Dots and stripes.

• Button down: Maurices (previously)
• Cami: Maurices (buy)
• Skirt: Maurices (previously)
• Sandals: Lela Rose for Payless

This post is part of Megan's challenge to show off your stripes. Okay, this is going to have to be super quick: I got slammed a little yesterday and today, and have a lot of non-blog things to do (trust me, I would rather be blogging! :) ). And for all my blogging buddies further to the north... our weather is supposed to get unpleasant later in the week, so please don't hate on the bare legs! And of course, the pictures today were taken by my awesome wife.

First outfit of spring.

• Top: Maurices (previously)
• Skirt: Maurices (previously)
• Sandals: Payless

Megan of Megan Mae Daily is hosting a challenge this week to showcase your stripes. Since the weather around here has suddenly and dramatically become gorgeous and springy, I decided to go for something simple and suitable for just enjoying the weather. And I while I originally planned to get caught up on some blogging this weekend, the weather was too nice to stay inside, and my cabin fever won out, so we went exploring on the back roads in the countryside on Saturday. I may have found some neat places to do some outfit photos in the future, so I'll just save the details for a later post (hopefully one with pictures! :) ). Oh, and of course, my beautiful wife took the pictures for today's post.

Green for Saint Patrick's Day.

• Blue t-shirt: Maurices
• Green t-shirt: Maurices
• Trouser Jeans: Maurices (previously)
• Oxfords: Payless (previously)

This was my casual outfit for Saint Patrick's Day. I know it's nothing particularly exciting, but I had some errands to run around town, and I went with something a little more subtle. While it was actually a beautiful day out, it was still enough on the chilly side that I went for layered t-shirts. Tomorrow I have a pretty full day, and my wife and I are going out with friends in the evening, and I will hopefully have a post about that next week. And of course, my adorable wife took the pictures for today's post.

An outfit for driving.

• Hoodie: Maurices (buy)
• T-shirt: Old Navy
• Jeans: Maurices (previously)
• Boots: Clarks via Craigslist
• Socks: Hanes

Since the beginning of the year one of our ongoing projects has been to get rid of some excess stuff, either by taking it to consignment and thrift stores, or by selling it on Craigslist. This plan has a flaw I have recently discovered: other people on Craigslist have things I want, and so I end up "window shopping" the other listings. And that is the genesis of this outfit. I found a listing for a formal dress on the cheap, and while I have no "reason" to own one, I found myself realizing that it would be really nice to try one on, and own one "just in case", and the seller was offering an excellent deal, and really, this is all just rationalization for the fact that I want to make up for wearing a tux to my HS prom. So I sent an email, and scheduled a time and place to try on the dresses to make sure they fit. I realized that since I would mostly be driving and trying on dresses, I might as well dress how I wanted. And so after a pleasant and chilly afternoon drive, I am now the proud owner of a formal dress, and pleased with my outfit for the day. Even though this outfit spent more time in the vehicle than it did outside.

And of course today's pictures were taken by my wonderful wife. And I am slowly getting back into the swing of things with blogging and commenting, it only took the first two months of 2011 to do that. Thanks everyone for your comments and reading my blog!

Funky office casual.

• Blazer: Maurices (previously)
• Tube top: Maurices
• Cropped pants: Torrid
• Pumps: Payless

I've had this tube top in my closet for a while, but I've not been satisfied with my attempts to style it until now. And while a tube top is not something I think most people would count as acceptable office attire, I think it works well under this blazer. Admittedly, since I work from home, any discussions about acceptable office wear are purely theoretical. (And let's face it, in my case, most people are going to get stuck on that whole "crossdressing" thing instead of noticing the tube top...). And while I'm not sure if it shows up in the pictures, but the shading on the pumps are actually polka dots that slowly get bigger and more dense toward the toe.

I have one more outfit from my backlog to post, and we're still having to share computers in our household (not much longer I hope!), and of course in addition to being so gracious with her laptop my amazing wife took the pictures for today's post.

Too many patterns.

• Dress: Maurices
• Belt: Maurices (came with dress)
• Button down: Old Navy (previously)
• Pumps: Payless
• Pantyhose: Just My Size

This is another outfit from the backlog that was trapped on my old computer. When I put this outfit together I decided to have fun with pattern mixing. The shoes are plaid, and both the dress and the button down have vertical stripes in them. And in writing this post, I realized this outfit has a certain resemblance to the previous one in which I wore this button down. I guess that means I just need to get more button downs. And the temperature around here has been up and down lately, so it's just been too chilly for bare legs, but I've had this dress for a few months, and I really wanted to wear it, so I opted for the pantyhose.

