Dresses-Dresses-DRESSES

Trying to get all my summer dresses in while you know, it's still Summer. 

Jessica Simpson, what can I say, I love her. I have loved her since her Nick Lachey days, and I still love her, or more appropriately I love her clothing line. She has an awesome clothing line and has such a wide range of style and sizing it can really accommodate any body type. I believe she has mentioned that she can dress any size/weight as she has been all of them. I own a lot of dresses from her and a bathing suit. Two of the dresses are very dressy and for special occasions. These two are little bit more casual, thus, making them everyday wear.

Bought on eBay as I had tried on dresses in the store of hers and new my size-again I hate paying full price if I have to. This is a really light weight black dress. It has a black slip that came attached to it. Over the slip is a circle lace cover and across the waist is a faux leather belt/tie that covers the front and ties in the back. It zips in the back but leaves a bit of a peek-a-boo opening at the top between the shoulder blades. It’s a great dress and style and can be appropriate for many different occasions. I paired it with a few simple pearl bracelets,  a layered pearl necklace, and some simple pearl studs. Shoes I was not overly crazy with this outfit. Felt it was a bit too heavy for the dress. I think the bows across the foot take away from it. I think a simple patent black shoe would of fit this much better.

Similar Dress 

Similar Shoes

Next is another favorite of mine also bought on eBay. It’s a halter butterfly print dress from Jessica Simpson. I was sold on this dress when I saw the butterflies…I love butterflies. However, the pockets just put me over the top. I am a sucker for a dress with pockets. This dress zips on the side making for a comfortable fit. The halter aspect of the dress has buttons instead of a tie, which I like. You can choose between two fittings, also comes with a black patent belt to help cinch in the waist line. I love the simplistic black and white pairing of this dress, I feel it allows you to bring in some color elsewhere. Keeping it with a black/white theme Is fine, but it looks better IMO with a pop of color. I paired it with a teal cardigan from Old Navy, some low heel open toe shoes from ShoeDazzle, and some teal jewelry also from Old Navy.

Similar Dress

This next dress or really outfit is one of my favorites and gets some pretty heavy rotation. It is a white linen dress. It has some ruffle sleeves and actually came with a white cloth belt made of the same material of the dress. I ironically couldn't find it to wear with it so I paired it with this brown belt. The irony here is the belt was hanging from the mirror where I take my pictures- oy vey! I paired it with this adorable polka dot cardigan. It is from JCP and was a gift from my adorable mom. However, it was a size smaller then I normally care to get. I wasn't really sure if I was going to be able to keep it because when I paired it with items, it just didn't look right. Then one day I threw it on with this dress to brighten it up and it was a match made in clothing heaven. I added my accent necklace and some closed toe brown shoes from target. It's a great outfit and can go from work to weekend wear quite easily. Only draw back...I should of ironed..woops! 

Similar Dress

Similar Cardigan

Similar Shoes

Similar Necklace

Ending the professional dress week (remember Friday is casual Friday!) with another black ensemble.  It was just easy to pair it and I was able to throw on some flats I don't often wear. Black dress if from JCP  a few years ago with black patent belt. Good length for work but versatile for many different occasions. I paired it with some leopard flats from Fergies line. These flats have a mixture of black and brown in them so it was a nice way to break up an all black outfit.  I was boring aka tired and didn't pair with any jewelry-fail! 

Similar Dress

Similar Shoes

Casual Friday- How I thought you would never come! So many things make this Friday better then most. First off PUMPKIN SPICE LATTE'S ARE BACK!!! Second it's a long weekend for most! Third my bestie and fellow blogger at Someone's in the Kitchen with Momma Amber is coming to visit me! I love her and her family so this is just going to be a GREAT weekend. Plus...there are LABOR DAY SALES EVERYWHERE. Ok focus, focus, focus back to my outfit.  Today at the last moment I changed what I was wearing. I knew I wanted to wear one of the three new flats I bought at Target...blog on those later, so my outfit had to center around that.  I decided to go with this peach color tank from Victoria's Secret paired with a light short sleeve cardigan from Victoria's Secret as well, paired off with a pair of American Eagle jeans. Notice short girl problems-these are a petite/short style/sizing of these jeans and even when I wear my flats they are STILL to LONG for me. Womp-womp. Can't win them all. Still love the outfit, it's comfortable but looks put together. Great outfit to bring in the weekend.

Exact Shoe in Taupe

Exact Jeans

Hot and Humid

This week it is really hot and humid so I decided dresses would be the best to wear. Now, inside my office it is freezing so….maybe not the smartest choice since I am in the office more than outside but oh well-live and learn. This is the week of dresses.

