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Five Take: Animal Print

In theory, this Five Take post should have made it up before my trip to New York… or while I was there, because I naively thought I’d have time to this post… and blog about Full Figured Fashion Week as stuff was happening.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Kudos to those who did! I can’t even imagine. FFFW posts are in the works, hopefully the first two will be tonight/tomorrow. We have a house guest, I had to get images out to other people, more “responsibilities” and my first few days back to work have been super busy, so the blog (as usual) gets neglected.

My school semester starts this week too! Oh boy. I better get my shit together, right?

Dress – Land’s End, 3x
Belt – Torrid, 4
Cardigan – Old Navy, 3x
Shoes – Clarks, 11M
Purse – Coach Outlet

If you’ve been here before, you know the drill… if not, the idea behind Five Take is pretty simple. One theme, five people… resulting in five different looks. The only restriction is having to shop from our closets. Sounds easy enough, right?

This may be shocking to some, but my wardrobe is sadly lacking in animal prints. They just aren’t really something I’m drawn to, and if I am… I’m really, really picky. Badly tiled designs, odd colors, and weird prints are a no-go. It is one thing I absolutely love to see on other people, but rarely wear myself.

That being said… I own a few pieces, none of which are suitable for the weather here in Houston. Two cardigans, a short sleeve sweater and a belt that I haven’t seen since the move, otherwise I would have worn that. Ha!

I thought wearing the cardigan was a stupid move, but it wasn’t bad at all. Guess I’m acclimating to this weather faster than I thought? Then again… it isn’t even “hot” yet!

Back in December, I posted about the twin of the cardigan I’m wearing. This grey version has become one of my casual outfit staples. Bright jersey dress, funky animal print cardigan, maybe a belt… and off I go!

Oh wait. This outfit is exactly that but (to me), the bright red dress and make-up make it a little fancier!

It could be because I am in love with this dress (and the purse). The fabric is amazing, it is a heavier knit but still light. I’ve washed it several times now (no special treatment either!) and it is still bright red, with no pilling. The cut and fit are fantastic – there is a little bit of structure in the waist, great draping in the neckline, pleats in the front of the skirt and the length is just right.

I don’t think I can actually say anything bad about this dress, except for the price, which is $65. But in my humble opinion, it is worth it. Luckily Land’s End seems to always offer a coupon, usually with free shipping, which makes it even better. Right now Land’s End has a coupon for 25% off + free shipping – code: PRIVATE, pin:2530.

Don’t even get me started on all the dresses I’ve bought from Old Navy or Torrid that pill after the first wash. Grr… every time I think, “Oh! Maybe they’ve changed…”, things haven’t.

Not sure if this was purse or New York excitement/panic or just me being silly.

I guess you can tell, but last year or so, I have completely fallen in love with Land’s End. They carry more preppier clothes than I would usually wear, but they do have some great basics and cute dresses. They carry up to a size 26W, and run big, in my experience.

Take a walk on the wild side, visit the others to see more animal print!

Claire – A Monkey Fatshionista
Rebecca – The Plus Side of Me
Gina – Fat Fit Fine
Becky – The Ramblings of Mrs BeBe

Would you wear animal print?

Challenges / Five Take / OOTD — 9 Comments
4
Jun 12

Five Take: Pastels

It’s allllliiiiiiiiiive. By it, I mean me.

Well, I made it to Texas. This will be my… third week of apartment living. I have lots to post and share (what’s new) but getting settled in and figuring out my new schedule (work, blah, blah) kind of took priority over anything else. Sorry blog!

Plus recovering from hauling/moving/unpacking all my CRAP to a second floor apartment. And I even had help!

Shirt – One Stop Plus
Skirt – Webster for Target, 4x
Shoes – Clarks, 11
Belt – Torrid, 4
Jewelry – Miscellaneous stuff I re-discovered while packing.

Anyway, I’m here to FINALLY post a Five Take (slacker that I am). Last weekend, I was set to do the Chevron challenge we had scheduled. I checked Twitter for giggles in the morning… only to see that it got changed! Really, this was no big deal because it was Memorial Day weekend and yeah, I had other things to do.

The idea behind Five Take is pretty simple. One theme, five people… resulting in five different looks. The only restriction is having to shop from our closets. Sounds easy enough, right?

