tweedy

scarf - import shop in Copenhagen / tweed wool blazer - vintage, mom's / striped shirt - thrifted / overdyed skinnies - Zara / purse - custom, valhallabrooklyn via etsy / woven flats - UO

Just a few photos from a lovely fall walk in our new neighborhood. We got the keys to our new place just over three weeks ago, and since then we have been working on it non-stop - from fixing broken doors to caulking windows, replacing our refrigerator, painting our six (six! seven if you count the vestibule! but of course, they're all tiny) rooms to putting up shelves and negotiating turn-of-the-century closets that aren't even deep enough to put a hanger in straight. I haven't bothered with nail polish or makeup in weeks, and it isn't unusual these days for me to find paint on my elbows in the middle of the workday.

Still, it's been fun rediscovering some old favorites as I slooooowly unpack my clothes. Case in point, this herringbone tweed blazer, definitely one of the nicest vintage pieces I own. It was part of a suit my Mom wore as she was just beginning her professional career, and I now love pairing it with more casual outfits to give them some classic texture and shape. It's also been the perfect outer layer for the fabulous weather we've been having lately, and I've been trying to get out and enjoy it as much as I can in between our many home improvement projects.

thoughtless

jean jacket - LOFT, thrifted / necklace - clyde's rebirth / striped dress - Old Navy / watch - Arkanoplatz flea market, Berlin / purse - Athens tourist shop / woven flats - UO

It will probably come as no particular surprise to regular readers of this blog that, if I had my druthers, I'd be happy to just wear this outfit every single day. In fact, up until these last few days,* I'd been creeping dangerously close to doing just that. Although we've only been here a week, I've somehow already grown bored with everything in my suitcase (didn't I used to have a lot of clothes in there?), but fortunately this dress and jacket combo still manages to make me feel great on days when I'm not up for thinking about what to wear.

*When New York decided to belatedly welcome us by approximating the interior climate of a steam room.

birthday suit

brass whistle necklace - vintage via etsy / fox-print tank - Forever 21 / belt - vintage, thrifted / wood & brass bangle - vintage, thrifted / linen skirt - vintage, thrifted / purse - Athens tourist shop / woven flats - UO

Thank you all for the well-wishes on my birthday, both here and on Twitter, I had a great, fairly low-key day. Chris and I have been scoping out potential neighborhoods all week (we're in a short-term place for now), so we spent most of the day on a long walk all the way up to Williamsburg and back. We decided we're definitely too old and uncool to live there, but we'll still visit for the abundant taco trucks and flea markets. On our way I got an extra-lovely birthday surprise - a job! I hadn't expected to get something so quickly, so I'm absolutely thrilled - and now we can actually start apartment-shopping in earnest. We went out for a double-celebration dinner in Park Slope, then ended the night drinking wine on this lady's fire escape.

bestriped

trench - H&M / striped shirt - H&M / braided belt - vintage, thrifted / watch - Arkanoplatz flea market, Berlin / red jeans - thrifted / brogues - Primark

Some photos from yesterday, offered (almost) without comment. I wore this for a rainy day of thrifting with Tania, who is completely awesome and has successfully made me just the teensiest bit sad that I'm leaving DC soon. (I mean, honestly, anyone who sends you home with amazing homemade cookies is a true friend.)

chopped

purse - Athens tourist shop / chambray shirt - Banana Republic, thrifted / belt - vintage, thrifted / skirt - altered from a dress, Old Navy / clog sandals - Stockholm tourist shop

This skirt used to be dress; I bought it on clearance years ago because I loved the airy, printed cotton and the fact that it had pockets, but the fit just never worked for me as a dress. It had an always-on-the-verge-of-wardrobe-malfunction surplice bodice and an un-beltable empire waist, and it wasn't long until I found myself folding in the top half and just wearing it as a skirt every time. I unpacked it over the weekend and started wearing it that way on Saturday morning, but by lunchtime I was so fed up with fussing with my improvised skirt that I finally cut the top half off and put in a proper waistband. I can tell I'm going to get a lot more wear out of it now - in fact, I've already worn it three times since chopping it! I even remembered to take the time to photograph the transformation (a rare feat when I get the instant gratification sewing itch!), so I'll be posting a simple dress-to-skirt sewing tutorial later this week.

four

earrings - Clementine via etsy / chambray shirt - Banana Republic, thrifted / tote - Forever 21 / ring - Amsterdam shop / overdyed skinnies - Zara / flats - UO

Today I decided to wear a Canadian Tuxedo in honor of Canada Day. Or perhaps I wore a Canadian Tuxedo, and then later realized it just happened to be Canada Day - I'll never tell. I will tell you that Chris said today that he liked this version more than the last time I rocked the double denim. He claims it's because he likes it more (or dislikes it less) when there's more contrast between the colors of the shirt and pants. I think really it's just that I'm wearing him down.

For the last day of Dress Your Best Week, I wanted to focus on a part of me that I find both beautiful and useful. Many of the other bloggers participating have highlighted their marathon-running legs, or the fairly miraculous fact that their bodies are currently in the business of making tiny people. These things are absolutely staggering to me, and I can't even imagine how such feats might alter the way one sees one's body. As I have yet to have children (and am unlikely ever to run a marathon), I decided to focus instead on a part of me that over time has become integral to my self-identity - my hands.