I went to my dress closet-yes…I have a separate closet for dresses. Not out of having spare room or money, but well the opposite of that. Small closests in the house, it’s easier to move certain items of clothing to other areas. I have enough dresses that filtering them out to another closet made sense and saved room in the bigger closet. Anyways,  I went to the dress closet and instantly saw this dress. It gets worn randomly, not heavy rotation, but not on the forgotten side of things either. I bought it from New York and Company a few years ago. It is a very light weight silky material-perfect for the heat and humidity! I paired it with some pink studs, a pink gem necklace, and some simple black peep toe heels. This dress could be paired with so many different color shoes/jewelry/cardigans since there are so many colors in it. I kept it simply though this week. My awesome hand placement in the mirror blocks the center of this dress, it’s a bit of a knot in the middle. Adds a little detail to the dress.

I love, love, love this dress! What’s crazy though is that I FORGOT about this dress. I cleaned my closet out this week and found it.  The dress is from Loft but bought on eBay (thrifting!). Normally when I wear this I pair it with a darker purple cardigan I have (seen here) however, with it being so hot I nixed the cardigan. I  didn’t do well pairing it with shoes or jewelry though, hence the lack of shoes in this picture. I normally wear heels with this dress, but this dress is on the shorter side and heels seem to take away from/doesn't look right. So I opted for a pair of flats-however the pair of flats I paired with were  a brown that didn't flow well and were to “heavy” of a shoe, just was a bad match. I paired it with pearl jewelry which was OK but I think some contrasting purple/pink/silver would of looked better. Definitely a dress that is a keeper, but will pair better next time.

Thinking of getting these shoes for the dress…and obviously other outfits as well.

Jessica Simpson-Thaye Flat

Let's play catch up!

Trying to catch up so I can blog more currently. Still successful at wearing different pieces so far, so I am happy with that. Let’s continue on last week or more accurately known as the week of pants that don’t fit.

So here we are with the gray outfit of the week. I love the shirt- it is from New York and Company and pretty much anything with some type of animal print I am going to love. It is casual enough I can pair with jeans but can still dress it up for work. I had some gray diamond studs I wore with the outfit and paired it with a black watch that had a chevron pattern in it. I think the watch looked horrible with it and I will pair a different one with it next time. I love to wear watches but the darkness of this one just clashes to much with the outfit. Now on to the pants….those pants. Ugh. What is there to say?  I bought them from Victoria’s Secret a few years ago. Again not sure if they ever fit me. They are suppose to be a looser fit/flowly but they are just to much on me. I mean you can’t even see my feet- and they were hemmed!!! If they were a better fit, even if long, you still probably would be able to see my feet. I love the material of these pants though so they are really hard to give up but again…another one bites the dust. RIP Gray Pants! Bandito did NOT approve of them.

I totally forgot to snap a picture of this outfit on. Was my least favorite of the week. I like the shirt and I love anything polka dot. It’s a good color, but the shape of the shirt I am torn on. I am just not sure it is really a good fit on me. I am keeping it though and going to see how often I re-wear it, if that doesn’t happen then it’s going. Now let’s continue our parachute pants themed. Guess what-these are also from Victoria’s Secret –what the French toast? So I only have two pairs of khaki’s and the other pair I absolutely hate, they have no shape, just horrible fit. I like these because they are a bitter fit up top on my waist but like my gray pants, they drown me. You don’t see my feet unless I am wearing insanely tall shoes. That is the overall style of them but I think if they were a size better it would love overall better. As much as  I hate to part with them, I know I must. Another one down…..

The sunshine dress. I love this dress so much and it just makes me so happy. I got it at JCP  a few years ago and is a really good fit on me. The shape/style/fit/material I feel is classic but also reminds me of Mad Men…hmmm…..if this is a Mad Men dress this where is my Don Draper? I mean he is married to Megan in the show..JUST SAYING.  I feel like this dress can transition to early fall still by throwing a simple black cardigan on ( or red…or any other color if you want -be creative!) I paired it with some long flowy black earrings and my penguin shoes! I love, love, love these shoes. Bought them a few years from Shoe Dazzle. They are close toe black and white and then have a random splash of yellow in the back. They are just as fun as the dress is. The only drawback of this outfit is the material of the dress. I like the material but as you can see from being worn on day it wrinkles very easily, so by the end of the day it has a little less polished look, overall though a total winner of an outfit!

Casual Friday-my favorite day! End of the week, couldn’t be a better time. I wore my gold gladiator sandals, a pair of dark wash jeans and one of my favorite tank tops-a  white tank with gold pineapples! Ha! I am not sure why but I was so drawn to this when I first saw it.  I topped it off with some gold feather earrings,  and a gold necklace. I wore a black cardigan with it to work as well-work is always a tad on the freezing side.

