warehouse with Emily and kind of fell in love. The peplum is subtle enough that I don't feel goofy, and the whole thing just has these polished, professional lines that I could not pass up.
It's finally getting warm enough to allow me to do outside photos again, and I'm happy to report that this will (hopefully) be the last indoor shoot you see for a while. Oh, and speaking of warm weather, guess who's going to pick up her freshly painted, now-running-again scooter from the shop this afternoon? THIS GIRL! I'm so excited, I can hardly stand it.
Every once in a while, I'll stumble across a blog post or a pin or some other resource that makes me think, "Doy, why haven't I tried this yet??" Many times, those "doy" moments involve photography and photo editing. I'm still very much a pupil when it comes to shooting in my camera's manual mode, and self-photography is far from an easy way to learn.
I have a bad habit of fidgeting slightly out of place, which throws my focus area off and effectively dooms my photos to blurry, sub-par quality. But I don't always realize this right away, because my camera's preview screen is tiny and sometimes the photos look great until I upload them. This is especially frustrating if I was having a really great hair and/or makeup day on the original shoot.
When I uploaded these photos and realized that some of my favorites were a bit on the blurry side, I decided to take matters into my own hands with some RAW editor sharpening. I'm not entirely sure I'm happy with the result, but I'm still playing with the settings and figuring out what everything does.
I also used another "photo tip" I recently picked up. The tip talked about how wearing lip color can really make a huge difference on a portrait photo. I wasn't wearing any when I shot this, and sure enough, my lips were blending into my face just a tad. So I went in and bumped up the red/magenta hues in the RAW editor just a *wee* bit. The effect was only visible on my lips, and it was pretty subtle. But it made a huuuuge difference. I'm thinking I'll make that the topic of a Makeup Monday post soon (next week?).
blazer: thrifted
blouse: The Limited via Discount Fashion Warehouse
skinnies, heels: Target
necklace: Etsy
I wore this a few weeks ago almost a month ago to a little date night with Matt at The Refectory. His sister and brother-in-law got us a gift card for Christmas, so we used it during a three-course prix fixe special the restaurant was having. It was heavenly, as always, and I was seriously regretting my choice of skinnies and heels by the time I hobbled out after dessert. I was pretty convinced they would have to roll me out, but I managed--somehow!
Actually, if I really wanted to stretch things and tie this outfit in to the "experimenting" theme, I agonized for a while over whether to wear a long or short necklace with this. It's silly, I know, but it was really bothering me. I even texted Emily for advice, because I thought the outfit was very "her." She actually suggested the long necklace, but I was stubborn and went short anyway.
I've discovered that when I ask people for advice, it tends to just be a way for me to gauge my gut reaction to your suggestion and figure out how I really feel. I did this recently by asking all my Facebook friends whether I should grow my hair for the wedding. They all said "grow it out!" and I immediately shouted NO! (in my head) over and over. So there's that.
Ok, so, abrupt subject change. It's honest critique time. Do these photos look a little off, thanks to my artificial sharpening/noise reduction attempt? Or is it all in my head? (And I promise, this isn't a "how do I really feel?" question. I really can't tell if I'm being too picky or not, haha!)
When I first started blogging, I tended to wear a lot of neutral colors. Black, gray, white, beige...that was my comfort zone. Every once in a while, I'd throw in a pop of red or yellow. Now, I'm mixing colors and patterns with the best of them. I might stick more to the "safe" zone of color-/pattern-mixing, but I still do it.
Usually.
sweater: New York & Company
blouse: Express via Discount Fashion Warehouse
khaki skinnies: Old Navy
boots: Target
necklace: Jane.com
Sometimes, it's kind of nice to go back to my roots, so to speak. Though even this outfit is a far cry from the black shirt/khaki pants combo I would have been wearing three years ago, when I first started brainstorming the idea of a style blog. The pearls! The stars-as-polka-dots sheer blouse! The layering! The khakis-as-skinnies-tucked-into-boots! I would have worn none of it, I tell you.
Except the sweater. That baby was purchased nearly three and a half years ago, when I first entered the professional world and needed a business casual wardrobe, stat. New York & Company, you've done well for me.
Oh, and if that last photo looks different, it's because it is. Slightly. I played around with sharpening the image in Photoshop's RAW editing mode before using the sharpening actions I've mentioned before. (My original post on sharpening photos is pretty poor; it's little more than a link to these three pages. I'm going to do some more research on sharpening in the RAW editor, then I'll come back and do a comprehensive post on the whole shebang. So...stay tuned!
blouse: really old, don't remember
cardi: Express via Discount Fashion Warehouse
skinnies: Forever 21
boots: Target
necklace: gifted
I read this Tumblr thing recently that claimed that when corals get stressed, they die. I can't attest to the veracity of that claim, but I can say that I relate a little. Only instead of dying, I just kind of shut down a bit. Like yesterday, when I was trying to catch up on some freelance work and I kept stressing out about what I was/wasn't getting done. So I just stopped. And watched Girls for approximately three hours. And then in Girls, Hannah was stressed about a deadline and she just stopped working on it too, so that kind of validated my decision. Only difference is she had a bit of a nervous breakdown whereas I am just getting really grumpy and annoyed and...well, stressed.
That's, like, a normal thing. Right?
