Fashion Files

"Fashion" is a word a bit too ambitious for some of my outfits. "What I wore" would be a better description than fashion 😀

Ok, the first outfit is the most "fashionable" of the bunch!! I had this on when I thought I was meeting a friend for lunch. Turns out not so much that day... We had been going back and forth on the date and I had the wrong one in my mind. I verified the time we were meeting by looking at our texts and realized the time I had in my mind was correct but the date wasn't!! I was a week early. Thankfully I hadn't left the house so I just changed out of this outfit and shortly after that left the house to go help my father in law with some tasks pertaining to him moving to a new place. It ended up working out really well that the lunch date was the following week. Anyway, since I had this on and thought to take a photo, here goes:

First a caveat, as I looked at the pictures I had of my outfits, I realized that almost every item that I wore (with the exception of one piece) are many years old. This is due in part because 1) I'm not a shopoholic by any means. I don't enjoy shopping unless I'm with someone who does enjoy it like my girls or my sister so I don't do it too much which means it's necessary to keep items that I have 2) I've been close to the same size since I've had my current closet (21 years!) so I haven't grown out of too many clothes meaning I've never had to do a weed out of clothes due to size. Now my weight has fluctuated for sure and there are some clothes that were tighter on me when I was at my smallest- those I wouldn't/couldn't wear now- but for the most part, I'm able to wear everything that I've had 3) I tend to be drawn to neutrals which stand the test of time/are less trendy so I feel like they are keep worthy longer. (I do get rid of clothes quite periodically!! But I have also held on to numerous pieces for years.)

The top here is a Vineyard Vines blouse that I've had for years. I don't wear it often but it's too basic/neutral of a blouse to throw out so it stays in my closet and I wear it every once in a while. I thought it paired well with a newer addition to my closet- this Lilly skort. The print of the skort is a little outside of my comfort zone- I am drawn to neutrals but I have begun to branch out a little and this skort would be an example of trying bolder prints. 

Moving on to a "what I wore" rather than "fashion" here is an outfit that I had on for part of one day last week- mainly just to do some gardening in. The top is an athletic top and is super lightweight. It seemed appropriate for the weather (hot) outside and in (still no AC!!). My bottom is a skort from Amazon. I don't shop at Amazon for clothes much at all. I checked my order history and I bought this skirt last June and have not purchased  any clothing items (except for shoes) since then from Amazon. I don't have anything against Amazon clothes- it's just not a place that I think to look for clothes. I ordered the skort from Amazon because I decided a couple of days before Abby and I left for out West that I wanted it and two day shipping worked for me :). I do like that there is a pocket in the side of the skort- it's super convenient to put my phone in it to have my hands free but the phone is still nearby me. 

This is what I wore the same day that I gardened but it's after I had run and showered. I needed to run some errands. I kept the skort that I'd had on before but changed my top to a t-shirt. 

I wore this when we had friends over on Friday. The top is one that I got in Louisville on a blogger's trip. One of Fashion File's hosts, Amy, took us to a consignment shop called Clothes Mentor (I think?) and I hit the motherlode of a sale. One rack had an additional 90% off the ticketed price!! Yes, please! I bought five summer blouses and with tax, I spent around $9 for all the blouses combined. This was one of them. I think it's cute and super summery but the top part is odd. I feel like it's supposed to be worn off the shoulder because if it's not, the top bunches- it's like there's extra material for the top to stretch across the shoulders. But it's kinda hard to wear something off the shoulders? Every time you move your arm upward, the sleeve moves up. Still it's a cute top but one I don't feel badly about for not wearing much since it was so cheap :). 

I also thought that not tucking the shirt in made the whole look more tent like than it needed to be...

I thought this looked more flattering.

This is what I wore to a grad party on Saturday. The shirt is an oldie but a goodie from Walmart of all places... Walmart is paying influencers now to make its clothes seem cool but I bought this long before Walmart took big steps to get a larger market share of women's clothing purchases.  I don't shop at Walmart much for clothes (notwithstanding the influencers!)- if memory serves me, this was on a clearance rack (my eyes always gravitate towards those!) and was super cheap. It's very lightweight and I think it has stood the test of fashion time well enough (for me anyway!!)

The skirt is from Banana Republic and is one of my favorites due to how natural the color is yet it has the fun touch with the flare at the bottom. 

Here are some of the pieces more up close and some more info about some of them:



This skirt is cute but I will never order another one like it because...

This hook and eye on the back has to be attached (or the zipper falls down!) and it's not easy to do since it's on the back of the skort and you can't see it. You have to feel around to try to attach the pieces together. Kind of a pain and can take some time.

I think I got this at Zulily years and years ago.  I wonder if that company is still around? I used to get the kids items from Zulily. Speaking of kids, this is a girls' extra large. Kids clothes are cheaper than adults so I will buy a kids version for things that don't need to be structured well such as a running top. 

My Amazon gray skort. I like how the top has this wide band. It pushes "things" in as much as possible :).

This is the T-shirt I wore with the skort above to run errands. It looks white here but it's light green. I like Laudy quite a bit provided it's not spring break! (Though I do think traveling there once with Alyssa when she was on spring break in high school opened her eyes to some of the negative consequences of imbibing too much alcohol (and that just when we were out in the main area to eat dinner. We were not out late at all.))

This is the "I think it's supposed to be worn off the shoulder shirt." You see here that the neckline is not normal... This shirt from Ann Taylor is a linen cotton blend. Not bad for less than $2 especially since it looks like it was never worn (it actually might have been brand new. One of the five shirts that I got at the consignment store still had tags from a store on it).

These are my favorite "house shorts." I wear them at home A LOT in the summer! They are comfy and worn in. They're from the Gap and the Gap at our mall closed in the autghts so these are many years old! (I remember buying them in the store at our local mall so they are at least as old as the Gap is gone from the mall.)

My Walmart black blouse

My khaki skirt is from Banana Republic- it's so versatile. I think it's flattering and I like the length and really everything about it :)

What a fun lighthearted topic to talk about! Thanks Amy and Marsha for the Fashion Files link up.

Speaking of talking, also linking up with Joanne's fun link up, Talking About it Tuesday