A little sparkle

Dillard's had one of their "extra 30% off permanently reduced merchandise" sales this past week. I tried really hard to stay away and ended up going on the last couple of days of the sale which probably meant that there were fewer treasures for me to find, but that's okay. I still found a couple of things. One is the necklace that I am wearing today. The pictures do not begin to show how beautifully sparkly it is. I do love me some sparkle!

This outfit was inspired by an email I received from JCrew, called the art of the collar. I am sorry I do not have a full length picture. My DH is down in the back and I did not want him to have to stoop over to take pictures. My shirt is from Old Navy and the suede jacket is one I purchased many years ago at Dillard's.

I used the Lucky magazine that I just received as a background for the necklace. If you look closely, you will see that on February 13th, Lucky is having a giveaway for a Wendy Brandes necklace! Hooray for Wendy. I hope it will bring her a lot of new customers. I am going to enter that one for sure! You can go to luckymag.com/breaks to access the giveaways.

Last week RoseAG asked about whether or not I had tweaked my hair color. The answer is yes and no. I have been experimenting with some different purple shampoos which can change the tone of my hair. Purple shampoo? What the heck is that? Well, it is a shampoo that has purple color depositing toner in it that is used by blonds and women with gray hair to reduce brassy tones. If used too often, it can turn very light hair kind of purple. Hey that is okay by me as I love the pale lilac tones in hair. It has been hard to find a good one that is not perfumey and that doesn't cause a reaction on my sensitive skin. Once I find the one that works for me I will report my findings. I know a few of us are trying to go to our natural color.

Please join the very visible fashionistas at Not Dead Yet Style for our Monday linkup!

It looks better in person; I promise!

One thing I have learned from my time blogging is that often an outfit will look different in a photograph than in real life. Today's outfit is definitely one of "those." The colors of the Chico's jacket are much prettier in person. (I sure miss Picnik photo software, it was so easy to use to correct colors. PicMonkey is just not the same.) In person, the Chico's necklaces pick up the purplish colors in the plaid. I felt very stylish while running a few errands and getting my hair trimmed.

 As usual, Mr. Harry was excited about the photo session. He was so excited that he was moving so quickly he was just a blur. He was a very happy blur while shaking his loofa toy (the yellow blur.)

3 Chico's necklaces layered

I hope you will all join me over at Patti's for Visible Monday with all the lovely ladies whose style I so admire. My gosh, it is getting to be a really big party!

Fire and Lace

Good morning to everyone on this special day for those of us here in the United States of America. It is Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and the Inauguration of President Barack Obama. 

I decided to go with some color for my outfit of the week. The title of this post is based on the fiery colors of the scarf and blouse from Coldwater Creek and the lace pattern on pants from Chico's. The jacket is from Jones New York. I certainly felt visible in the bright colors!

I spent quite a bit of time looking at different scarf tying methods and did not find this particular look. This is a variation of the loop and tuck (keep the ends the same length when looping instead of the way it's shown in the instructions shown in the link.)where instead of tightly tucking the ends through the loop I pulled them up to drape over the top of the loop. I've tried this on several scarves and I think it is a pretty variation. I think it works best on a very long scarf because the hanging pieces end up longer. I am calling this Loop, Tuck, and Drape. What do you think of it?

Please join me on with all the other stylish ladies for the Visible Monday linkup.

Shimmer at Sunset

The gold and burgundy colors in my outfit reminded me of brilliant sunset colors and the jacket has shimmery gold threads, thus the title of this post.

Last week I asked you all about listing brands of clothing shown in my outfits and the consensus seems to be to list them.  I often learn of new companies that I wouldn't have heard of if it hadn't been for information other bloggers have shared with us. 

A couple of you commented that I looked like I was glowing. I think it's the 7.2 mega-pixels and bad lighting! We had some pictures taken at a local studio and I am pretty sure there is no glow. I rarely wear any makeup in my pictures and don't really do much in the way of skin care. I may do a post about products I do like. I think that it is very helpful to share our experiences with products. 

Jacket and Blouse: Chico's
Jeans: NYDJ Jade Leggings
Scarf from Von Maur

(The scarf isn't as bright a yellow as it appears on the screen.)

I cropped this from a photo of
me and my sister taken Saturday.  

We had family pictures taken at Portrait Innovations. The photos were quite nice for the number of photos we received and the number of pictures taken. The last time we had pictures taken was at a professional photographer's studio. Those pictures were so beautifully done and time was spent making each pose perfect.  However, it took a lot of time to get the photos back and the photos were much more expensive. For my blog I sure cannot gripe about my photographer as he doesn't charge me and I know we don't have hundreds of dollars in camera/photography equipment. 