In other news, I'm really digging this outfit. This cardi in general is pretty awesome, but I surprised myself a bit when I paired it with these boots. It looked so much better than I expected it to! The sad news, though, is that I have to retire these boots. They're cheap-o Target deals, and while they lasted me two years, they're about to kick it. (Heh.) But really. The faux-leather stuff is peeling off the front and the toes. Bout time to hit up the end-of-season clearance racks for some new cognac boots! I think I'll go non-slouchy this time.
blouse: The Limited via Discount Fashion Warehouse
cardigan: Express via DFWh
slacks: thrifted
flats: secondhand
necklace: The Limited
For me, most really bad colds usually have a turning point, or a hump. After days and days of feeling crappier and crappier, suddenly there's a day where you don't feel quite as bad as the day before. And then another. And that's when I realize, I'm getting over the hump. I think that's where I am now; I hope it is, because I don't know how much more of this going-to-bed-at-nine-every-night-and-still-waking-up-exhausted stuff I can take.
Of course, this week, "the hump" also means the same hump as everyone else's: Wednesday. Due to holidays, vacation days and sick time, this is the first full week I've worked since before Christmas. I'm not complaining, but man, that extra day seems like five this week :)
Today's outfit is another month-old gem from my stockpile of photos. It's crazy how much my hair has grown in that time! Well, I guess any amount of growth is significant when you have a pixie. Also, you can see my work badge in that first pic. Forgot to take it off at first! If you look reeeeeeally close, you might get a glimpse of my shoulder-length hair from almost two years ago. Hard to believe it's been that long!
blouse: secondhand
slacks: thrifted
cardi, flats: Target
necklace: Etsy
Hooray, you might be thinking, she finally put up another outfit post! (Who cares if it's a month old, right?) Or perhaps you're mentally rolling your eyes at the mention of being sick yet again. Well, I agree with you in either case. I know I complain a lot about colds and whatnot around here, but that's only because I have a terrible, crap immune system that doesn't seem to understand what it's supposed to do. Seriously, I've had this cough for like a week and it's showing no sign of letting up.
I had a hugely busy weekend planned for yesterday/Sunday, full of venue tours and DMV visits and dance rehearsals and various other things. The mere thought of it on Friday was exhausting. But fortunately for me/my immune system, literally every task/event I had planned was cancelled due to a sizeable snowstorm. Except our friends' engagement party. Happily, that continued regardless.
So instead of running around like a chicken with my head cut off, I was able to stay home almost all weekend and relax. I got some writing done, I napped, I read, I napped some more, I watched a few movies, I went to bed early every night...it was just what the doctor ordered.
How was your weekend, all? Busy like mine was supposed to be, or relaxing like it actually was?
sweater dress: The Limited
cardi, boots: Target
tights: Groupon deal
belt: H&M
necklace: Express
I think one of the worst parts about blogging, for me, is having news that I'm not quite ready (or allowed) to share on the blog. When it comes to my own personal secrets, I am a terrible keeper. I just get so excited and want to share that excitement with the world! (When it comes to other peoples' secrets, however, I'm a vault. Swear.) Anyway, some pretty exciting collaborations and other fun things are coming up, both here on VM and in real life. And I can't talk about most of them for, like, another month. Maybe more? One of the IRL things I actually have no idea when I'll be able to share. How's that for cryptic?
Don't worry, I'm not a complete tease here. I do have one fun thing to share with you guys. A fellow Ohio University J-school alum, Rachel, has started a blog about Generation Y-ers/Millennials. Specifically, folks that age who aren't living up to the media hype of being lazy underachievers. Her first feature? It's me! I'm so flattered; to be honest, I didn't think of my debt paying-off-ness as really a huge achievement. It was just something I had to do. Then I thought about the numbers...$18,000 in less than three years is something to be proud of. And I am. Ok, not-so-humble-brag over. Check out Rachel's blog, both now and later when she has some more features.
In other news, there are clothes pictures here too! I'm digging this outfit, though I think the tights might be a little too dark. I had the same problem when I wore them here, but I think it was worse for that outfit. Here, it seems almost passable. What do you think?
blouse, skirt: secondhand
blazer: Express via Discount Fashion Warehouse
tights, heels: Target
necklace: gifted
Oh yeah, I went there. Does using words like "chillaxin'" make me cooly ironic, or just dorky? Wait, don't answer that; I've just realized that I don't actually care :)
So I thought this weekend would be a pretty busy one, but it actually turned out to be fairly chill. We went to a friend's housewarming-slash-football-viewing party (Go Bucks!) for most of the day Saturday, then Matt and I ordered in and watched movies the rest of the evening. (Apparently one's day-drinking skills go out the window a few years after college.) And Sunday I did some freelance work while Matt ran errands, and we settled in for some more do-nothing laziness. It was incredible, especially after the chaos of last weekend.
And of course, it's now Monday and I'm wishing for a third consecutive morning of lay-in-bed laziness. Ah, well. I guess I'll never be able to get enough of that :)
On a random note, after looking at these pictures, I've decided it's time to pull another RIT-in-the-washing-machine-dye-job. This blazer is decidedly less black than the tights and shoes. I've done it before, but dyeing clothes in the washer always makes me nervous. Have you ever tried it?
P.S. Hey Columbus-ites, don't forget to enter my giveaway! Ends a week from yesterday. Also, it's pretty damn epic.
