Mrs. Beasley's Outfit

What I wore today reminded me of Mrs. Beasley.  I can't explain why.  Mrs. Beasley wore a polka dotted electric blue "dress" with bright yellow trim.  Some associations can't be explained.  They just are.  In any event, being reminded of Mrs. Beasley, I started to fixate on her glasses:  Large black square frames.  I would love to have glasses like that.  Is this the beginning of a hunt?

When I Wore Black

Back in the days when I wore nothing but black (black and more black), people used to say to me that the colour one chose to wear was a reflection of one's mood.  "Poppycock", I used to retort, "I wear black when I am happy, sad, mad or whatever."  (I suppose people were simply trying to figure out whether, by suddenly choosing to wear nothing but black, I was trying to say that I was sad.  I hope that my answer convinced them that I wasn't, because I truly wasn't.)  Now that I wear, not only back, but also all of the colours of the rainbow, I am definitely aware of the connection between the colours that I choose to wear and my mood.  Now wearing black during the day signals that I don't want to be conspicuous, that I want to withdraw and think, to reflect on things, that I want to be quiet, that I want to stop and smell the roses, that I want to slow down.  Of course wearing black for a formal evening out signals something entirely different ... I think ... or maybe not.

The Strawberry Fields Forever Dress

If I start dressing in Spring-like outfits (I would be crazy to wear actual Spring outfits, for I would simply freeze), do you suppose that I could coax Spring out of hiding?  It certainly didn't work today.  But if I had some sign that it might work, I would certainly be willing to keep trying.  I can, however, think of one advantage to Spring staying in hiding.  It gives one the opportunity to try out some of the Fall outfits that just walked down the runways of the "fashion capitals" of the world.  Not the actual outfits of course, but ones inspired by the actual outfits.  That is what I did today.  I tried on for size my interpretation of this outfit from the Steven Alan Fall 2011 ready-to-wear collection:

Image from style.com

All About Footwear

Today, I was looking at the twenty-seven names Summer 2011/2012 lookbook and I was reminded of something that I noticed some time ago about lookbooks, particularly those of "smaller" designers/labels.  This is the tendency to feature all the outfits of a line with the same footwear.  Would it be at all fun (or interesting) to try this out with one's own outfits for, say, a week or more?  I am not very good at such challenges.  I have tried a few different wardrobe challenges and I have failed miserably at all of them.  So I am not sure that it would be wise for me to challenge myself in any way here.  So I won't.

The First Of Many Chambray Dresses To Come

Do you ever conceive of an outfit that you can't wear immediately because it doesn't suit the weather?  So you wait, patiently, for the right weather to come along.  Finally, it does, so you do a little happy dance and you put the outfit on.  And you walk around all day with a big smile on your face!  That was my day today.  I have been wanting to wear this particular chambray dress since last Fall, when it came into my life.  But Winter came fast and furious and the dress just would not have kept me warm enough.  So I had to put it away until this Spring.  I think that one of my personal trends this Spring/Summer is going to be the chambray/denim dress/jumper dress.  I have already acquired several of these.  And, every time I walk into a clothing store and see one on the racks, I am drawn to it.  In fact, it takes a lot of discipline to assess the dress rationally and to determine if it is me and I should buy it.  All I want to do is just grab the dress and run (paying for it of course).