I hope you will share this Visible Monday and Monday Mingle linkup's with all the lovely ladies who share their beautiful selves with us each week.

I Dream of Stars and Tie-Dye

Whenever I read the really cool titles that are on blog posts I always think that I wish I could come up with one. I don't know if this one is really cool or is just cool in my head, but it jumped into my thoughts today so I decided to use it. For today's Visible Monday outfit I do have a star print top and tie-dye scarf. Megan Mae and I have 'a thing' for stars (the outer space kind.) For me, maybe it was growing up during the 50's and 60's when the space program was a really big deal, Star Trek was brand new, and man stood on the moon for the first and then the last time. I hope someday to see humans go to Mars, but I fear I will not live that long.

As usual, Mr. Harry decided he needed to get in the pictures. We get such a kick out of his excitement.

I have a question for you all. I am unsure as to whether or not to continue to list the brands of clothing and accessories that I am wearing. When I do list them it is so that if anyone is interested in finding an item it will make it easier for them to do so. If  no one cares, then I will not list them any more. Please comment and let me know your preference. 

I just got my new issue of People Stylewatch and in looking through it I realized that the bloggers I follow are really much more interesting than any celebrity. You all dress more uniquely and have more interesting outfits that reflect real life style.  Please visit the linkups at Monday Mingle and Not Dead Yet Style for Visible Monday.

Blue and Gold brocade

Ah, New Years Eve and the last Monday of 2012. It just seems hard to believe that another year has flown by in the blink of an eye. Our evening will be a quiet one spent at home and if we are lucky we might be awake at midnight to greet the new year.  

I purchased some new boots from Amazon this past week with some money I got for Christmas. On Christmas day, my sister was wearing these boots in black. She had purchased them from a local boutique for $160. I hoped to find them for less and after some searching, I found them on Amazon for $40. I ended up getting both the taupe and black since they were such a good price.

For today's outfit, I combined the taupe boots with pattern and shine in gold and blue. I started out with the pants tucked into the boots but I was unsure if I really liked it so I ended up untucking them. It is hard for me to find anything pants that are tight enough through the calves to tuck in boots. Plus-side skinny or jeggings are not made for those of us with smaller calves (although mine aren't that tiny!)



Image From Amazon.com



Jacket: Chico's
Blouse: Dillards
Jeans: Wit & Wisdom via Nordstrom
 Boots: Very Volatile via Amazon
 

It is hard to see the pattern on the pants, but it is a large brocade pattern. Because I had so much pattern going on, I decided to go with minimal accessories. I have had this bracelet and matching earrings for a long time and haven't worn it much. It is so beautiful that I am kind of afraid to wear it and risk damaging it. It went so perfectly with this outfit that I had to get it out.

Stanley Hagler NYC/Ian St. Gellar

 

 I wish you all a very Happy New Year. Thank you for joining me on my style journey through my retirement. I am so thankful for being a part of this wonderful blogging community. I am always in awe of all the creativity and style that is shared on Visible Monday and every other day. You are all amazing and inspiring. Thank you for being here. Please visit Not Dead Yet Style for the last Visible Monday of 2012.

Cream and Gray

I have been going back and forth trying to decide whether or not to post today. With the news of what happened in Newtown on Friday I feel so sad and a bit overwhelmed by the enormity of it all.  What a horrific tragedy. My heart goes out to all who lost a loved one and to those whose innocence has been forever lost.

My outfit for today is rather muted in gray and cream. I need to get the pants hemmed, but I did not want to wait to wear them, so I turned the hems up. I remember years ago I never had to hem pants. Now I almost always have to unless the pants are "ankle" pants in which case they fit me like perfectly.

I decide to use rather feminine accessories so I went with what I think is the ultimate feminine accessory - pearls.

Friday evening we took Harry to the dog park. It was the first time at a dog park for us and it was fun even though it was cold and windy. It was fun to see all the dogs running and sniffing. (I don't think Harry much appreciated the two neutered males who thought he needed to be humped.) While we were watching them, a lady sitting on a bench with me remarked that there was a much larger than Harry black Lab who should be arriving soon. Imagine her surprise when the huge Lab, Rex, turned out to be smaller than Harry! He is a big dude. When we got him we were told he was a smaller Airedale and was full grown. Ha! We love him regardless.

On another subject, I am going to remove the ability to comment anonymously for a while. I have been getting a lot of spam anon comments. I wanted people to be able to comment easily even if they don't have a Google account. Unfortunately the few ruin things for the many. I apologize if this inconveniences anyone (except you spammers!)

Please join all the wonderful bloggers who share their beauty on this Visible Monday linkup.