Ecuador, old navy, OOTD, skirt a day challenge, target

Day 7: Flower Power

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   Shirt: Old Navy Skirt: Kohls Shoes: Target

          So if you adhere to the no white after labor day rule fret not I wore this labor day weekend and therefore broke no rules, though I don’t really believe in fashion rules and will wear white whenever I feel like it.  This is another outfit comprised of clothes I’ve had for years and never really wear much. I used to wear the shirt a lot but it’s seen better days and isn’t really that great to begin with so it’s sort of relegated to the back of my closet. In the beginning I was going to pair this skirt with a red and grey striped top but I decided it looked better with a solid top and this was one of the few ones that had a color that really worked with the skirt. The skirt I bought two years ago in a little pre-study abroad shopping trip. I went to Ecuador in spring 2009 for study abroad and wasn’t really sure what the climate would be like so I figured I should have some items I could wear if I went somewhere really warm and/or had to be a little bit more put together. My program was based in Quito where it’s pretty much like spring most of the year and layering was a must. I did go to warmer parts of the country but ultimately never wore the skirt. When I got back this got pushed to the back of my closet and I kind of forgot about it until this challenge came along and I rediscovered it. I really like this skirt, it has kind of a 50’s-esque vibe which I always like and the print is kind of fun and interesting. I didn’t really wear it much this summer but I’ll definitely be wearing it more summer ’12. This skirt has also made me a bit Ecuador nostalgic, I had such a good time there, if you’re thinking of studying abroad in Latin America I definitely would look into programs in Ecuador. Anyway since I’m feeling nostalgic and recently spoke with my host niece/little sister Manuela I figured I’d also post a picture from Ecuador. Enjoy!


View of the Panicillo (Virgin of Quito, on the hill) from the Basilica in Quito



cats, DSW, old navy, OOTD, skirt a day challenge, Tang, target, thrift

Day 6: Make it Classy add a blazer

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Tang and my shoes

       Blazer & Belt: Target  Shirt: Old Navy Skirt: Thrift  Shoes: DSW
              Sorry for this slightly delayed post, I wore this and couple other outfits the last few weeks and took pictures this weekend but we changed internet providers and had a mini lapse in internet for few days. Anyway we’re back up and running and I have a bunch of skirt challenge outfits to post and will hopefully be wrapping up this challenge soon. 
             On to the clothes! I wore this outfit to get up really early on a Saturday and try and get some amazing things at the final day of an estate sale. I totally lucked out and got all the pieces I wanted, about eight things for $40 bucks, all of which I’ll show you in an up coming A Sale-ing We Shall Go. Most of this outfit I’ve had for a really long time. The blazer I think I’ve had for roughly five years and never really worn. I’ve never really been much of a blazer person, I think they look amazing on a lot of people and can really pull an outfit together but I’ve just never really gravitated towards them. I bought this one because I’m an avid What Not to Wear fan and Stacy and Clinton always praise a good blazer. Anyway I think I may be a convert now, I really like how the blazer pulled together the outfit and I think i’ll have to start giving them more of a chance. The skirt was originally an 80’s dress I got at Savers a couple years ago in a very last minute decision. I liked the color and pattern so I just decided to get it. When I got home I tried to twerk it and make it work as a dress but it just wasn’t cutting it, so a year or so ago I cut my losses and made it into a skirt. I think I made the right decision. It’s a lot more versitle as a skirt and I really like it. The only slight downfall is it’s kinda sheer. It could probably use a slip but the only one I have is really long so I just wore it as is, I figure I don’t really care if in the right sunlight you can kinda see the outline of my hips. 
      Anyway  you may have noticed a little furry friend at the bottom of a few of the pictures, that’s one of the two cats behind Black Cat Lies, my fur baby Tang. Usually when i’m taking pictures she wonders what the hell i’m doing and comes over to meow at me and rub against my legs. As you can see she’s not a black cat but she’s adorable so you can’t really complain too much. The other cat behind BCL is Diamond who isn’t really a black cat, she’s a torise shell, but she’s mostly black so just go with it. You’ll probably see more Tang pictures in the future since I can’t resist a gratuitous cute cat picture and she always seems to be following me around when I take outfit pictures You probably wont see as much of Diamond, she’s not as much of a ham but i’ll try and post pictures of her too.