And I am slowly getting caught up(and I'm still borrowing my wife's computer that she is graciously sharing with me until my new one gets here). And of course, my awesome wife took the pictures for this post.

Trippy heels.

• Top: Maurices (previously)
• Cardigan: Maurices
• Trouser Jeans: Maurices
• Pumps: Nine West
• Bag: Target (previously)
• Necklace: Maurices (previously)
• Bracelets: Torrid (previously)
• Umbrella: Crabtree & Evelyn (previously)

Some friends of ours had some guests over this past weekend, and I took the opportunity to dress up. I was really excited about my new trouser jeans, and I really wanted to wear heels with them, so I paired them these heels which I have never really worn other than the initial try on, despite owning them for a while. The weather was pretty rainy and dreary, and I briefly thought about switching things out for my rainboots, but I knew we weren't going to get any good outside shots, and I figured we would mostly be making a few brief trips to and from the car.

After a fun evening with friends though, in the dark and rainy night, I mis-stepped on their stairs walking to the car and tripped. The biggest casualty besides my pride, was my pair of heels, as you can see above. The jeans are mostly okay, but I will probably be demoting them to much more casual purposes due to the blemish on the knee. (I realize that logic may be flawed since I have a matching blemish on my leg...)

I admit I'm a little bummed out about the shoes, but I got to spend a couple of days dressed how I wanted last week, and it helped my mood out a lot actually. And I will have more on that (and the outfits) in a future post. Plus, it turns out there may be some hope for the shoes after all! I talked to some friends and did some searching and I found a cobbler, and when I dropped the shoes off yesterday, they didn't seem to think it was too big of a deal to fix them. And honestly, while replacing shoes in my collection can be a little difficult due to sizing, I feel a lot more bold about going out these days and this blog has definitely played a role in that. And frankly, I'm happy I wore the shoes outside to an event with friends, even if they did get damaged in the process. There was a time when I would not have believed that I would ever own a pair of shoes like this, much less severely damage them from wearing them out and about.

So I look forward to seeing how the shoes come back from the cobbler (this is a new experience for me), and hopefully I will be figuring out a better balance of blogging with the rest of my life. I really miss everyone! And of course, my beautiful wife helped with my hair and makeup and took the pictures for today's post! (She's also still letting me borrow her computer!)

Bright outfit, cold day, and an unexpected blogging break.

• Sweater: Maurices
• Skinny Jeans: Torrid (previously)
• Boots: Torrid (previously)

First, I must apologize for my absence. While I have never publicly committed to a posting schedule, I like to make sure that I post "regularly", and frankly I feel worse that I have not been reading and leaving comments on other blogs as well. I will chalk it all up to a lack of time coupled with technical difficulties: This year has been... busy for lack of a better way to put it, and then I ended up suffering from a lost (and then found...) wallet (but not found before I canceled all the credit/bank/ATM cards and got a new id!), and a dead computer, (and all this interrupted working on pulling together stuff for our taxes... which are still not done! Ugh). In fact, my computer is still dead. Thankfully I don't think I lost anything, but I'm still waiting on a new one, and borrowing my wife's computer at the moment. And the cake topper was tripping and damaging a pair of heels on their first outing (I'm fine... the heels... not so much). I would love to tell you all that I suffered all this with grace, poise and dignity, and that I was pleasant to be around. But that would be a lie, so I won't say that.

On the other hand, I do have a backlog of outfits to post as soon as I can work out some technical details of getting them off my old computer, and I have some pictures still on the camera for even more posts. Alas, I will still be posting... somewhat randomly for the next few days. And while I would love to go back over all the blogs I have missed, I will be doing a lot of skimming and then hitting "mark all as read" in Google Reader soon, and hopefully figuring out a better way to stay on top of my reading, and I am so sorry for missing out what has been happening with everyone and your wonderful outfits. So please excuse this brief rambling post and forgive me for not staying on top of everyone's blogs, and hopefully enjoy this outfit from a few weeks ago that I uploaded before I had computer problems. And about this outfit. I did have to wear a white tank top under the sweater because it was a little too "see thru", but other than that, I felt really comfortable and cute in it on a cold day. In fact, it was so comfortable I didn't want to take it off that evening, which is always a good sign in my book.

Oh, and of course my fabulous wife took the pictures for this post, and even loaned me her computer so I could post it.