Saturday!!! Got my hair touched up and ran some errands with my mom. Wore a pair of my favorite shorts (old navy) some flats from target and a shirt I had forgotten about. I believe the shirt is from JCP. It is really comfy and just looks put together. I wore some teal earrings that were a gift for my birthday years ago.

Sunday.... Nothing to report. Vegged at home and cleaned. Sundays will be nixed with especially with football coming up. I'll just be rotating Saints shirts/jerseys... WHO DAT!

The week of pants that don't fit....

The title pretty much says it all. This is the week of pants that don’t fit. Did they ever fit? Have I lost weight? Did I just buy pants that were really parachutes on me? I really have no answers for you. I have had the pants you are going to see in the next several posts for some time, but haven’t worn them in awhile so I have no recollection on if this is just how they fit when I bought them…although I think it may be true.

So sorry for not the best picture ever- I haven’t been feeling my best this week and quickly snapped this thinking I would retake one later…WRONG. What’s even worse- no Bandito Burrito. Ugh. Better luck next time folks. Anyways on to the outfit…

Went to my handy-dandy closet and found this cute pin-striped blazer/jacket. I got this a few years ago and safe to say at Plato’s Closet…a second hand store (I am obsessed with thriftiness). I instantly fell in love with this when I bought it but I can’t tell you for sure if I ever wore it after buying it. I have a really bad habit of doing that (Al la old navy tank top anyone??). I put it on and had a white cami on and instantly knew I would pair it with a purple cami for work. It adds a nice splash of color especially against the white pants. It would of just been too much white had I kept the white cami. The cami is just a simple cami from a local store. It’s a polyester material so I am not crazy about it-I would rather have it in cotton, the bottom tends to roll up, aside from that though it looked great with this outfit.  I paired it with some pink and gold studs, a purple statement necklace, white watch and some open toe heels by Madden Girl (from DSW).

Let’s talk about those white pants now. I don’t believe in the “no white after labor day” rule however, I don’t normally where white anything on the bottom ever. So when I pulled this blazer out with its white in it I instantly thought this is my chance to bring out another piece I haven’t worn in forever-the white dress pants! I’ve had these pants for a few years. Wore them a lot the first year I bought them and that was it. I got them from JCP. They are cute and had to be tailored because I am short and that is about all the good I have to say about them.  I bought them and I remember them being big. Now, when I say big I don’t mean drowning big, but they weren’t very fitted, which was fine, however it seems either I remember it wrong or these pants magically altered themselves in my drawer because now I am drowning in them. They are straight leg and were bought in what I will so eloquently refer to as the normal height person section of the store. At JCP I should really shop in the petite section, but this time I didn’t and my body paid the price. The bottom half drowns me out for the most part. There is absolutely no shape, which on a straight leg dress pant they are just that-straight-but normally fit a little closer to the leg so you get the general impression of the person leg. Here they do not fit even close to my leg, my legs are  just are swimming somewhere in each pant leg. On top of all of this my butt looks like I am wearing a diaper maybe? I have a big butt, I am curvy and I can own that. What I can’t own is having a pair of pants making me look unflattering, so as nice as these pants look with this outfit I will be in search of new white pants next year. Overall the pants served their purpose and the outfit looked good. I feel it would of looked better and more polished had the pants been a better fit. One of the key things I took away from what not to wear is a good fit makes a huge difference!

RIP White Pants-being donated to hopefully be a better fit on someone else!

What I wore...Weekend Edition!

 Playing catch up between starting my clothing pilgrimage and starting this blog. I've been documenting the pictures so just need to get them uploaded and blogged about. Unfortunately I have the worlds worse laptop known to man. I wish I was joking but the reality and depth of the situation is this- every time I use this laptop I have thoughts of this going through my head:

ok and maybe a little bit of this:

Alas though here I am fighting the good fight to blog on this laptop. So let's do this- The outfit above is what I wore this past Saturday-8/9/14. My normal routine when we go out is to go to my rotation of clothing that I normally wear/fall back on or wear some of my workout attire. I turn to these clothes because they are "comfy" and throw my hair in a ponytail. The thing is what I am wearing above wasn't any less comfortable then what I normally would wear and I actually FELT better because I made the effort to look a little nicer.