color blocking, OOTD, skirt a day challenge, target, thrift, Urban Outfitters

Day 5: One skirt two looks

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      DAY                                                                                   NIGHT

 

Day                                                                                                 Night:
Skirt and Shirt: thrift                                                                       Skirt and Shirt : Thrift
Shoes and Belt: Target                                                                    Belt and Necklace: Target
                                                                                                        Shoes: Urban Outfitters
         
        Is it me or did summer just wiz by? I can hardly believe it’s already september, sheesh. It seems the weather has caught on to the change in season as well. Last week it went from the 90’s to almost needing a jacket/sweater. Though I do miss the longer days and warmer weather I have to admit I’m a little excited for fall. I’m ready for layers, leather and BOOTS!! It is my mission to find at least one pair of amazing boots that I will promptly wear all the time. I’ve already been looking around but I have big calves and a good pair of boots can be hard, and sometimes expensive, to find. So the search continues.
       Anyway I wore this outfit awhile ago (in August actually) to go visit my grandpa and run some errands. As you can see I’m color blocking again! This is the skirt I previously mentioned that I got while thrifting. It’s a purple Go International knit pencil skirt. I think it was originally from target, though I don’t remember ever seeing it in store. I love the skirt it’s fun, colorful and I think it could work with a variety of different looks. I found this shirt at my favorite thrift store this summer when they were having an odd not on a holiday 50% off sale. By the time I got to the store it was pretty picked over but I managed to find two t-shirts. This is my favorite of the two, I’m obsessed with this shirt and it’s red/orange color.  A great t-shirt really is a staple for any wardrobe since you can dress it up or down in millions of ways. I didn’t drastically change this outfit because it think it translates pretty seamlessly from day to night with few tweaks. You could wear the day version at night and the night version during the day but I figured I’d style it both ways so you get a good visual. For day I stayed with minimal accessories and flats,  for night I dressed it up a bit with black heels and gold necklace. I love this outfit and I’m pretty confident it can also translate well to fall/winter. Add some tights, boots and maybe a leather jacket and you’ve got a great outfit for fall as well.

ASOS, mini skirt, neon and neutral, old navy, OOTD, skirt a day challenge, thrift

DAY 4: mini skirt

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Shirt: Old Navy  Skirt: ASOS  Belt: Target  Shoes: Thrift 

First of all I want to apologize for the lack of posts this month. August has turned out to be a slightly chaotic month for me so far. About two weeks ago my grandpa had open heart surgery so I was a bit preoccupied with that. He’s fine now his surgery went well and he’s back at home and eating some solid food. Anyway I have a good amount of content to post in the near future including more of the skirt challenge and a thrift haul, so stay tuned ! Can you believe summer’s almost over? It’s kinda sad really. I  like fall though, especially since I’m no longer in school and don’t have to prepare myself for impending studying/ paper writing. I’m especially excited about fall fashion,  I’ve already thrifted a few pieces that I can’t really wear until fall and am excited to get to wear a  leather jacket that I bought this spring but only really got to wear once. The only bad thing about fall is that it’s too short and eventually leads to winter, but I digress.