Small, beauty-marked, and scarred in places, my hands have done a lot for me over the years. They've drawn, painted, carved and etched in my art classes, they build models and memorize keyboard shortcuts for me at work, and they knit and crimp pastry at home. They learned how to cut glass, how to weld steel, and once wove the cane seat of a chaise lounge for 72 hours straight. They solder jewelry and sew zippers and give excellent back-scratches. In fact, the only thing I've ever asked them to do that they failed miserably at was to play the guitar (they were great for finger-picking, but far too small for bar chords).

For all that work, they remain (to me) rather lovely - not the longest, or most slender-fingered, but lately they're more and more recognizably my mother's hands, a resemblance I'm happy to embrace. I can't for the life of me seem to figure out how to photograph them (no future in hand-modeling for me!), but I wanted to give them the spotlight today with a big ring and some seriously bright green polish - and every time I catch that flash of chartreuse in the corner of my eye today, I get to reflect again on how much of me I define by the work of my hands.

Oh! And if you were wondering to what the title of this post refers, it's the number of coats of this polish I had to put on to get any kind of opacity. It's a good thing I still hadn't watched the last two episodes of Glee, or I would have gone nuts waiting for it to dry between coats!



To learn more about Dress Your Best, and to find other bloggers who are participating, please check out this post at academichic.

stripes & stripes

earrings - Berber handcraft, gift from Tunisia / dress - Topshop / belt - vintage, thrifted / striped espadrilles - Old Navy

Double stripes! Triple if you count the odd blonde streak I have at the back of my neck (which my mother still refers to as my 'skunk stripe').

Along with my weird trip-anticipation desire to 'save' the things I'm planning to pack, lately I've had an urgent sense that I should be trying to make the most of those clothes I'm not planning to bring. When we headed up to Massachusetts, I imagined I'd spend our entire visit frolicking in the host of summery dresses and wedges I'd planned to unearth from my boxes in the attic. Unfortunately, the weather had other plans, and the majority of our visit was far too cool for airy dresses. (Of course, now that we're headed back to VA and the temperature tomorrow will be pushing 100, I didn't really have room to bring back anything I'm not planning to take on the trip. Sigh.) When it did finally start warming back up yesterday, I jumped at the opportunity to break out this striped dress and wedge combo, both favorite pieces of mine over the last few years, but ones I'd never yet thought to pair together. I love the mix of horizontal, vertical, and diagonal stripes found in the bodice of this dress, and the wider stripes and neutral colors of these espadrilles felt like the perfect complement.

cookie salvation

gold paillette necklace - Anthropologie / trench - H&M / black scoopneck tee - UO / peach geode ring - H&M / wide leg jeans - Banana Republic / shoes - Toms

In my still-nascent career as an international lady of leisure/style blogger, I've had to accept the hard fact that not every outfit, or every outing, is going to be a home run. Sometimes they are just singles - totally respectable, and they get the job done, but not particularly spectacular. That's how this outfit felt to me; while I always love the simple top - wide leg jeans - trench formula, I will admit to having some doubts over this look's 'blog-worthiness.' It was comfortable, I felt fairly chic and all my bits were covered, but there just wasn't a whole lot of 'there' there, you know?

Enter the cookie ring. Those who've checked out my Pinterest lately are already well aware of my current obsession with over-the-top cocktail rings, so it should come as no surprise that I couldn't resist this peachy faux-geode on my recent H&M binge. While I definitely don't have a future as a hand model (how other people manage to take non-weird/creepy hand pictures totally baffles me), this ring is so much fun to wear, and inspires otherwise aloof strangers on the street to grab my hand in wonder. And I can tell even Chris likes it, because he says it looks like a cookie.

P.S. I know I talk about Pinterest an awful lot, but it's probably my favorite new website in years. As always, just send me your email address if you'd like an invite!
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self-conscious

silk top - Mango / belt - vintage, thrifted / pink skirt - H&M / wood & brass bangle - vintage, thrifted / socks - H&M / brogues - Primark

I had such high hopes for this outfit. I'd had it in mind for over a week, but waited and waited for a day with perfect weather to wear it - then once I finally did, it sort of, well, fizzled. Sunny pink and yellow seemed like a perfect Easter Sunday combination, but as we spent the afternoon amongst picnickers and little egg-hunters in our neighborhood park, I started to feel a little self-conscious. I felt like people were looking at me a little oddly, and began to wonder if maybe color-blocking and over-the-knee socks might a little too fashion blogger for the dix-neuvième arrondissement. This awkward feeling was not helped when a stranger (wearing a pirate earring, no less) stopped me and asked me a question about myself using a word that I didn't understand. After he cheerily repeated his question, I clumsily offered that I didn't speak French, then more or less ran off mortified.*

So despite the beautiful weather, and the lovely scenery found in abundance in the Parc des Buttes-Chamount, I wimped out on taking outfit shots in crowded public places and opted instead for the ridiculous backlighting of our kitchen. While they're not the greatest photos we've taken yet, I do at least love that the room is color-blocked too.

*I later did my best to look up what he'd asked; as best as I can tell, he either asked if I was tired or if I was selling. I am not sure which question is more unflattering, but given my lack of makeup, and my expression in that fifth photo, I can probably tell you which is more likely.
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