This week? Pastels.

I’m not a pastel kind of girl. I love bold, bright colors. My wardrobe is massive and I left a lot of stuff in California… but there are very, very few pastel items. I thought I had the rainbow (and then some) covered, but apparently not. Surprised? Me too. I didn’t want to miss another week, so I started digging through my last few boxes (ran out of hangers, see question above) and found a few items I wasn’t too enthusiastic about.

Most of them were things that I thought, “Wow, why did I pack this?” Which made me panic… just a bit.

I settled on this shirt – the best of the bunch, which I actually wore last year for INDD. It seemed like the best option for the day, aside from the fact that it I prefer to wear it with a strapless bra… which can be a pain in the ass. And the fact that we’re twinsies, or close enough, color-wise. I have the same shirt in black and the contrast works better, ha ha.

It turned out to be perfect for a warm day, out and about and coffee with a friend!

I tried my hardest to NOT default to wearing it tucked into a high waisted skirt, with a belt. I still have the skirt and belt but wearing it in this unusual (for me) place – my waist! I KNOW.

It was awkward, but I survived.

Let’s talk about the skirt. Guys, I was surprised that Target actually did one of their designer collections in plus sizes. I’ve been out of the loop, but did any of you hear about it before the release?

When ordering a few things for the new apartment… I “fell” into the clothing department, saw the Webster stuff and found myself browsing to see if any of it ran big. Then to my shock, some of the pieces were available in plus!

The skirt is 100% cotton, navy floral eyelet and lined. It is cut with a slight flare and has very shallow pockets. But pockets are better than no pockets! It looks pretty well made and out of good cotton fabric – compared to some of the Pure Energy line. The elastic waistband is a little bulky for my tastes, but it is pretty much what you’d expect.

The prints in the Webster line weren’t all to my taste. Only a handful of pieces were available in plus sizes, this was the only one that I liked. If they had made the whole collection in plus, I would have tried a few more! The downside, of course, is that plus sizes are only available online. Hey Target! I want to try on my clothes in a store too!

This is my exaggerated: “I don’t know what I’m doing!” face/pose?

SERIOUS QUESTION:

The photo spot – yay or nay? It is possibly my new default (aka close to the apartment and NOT the balcony/hallway) but Chris questions my judgement. You’d think he would have learned by now…

As far as pastels go, I like color, even the muted ones – so I could be convinced to try and incorporate them into my wardrobe, especially the blues and greens. But at the end of the day… bright colors will always hold a special place in my heart.

Visit the rest of the Five Take crew to see more!

Claire – A Monkey Fatshionista
Rebecca – The Plus Side of Me
Gina – Fat Fit Fine
Becky – The Ramblings of Mrs BeBe

Is pastel a trend you’d try? What colors do you prefer?

P.S. I missed you all! Thanks for sticking around.

Challenges / Five Take / OOTD — 3 Comments
6
Apr 12

Five Take: Geometric

This moving stuff is throwing me through a loop… but that is (more or less) just an excuse! Packing stresses me out, so I’m trying to take breaks in between – especially breaks far, far away from the computer and outside the house.

This Five Take outfit is from last week’s challenge – Geometric. My mom and I planned on seeing Mirror Mirror, and this is what I wore. I forgot to have my brother snap pictures until after sunset, so we took them in the backyard with very little time and light.

Sorry for the awkward, rushed pictures. Such is life!

“Top” – Avenue sundress, 26/28, old
Tank – Avenue, 26/28
Skirt – handmade, thrifted/altered
Flats – Clarks
Necklace – Claire’s
Belt – Lane Bryant, 26/28, here.
Lipstick – MAC, Girl About Town

We technically didn’t make it to the movies that night. We missed one showing and decided to eat dinner before heading to the 9:40. After dinner, salad and a gluten free pizza (that didn’t taste like crap, amazing!), we had an hour to kill. What better place to spend an hour? Target.

My mom and I have a complicated relationship with Target. When I was a kid, we kind of joked that it was impossible to walk out without spending $100. Every. Single. Time. As an adult, I’ve come to realize that it is true, it is a CURSE – so I try my best to stay away. But I guess we broke it, even combining our purchases, we spent less! Small victories.