Anyway on to the outfit!  This is probably the only part of the skirt challenge I was a bit nervous about.  Though I’m pretty open to all skirts, the mini skirt is the one I have the hardest time with. Not because I don’t like them, I’m just not used to wearing them and I see them more as a night thing. Part of it is the length, I’m not super comfortable just yet wearing such a short skirt with no leggings or tights underneath. Anyway since I’m fairly broke and aren’t going out much it was a bit hard for me to put together a mini skirt outfit. A lot of people are able to style mini skirts casually but I just haven’t gotten to that point yet. In fact I only have one mini skirt,  the leopard one above, so that also contributes to the mini skirt dilemma. So, while trying to figure out how to style my one mini  I noticed a bunch of bloggers doing the neutral and neon trend and decided to give it a try. Since I’ve heard from various fashion talking heads that leopard print is considered a neutral and I knew I had a really bright pink shirt I could pair it I figured I’d give the neon and neutral trend a whirl. I tried to style the outfit pretty casually since I wasn’t going anywhere special and I wore my new thrifted wedges for the heels. I have to admit despite my intentions I think the outfit doesn’t look very casual and is maybe a bit more night appropriate. Anyway lets talk about the shoes for a minute. I’m kind of in love with these shoes.   I have a harder time finding cute shoes when I go thrifting. I have fairly small feet and it seems the section with my size is fairly picked over or pretty small a lot of the time. But a couple of weeks ago I found these at Savers and had to get them. I love the look of heels/wedges but I rarely ware them and am not so confident walking in them. But, these are actually pretty comfy and probably a good baby step to getting more confident with heels. All in all I’m pretty pleased with how this outfit turned out and I think I’ll be doing more neon and neutral in the future.  

ASOS, mini skirt, neon and neutral, old navy, OOTD, skirt a day challenge, thrift

DAY 4: mini skirt

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Shirt: Old Navy  Skirt: ASOS  Belt: Target  Shoes: Thrift 

First of all I want to apologize for the lack of posts this month. August has turned out to be a slightly chaotic month for me so far. About two weeks ago my grandpa had open heart surgery so I was a bit preoccupied with that. He’s fine now his surgery went well and he’s back at home and eating some solid food. Anyway I have a good amount of content to post in the near future including more of the skirt challenge and a thrift haul, so stay tuned ! Can you believe summer’s almost over? It’s kinda sad really. I  like fall though, especially since I’m no longer in school and don’t have to prepare myself for impending studying/ paper writing. I’m especially excited about fall fashion,  I’ve already thrifted a few pieces that I can’t really wear until fall and am excited to get to wear a  leather jacket that I bought this spring but only really got to wear once. The only bad thing about fall is that it’s too short and eventually leads to winter, but I digress.

Anyway on to the outfit!  This is probably the only part of the skirt challenge I was a bit nervous about.  Though I’m pretty open to all skirts, the mini skirt is the one I have the hardest time with. Not because I don’t like them, I’m just not used to wearing them and I see them more as a night thing. Part of it is the length, I’m not super comfortable just yet wearing such a short skirt with no leggings or tights underneath. Anyway since I’m fairly broke and aren’t going out much it was a bit hard for me to put together a mini skirt outfit. A lot of people are able to style mini skirts casually but I just haven’t gotten to that point yet. In fact I only have one mini skirt,  the leopard one above, so that also contributes to the mini skirt dilemma. So, while trying to figure out how to style my one mini  I noticed a bunch of bloggers doing the neutral and neon trend and decided to give it a try. Since I’ve heard from various fashion talking heads that leopard print is considered a neutral and I knew I had a really bright pink shirt I could pair it I figured I’d give the neon and neutral trend a whirl. I tried to style the outfit pretty casually since I wasn’t going anywhere special and I wore my new thrifted wedges for the heels. I have to admit despite my intentions I think the outfit doesn’t look very casual and is maybe a bit more night appropriate. Anyway lets talk about the shoes for a minute. I’m kind of in love with these shoes.   I have a harder time finding cute shoes when I go thrifting. I have fairly small feet and it seems the section with my size is fairly picked over or pretty small a lot of the time. But a couple of weeks ago I found these at Savers and had to get them. I love the look of heels/wedges but I rarely ware them and am not so confident walking in them. But, these are actually pretty comfy and probably a good baby step to getting more confident with heels. All in all I’m pretty pleased with how this outfit turned out and I think I’ll be doing more neon and neutral in the future.  

color blocking, forever 21, karmaloop, OOTD, skirt a day challenge, target, thrift

Day 3: Color Block!!!