Eventually I will start to take pictures of the details/shoes/etc but for now while I play catch up this is what we have. This outfit was all themed around the polka dot tank I am wearing from Old Navy. I LOVE anything polka dots for the most part. When I saw it I instantly knew I had to have it. Then you know what happened? It got hung up in my closet...and hung there until this past weekend..with tags still attached. I had bought it back in June! This is why I am doing this, because I have to many nice pieces to not be wearing them. So yes, back to the outfit, it started with this tank. It was a cooler day so I knew I wanted to wear my dark wash Candie jeans "(from Kohls-few years back) paired with my target gold sandals. I wanted a pop of color added as well so I went to my trusty cardigan collection. This purple cardigan is from J. Crew  however I bought it on eBay. I am a very thrifty shopper. It would be a lie if I say I don't pay for convenience from time to time, however, most of the time if I can get it cheaper I am going to go that route. I topped the outfit off with a gold watch and bracelet, gold earrings, and a gold and black necklace.

As you can see my sidekick Bandito Burrito makes his appearance, as does his blur of a sister Jewel.

Later that night I particpated in a run called the Glow Run. You dress up in bright colors, wear items that glow and run a 5k. It was a good time and I got to share it with my mom and close friends. While I have been documenting my running outfits as well (I have a lot of work out clothes I need to justify as well), this was the only picture I got that night. My dad was trying to find us and asked what I was wearing so naturally I sent him a selfie. I had a bright green under armor tank on. These tanks from under armour are amazing! I got them on zulilly for a really good deal and would definitely buy more if the opportunity presented itself. It was topped off...or perhaps...bottomed off? with some bright pink shorts with neon yellow/green stitching and some tie dye pink compression sleeves. No Bandito here, but I promise you, it has his paw of approval!

 

No Sunday outfits as I was just a bum that day. I had another 5k that morning that I had to help with prior to it starting so I wore a basic running outfit then after showered and ended up in a hoodie, Saints shirt (who dat!) and jeans.

What I wore....

                                                         Outfits the week of 8/04/14

Kicking off the new blog! What better topic then clothes and pugs! Cleaned out my bedroom and became aware that I 1. had a ton of clothes 2. had clothes I hadn't worn in....months...years...or ever. I decided to start changing my wardrobe up wearing things I forgot about and documenting it. At first I was just going to document it on instagram but I love blogging to much so here I am. This is also a good way for me to document what I wear, stick to changing up my outfits, and also weed out clothes that don't fit or I no longer care for. Sometimes seeing it on a hanger isn't enough to make a final decision to keep an item. I have kept a lot of clothes because of that however since starting this last week I have already weeded out tops, pants and a dress just because the moment it went on me I realized it was no longer for me. 

Last week I forgot to document one of my outfits and worked from home one day, so that leaves you with the final three. We will start with the beige/brown outfit on the far right. Shoes are a brown strappy peep toe originally from Kohls however I got them at a second hand store. I love these shoes and they are very versatile. However, a piece of the straps buckle is wearing out on both shoes so not sure how much longer they will be around. Does that mean I see new shoes in my future? I think so!!! Skirt is from Forever 21 and was bought about 8 years ago. I have worn it a total of maybe twice prior to this. It still fits really well but has a tendency to ride up through out the day so you are constantly pulling it down. Not sure this will make the final cut. Going to give it a few more wears to be fair though. Top is a lace top with a cami underneath from JcPenney a few years ago. I love this shirt, use to wear it all the time, then it fell out of the rotation so it was nice to bring it in again. It has a snag in the back though and with it being lace its days with me are numbered. I threw my hair up in a messy ponytail and paired it with some various pieces of pearl jewelry I had. Overall was happy with this outfit.

Middle outfit was one of my favorites. The Zebra dress is from JCP a few years ago-like my lace top use to be in heavy rotation the fell out. It is such a comfortable dress and so fun to wear. I paired it with a yellow cardigan I got from Goodwill (thrift stores for the win!) followed up with some more pop of color with a red heart necklace and red wedges by Fergie. The combination of the zebra pattern with the different colors is fun, makes me happy but still flows nicely. 

Casual Friday! Let's start with the top. I got my first Stitch Fix box last week and LOVED it. Not all pieces worked exactly but was very happy with it. I will be getting another box next month and I will review that in more detail and why I am willing to stay with them despite their most recent snafu. This top came from the stitch fix box. It was the only piece I kept. As soon as I put it on I knew I had to keep it. It was so soft and comfortable. Light weight that I could wear it in the Summer, but transition it easily to Fall or Winter. I thought a simple pair of skinny blue jeans (fromAmerican Eagle) and some nude/tan sparkly flats paired with some simple earrings, a watch from Charming Charlie’s was just what this outfit needed. It was comfortable but still felt nice and well put together.

Bandito Burrito made sure to make an appearance in every picture so I am just going to go out on a limb and say he approved these outfits. Who needs Anna Wintour when you have Bandito Burrito.