Valentines Gift Guide for Him
Valentine’s Day is just around the corner and here are my picks for gifts for the man in your life. I love Valentine’s Day and the last two years Will has been in China! So this year we are planning to do something fun to celebrate the day. Maybe a post about that coming soon.
Lake Erie Bluffs: How We Love to Spend Our Saturdays
This weekend was uncharacteristically warm for January which was a wonderful change from the freezing weather we’ve been having. For the first time in what feels like months Will and I have a weekend at home together and we decided to head to the local park to enjoy the fresh air and sunshine. We’ve been looking for houses and to be honest its been an interesting experience. It was great to take a break from house hunting and working to get outside and spend time together. If you are looking for a good day time date that doesn’t involve food or shopping, go for a walk.
Styles from this post
For this post I wore Melrose & Market Top I found at Nordstrom Rack and it’s been one of my favorites this season. It’s so comfy! The jeans I wore are vintage Levi’s, but Levi is bringing a lot of their old styles back (similar ones linked below). My boots are Sam Edelman that I’ve had for several years and are still one of my favorite boots.
Daily Style Diaries: Wednesday 01.17.18
Reflections
It’s a calm but cold Wednesday morning here in Ohio and I am currently sitting at my desk with a large mug of tea and a slumbering dog. Today, I’m multi-tasking both writing, reflecting and designing for clients. Usually at this point in the day I’ve already been to the gym and am still in workout clothes or a oversized sweatshirt. But today I’m so tired of the cold that I’m forcing myself into a t’shirt. I’m looking forward to 2018, hopefully buying a house, I’m going to be an aunt come May and a fair bit of traveling adventures. Before I get carried away I wanted to take some time to reflect.
Recently on a car ride home, my husband and I thought about ways in which we want to challenge ourselves more in the coming year. We both are youngest in our families and decisions have never been easy to make from things as trivial as where to eat dinner on a Saturday night to important things like where to buy a house. 2017 definitely pushed us to make some difficult decisions and for 2018 we both picked the word “Bold” as our challenge for the year.
I have the tendency to stay within the lines and never try to push myself beyond what I think I’m capable of. I let decisions often come to me instead of carving my own path. Like most people, I’m afraid of failure or disappointing people who I care about. Boldness is definitely a steep challenge for me this year, but its beginning with small steps like wearing short sleeves in the winter, making more challenging recipes for dinner, and not being afraid to put myself out there even when I am afraid to look stupid or fail. Yay for 2018! What are some of your goals for 2018?
In this Post:
Daily Look 11.1.17: Chunky Fall Sweaters and Ankle Boots
My husband and I took a walk along Loch Raven one last time before our big move to Cleveland, Ohio this morning. It’s a perfect overcast fall day here in Baltimore where we spent the day snuggled up on the sofa working on all the things we never have time to do. Moving is never easy and all the planning that goes into moving from state to state isn’t always fun, but getting break from the normal routine can be refreshing and open up time to do things like go for a walk in the afternoon on a week day! Though I’m anxious for what next, I’m excited to see where life takes us and the challenges that lie ahead.
Fall Favorites: Style Round Up
10 Things to Add to Your Closet for Under $100
Style Rehab: How I Fixed My Closet
It’s rainy and 50 degrees here in Maryland after a week of perfect sunshine. The sunshine provided the perfect excuse to ignore the inside of my house and soak up some vitamin D ignoring the rather large list of chores to be done. But now that I’m forced inside it’s all coming back to bite me. Staring at a rather cluttered closet filled with half summer, half winter clothes, all of which, are unfolded I’m forced to deal with the age old problem of organizing one’s wardrobe. Clothes…can’t live with them DEFINITELY can live without them. Staring at a wall of clothing, I decided it was time to take on the ever brewing battle between my closet and I. To give some light on the situation… I hate closet organizing… I think there was a pile of clothes on the end of my bed for all four years of college (and probably my whole life) and to make it worse, my husband is just like me. Both incredibly nostalgic, we hang on to the weirdest clothes because somehow they still mean something to us. Never mind that I haven’t worn it for years and has yet to see the light of day, it still has value in my eyes! And we all know that the second I throw it out I will need it for something. But I had to put that all aside to begin to formulate exactly what I own and what is worth donating. I found it easiest to work in categories.
I started by working through what didn’t fit and was worn out. Sometimes, we like to hold onto jeans that are a bit too small or short in the hopes that we will lose weight or somehow cropped jeans will make a comeback but we have to be honest with ourselves. If you lose the weight you can always buy yourself a new pair of jeans and keeping them around isn’t helping you feel any better about yourself. By working through what fits and what doesn’t gives you a good start on parting with things you would otherwise like. I also went through things that were worn out. The stuff you wore all the time in college… time to part with it… the billions of sweatshirts you never wear and have letters peeling off… get rid of them.
I then moved on to what I didn’t like anymore, this was easy, because there was a lot of it. And who doesn’t like getting rid of stuff they hate? Remove the items that don’t have anything that matches them or don’t fit the type of style you want or have. Get rid of hand bags you never wear because you used it once for a particular outfit. Donate the crazy leggings you used for a college dance along with the impulse formal dress purchase.
After the easy stuff was done, I moved onto more challenging categories. So many of my t’shirts hold memories for me, track meets, volleyball games, sorority events… they’re treasures and shouldn’t be thrown away instead I put them away in a containers. All the shirts I don’t wear on a regular basis were placed in a seven dollar tub from target and places in my basement- the perfect place for them. Don’t feel like you have to dispose of memory keepsakes but you don’t need to have them filling your drawers.
Next, I participated in the hardest battle… excess clothing… Who really needs five grey v necks anyways? Go through and get rid of excess, to much of a good thing really is bad for you. Pick your favorites and let the others go to someone who needs it. After all, you probably bought it to replace the originals to begin with and I can guarantee you don’t wear all of them all the time.
Finally, I worked through my sock and underwear drawer. I got rid of mismatched socks and old stuff. It’s the easiest drawer to get out of hand, but the easiest to reorganize. Best way- get drawer dividers to help make organizing easy. Keep it from overflowing by always match socks to their co-partners.
All in all, I ended up with 4 bags of stuff to get rid of and there was probably more I could have parted with. The scariest part, I was surprised by how much I had left even after four bags. I think sometimes we are uncomfortable with having a half empty closet. As women, Its almost scary to even fathom repeating outfits or particular pieces twice in a week. By choosing to get rid of things, I was admitting to myself that I care way to much about what I look like and what people think of me. I’m not saying that clothes are bad! but holding on to things we don’t need simply so we don’t feel like we have no style is just silly. This overwhelming amount of clothes has made me think twice about buying new clothes. I’ve begun to change how I keep and shop for my wardrobe from now on. By following three simple rules I keep myself from mindless shopping and holding on to useless items for too long.
- Dress for yourself… Don’t let the influence of others impact why you style your clothes the way you do. Furthermore, don’t let the fear of not having enough clothes make you hold on to things. A bigger closet doesn’t always mean better styling options.
- If you’ll only wear it once, reconsider… I always try to cut down on the clothes I buy for a particular event. It’s fun to have something new for a party, but if you don’t wear it again it might not be the best purchase. Limit the number of ONE TIME clothes to cut back cluttered closets.
- Quality over quantity… Self explanatory but invest in good clothes that last and fit rather than cutting corners for the sake of getting more. It always pays off in the end.