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Action shot

Scarf worn as headband

Close up of scarf
Purse and shoes
 Top: Target (last year)  Skirt: Forever 21  Shoes and Scarf: vintage via my mom
   Bag: Karmaloop ( 4 or so years ago)

So finally we’re at color blocking! Color Blocking is my favorite trend this spring/summer. I never shy away from a bright colors in both clothing and home decor. The only problem I had was although I have a lot of brightly colored clothing most of them are tops. But I was determined to try this trend so I went to a thrift store to look specifically for a brightly colored bottom. Miraculously I found a skirt that fit perfectly on the first try, a purple knit pencil skirt. Alas when I got home, giddy to pair it with some of my bright tops, I realized I didn’t like any of the color combinations. My color blocking dreams were dashed. Then, while planning out outfits for this challenge, I came across this Rachel Roy runway picture while googling color blocking and was instantly inspired.

Rachel Roy color blocking. Image via google.

I was initially drawn to this image because of the bright yellow shirt, I knew I had a bright yellow shirt similar to it that I got at target last year. Then, when studying the image further, I realized I had a skirt that was a similar color to the one above as well. Earlier this year I was obsessed with finding the perfect pair of cat eye sunglasses and did eventually find a perfect pair at forever 21. I made a trip to try and find the pair in store but had no luck.  Since I didn’t want to pay shipping for only two pairs of sunglasses I also got this magenta skirt that I’d been drooling over for months. I like the skirt OK, It’s from  forever 21’s  love 21 line and it doesn’t go above a large, but since it has a latticed stretchy back I figured I could make it work. While it works OK it does ride up a bit and exposes the oh so sexy (sarcasm) black shorts I wear underneath. Anyway last week in a 50% off stroke of luck at a thrift store I found the perfect red orange shirt to pair with the purple pencil skirt, and eventually I’ll do a post with that outfit. But, as yesterday was Saturday and all I was doing was window shopping in antique and vintage stores with my bestie the pencil skirt seemed a bit too dressy. Thus, I opted for my original color blocking inspiration. I have to admit I pretty proud of the outfit, I love the way the magenta and bright yellow go together and the turquoise/ green accents in my scarf, shoes and bag. Over all I had a pretty successful day I color blocked to my hearts content, found out a vintage store I like has a second location a couple blocks away from my house and I got to spend good quality time with my bestie. All in all a very successful day!

button down, OOTD, skirt a day challenge, target, thrift

Day 2: Wear a buttoned down tucked in

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Top: borrowed from mom  Skirt: thrift (originally target)  Belt and shoes : Target

This outfit was actually the first one I wore for the skirt challenge. I wore it way back on July 14th, right before anything other than short sleeves meant risking heat exahustion and walking around in mixture of sweat and BO. I don’t really like the outfit, I was thinking of wearing the button down with a different skirt but my mood ultimately dictated this one. That day wasn’t a great one for me, I found out I didn’t get an interview for a job I had gotten semi-excited about. So my mood immediately dropped and I felt I should pick a skirt that mirrored my mood, so I went with this one. I go the skirt at a thrift store a year or so ago, I thought it looked ok, was drawn to it because i’m trying to expand my skirt/dresses collection and it was a 50% off sale day. The skirt is a bit big on me but it’s a really nice piece to throw on and look semi-put together. The skirt’s at least two sizes too big but it’s super comfortable and I like it enough to wear occasionally. The button down is one I stole from my mom and is also a bit too big for me but it works alright. I think the outfit turned out a bit too conservatively for me, it’s kinda dull and I felt like something I should wear to work or something. I think more color or a differnt top is needed to really make this skirt more to my liking. I’ll definitely be re-mixing the skirt in the future until I find a way to style it that’s to my liking.