As it turned out, we overshot our “browsing” by 30 minutes and missed the 9:40 showing too, but agreed to go the next afternoon (and made it, thankfully). Good thing we made the stop – I bought a top at Target and wore it the next day to avoid wearing the exact same outfit. Ha!

Hopefully I’ll be on time for Five Take this week. I’m supposed to go out to help my mom with Easter preparation after work tomorrow night and I’ll have to make the post from there! This is how I feel lately:

Spazzing, or something.

After my closet purge, I realized that the geometric prints I thought about wearing for this post didn’t make the cut. I’ve been pretty ruthless with my closet clean out and still plan on going back through everything before taping the boxes shut.

This outfit (and post) made me realize that I absolutely loathe too big or ill-fitting cardigans, so that is more stuff that can go. If I wear a cardigan, 99% of the time it is open. Cardigans that “fit” when buttoned, look sloppy when un-buttoned. Such a dilemma!

Don’t forget to visit the others to see what they wore!

Claire – A Monkey Fatshionista
Rebecca – The Plus Side of Me
Gina – Fat Fit Fine
Becky – The Ramblings of Mrs BeBe

Challenges / Five Take / OOTD — 21 Comments
26
Jan 12

Five Take: Primary Colors

If you’ve noticed, I’m a bit of a color nerd. I blame it on being an art student but if we’re being honest – it started way (way, way) before that. This week, our Five Take theme was primary colors – red, yellow, and blue. Can you guess who chose it? ;) Though now I can’t help but think… Wonder Woman.

In 2011, I took a step back from the color roller coaster and added more neutrals to my wardrobe to try something different. Even after my experimenting, I still feel like some pop of color is always needed.

Most of my outfits with color tend to utilize the color wheel. I’m not kidding when I say that I used to carry one of these babies in my purse:

Yes, I am completely serious. Actually I have two, a mini (purse sized) color wheel and one that was with my school stuff. Hey! They come in handy. Over the years, they have gotten put… who knows where, but color theory is now ingrained in my brain.

Top – Simply Be, size 28, here.
Skirt – Avenue, 26/28
Jacket – Torrid, size 4
Tights – We Love Colors, size EE in Gold, black patterned tights from Avenue.
Boots – Fitzwell, “Syrup” via 6pm.com
Bracelet – F21, here.

For me, it is almost impossible to resist the urge to add color to anything. Almost physically and mentally impossible to resist adding color to my outfits, makeup, interior decorating, the food I cook – yes, I add different vegetables for color (okay, sometimes flavor). Usually, I’m drawn to a bright color. Surprise, I know.

Not that I always follow “the rules” (because they are meant to be broken) or have an entire rainbow (and then some) of clothing to choose from (despite my best efforts) but the thought is there.

For this challenge I had originally planned to keep it simple and wear just one primary color – I was thinking blue. The last several days work has been really busy and this weekend I spent most of the time in my snowman pajamas. Alas, they are not primary colored – otherwise you might have seen them. Since I try to not play “dress up” for the blog, you get this a few days late!

This morning I realized, that it was already mid-week and I needed to take pictures but a simple outfit no longer appealed to me. So here we are – two colors and lots of “stuff” or texture – sheer, floaty sleeves, houndstooth, cut outs, beads, patterned tights. Well, you can’t actually see the sleeves since I forgot to take a picture with the coat off! This outfit definitely has a lot going on.

I thought it might be too much, especially the coat & tights combo… but I like the effect. Though I don’t like the fact that the black tights scrunch around the knees – making it nearly impossible to see the pattern without hiking them up every two minutes.

My closet is well-stocked but the dominant primary color in my wardrobe is this bright, cobalt blue. A year ago, it would have been red. Yellow is definitely lacking… but I have a few pieces. 2011 was a great year for blue… and it’s a good thing because Pantone named Tangerine the color of 2012.

Guess what goes well with that? ;)

Don’t forget to check out how the others wore their primary colors!

Claire – A Monkey Fatshionista
Rebecca – The Plus Side of Me
Gina – Fat Fit Fine
Becky – The Ramblings of Mrs BeBe

What is the dominant primary color in your wardrobe? Do you use color theory in your outfit choices?

A Well-Rounded Venture

Posts Tagged: five take

Five Take: Animal Print

Five Take: Pastels

Five Take: Geometric

Five Take: Primary Colors

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