nikos and bobbi, OOTD, skirt a day challenge, skirts, target, thrift

Day 1: Your skirt your way

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So as promised I’m finally getting to the skirt challenge! I actually started last Thursday but I did the 2nd day instead of day 1 because I don’t own any button ups that have shorter than a 3/4 length sleeve and a lovely heat wave was scheduled to hit the following day. I did take pictures and will post them tomorrow or sometime this weekend. Anyway the heatwave came right on schedule and though we here in the Midwest, or at least in Minnesota, are slowly cooling down last Friday to about Wednesday the heat was kind of awful. I went out Sunday and the temperature felt like it was somewhere in the 100’s. It rained on and off that day and it didn’t cool down any, it just felt like you were taking a hot shower with all your clothes on. Needless to say I’ve been hanging out in the luxurious central air and avoiding the heat as much as possible. Today was actually a bit cooler at about 90 degrees but still kind of humid. I wore this to get some much needed groceries and hang out in my backyard. We are currently watching two adorable pups, Bobbi and Nikos, while their parents are on a little vacation. My mom volunteered for an organization that gives temporary housing to pets of deployed service men and women and that’s how we met Bobbi and Nikos. They were with us for about a year and now we get to dog sit anytime there parents go on vacation. It’s kinda nice since the last of our three dogs died in 2005 and though we love our cats it’s always nice to be able to play with some cute pups now and again. Anyway one day while we were watching them and during an intense game of fetch Nikos decided to take a dip in the bird bath, awakening us to his desire to cool off during outdoor ball sessions. So a couple months ago when my mom’s co-workers gave her a tropical themed 50th birthday bash and we became the proud owners of a ridiculously tiny kiddie pool, my mom had the brilliant idea of setting it up when Bobbi and Nikos visited next. Today we got to realize that dream as we set up the pool and after a few back and fourths with the ball Nikos eventually got hot and took a dip in the pool. Assorted cute evidence below.

Anyway you needed to know about Nikos and Bobbi because I took advantage of the situation to also take outfit pics.

pleas excuse the kinda weird picture of my feet and my mostly unpainted toenails. This was the only good picture I got of the shoes.
 Skirt: thrift  Shirt: Target (last year)  Shoes: vintage via my mom

I wouldn’t say this is my favorite skirt as a favorite denotes having being worn more than once. I bought this skirt last year at my favorite thrift store and it has been in my closet ever since. Luckily this challenge came along and I was able to finally debut it. It’s originally from forever 21 and kinda sorta fits me. In other words I believe you’re supposed to wear it around your natural waist but I hike it up to pretty much right under my bust and it fits. lol. Anyway since  it sorta fit and I love the almost 50’s vibe it has I figured I’d shell out the cash for it. The outfit as a whole probably could use a belt and next time I wear it I’ll probably add one. The shirt is from target, I bought it last year in an attempt to grow my black clothes collection. I realized last year that I had absolutely no black shirts and needed to remedy this quickly. I am now the owner of two black shirts, progress. Anyway you can’t see it but the shirt has gold stitching around the neckline and gold sequin-y accents on the shoulder which coincidentally go fantastically with the skirt! I think people are generally pulled towards certain colors and though black usually isn’t the first color i gravitate towards teal/ turquoise is. Aside from this skirt and the shoes I’m wearing in this post I also have a turquoise purse, shorts and assorted other jewelry. Someday soon I’ll do a few posts on colors I’m drawn too and the items I’ve accumulated in those colors. Finally the shoes are an amazing pair I recently re-discovered and stole from my mom. They’re actually a bit big on me, I’m a 6.5 and they’re a 7.5/8, but I made a few extra holes and now they fit pretty well. I had been eying this pair of turquoise sandals from Karmaloop obsessively, but unfortunately $50.00 plus shipping is a little out of my price range at the moment. So, I was ecstatic when I found these babies while looking for a ball to throw for Nikos. They’re not the most supportive but aside from flip flops they’re really the only sandals I have and they’ll be in heavy rotation in my wardrobe from now until the end of summer. That’s all for Day 1, I’ll post Day 2 at some point this weekend. Until then have a great weekend!