i change shapes just to hide in this place but i'm still an animal

This is my second year working in retail part-time while going to school. In 2014 I worked at The Limited, then I transferred schools and moved to a different city in January 2015. In October I got a job at White House Black Market, which is, in all honesty, very similar to The Limited. It's just more expensive. I do like it for the most part, but it's really changed my outlook on clothes. Constantly being around brand new sparkling fresh clothing that I don't own is...weird. My sense of style hasn't changed, but I have gotten more varied when figuring out how to style something that I normally would pass right by, but...it's much more than that.

I've been typing and retyping this paragraph, trying to accurately describe the sensation that I get from new clothes and going shopping since I started working in retail, but I can't seem to figure out how to explain it.

Anyways, I thought I'd put together some outfits using at least one main piece from WHBM. This is how I would wear these clothes if: 1. I was allowed to style them this way, and 2. I had enough money to buy them. (I do get a decent discount, but I still have to be very selective with what I buy. If they want their employees to constantly be decked out head to toe in their clothes, they'd have to, like, quadruple our pay.)

Without further ado...

button-front pencil skirt 98.00 | leather ankle-strap heels 125.00 | fringe clutch 98.00 | others

florals? for spring? groundbreaking.

How many fashion blogs have used this quote during spring? Seriously, I should start keeping count.

So it's more than halfway through March and it's caught me off guard just a bit. February in Kansas is so blah, and suddenly it's the third week of March and it's warm enough to wear shorts some days and sandals most days. I love the transition seasons, which is unfortunate because more often than not they pass by in a blink here. We routinely see snow in April and then in May it'll be 80+ degrees out; in the fall, we can experience days where it's 100 degrees even in September, and suddenly in October it's time for coats. It's frustrating to live in Kansas if you do not like or cannot deal with extreme weather; on the plus side, it's never boring.

i do believe it's true that there are roads left in both of our shoes

I have a story that makes me sound like a bitter old woman, but I don't care

See these shoes?

The dirtier, the better.

The shoes epitomizing all things Instagram-posting, Starbucks-going, leggings and baggy sweaters-wearing hipster girls?

one of those weeks..

The last week has not been great for me. I got sick in May, and by the end of June I was feeling much better. I thought that I was back to 100%, but the last two weeks have kind of slapped me back and been like, Ha yeah, not quite. I've had to drop a few classes, and because I had no flexibility left in my classes on my course to graduation, I ended up having to push my graduation date back a whole year. For two classes. Sucks. Trying to look at the silver lining, though, is that 1) I'm not going to kill myself from stress now, 2) I might actually get to study abroad next fall!! I'm so excited. It's all I've wanted to do since I came to college. But much more about that later.

Another thing that happened yesterday that made my bad week not quite as bad is that I got a call from a clothing store in town about coming in for an interview. I had applied there like over two months ago. I had applied at a lot of places, but sometimes people take forever to call back. Whatever. I ended up taking a job at a sandwich shop and I hate it. For many reasons. So I was really excited that I got this call. I have an interview on Tuesday. Fingers crossed it goes well, and I can quit the hellhole that is my current place of work.

So trying to take my mind off of my current woes, I've started dreaming up some cute outfits to wear to my maybe-soon-to-be new job. And then I realized, hey. Polyvore. So I put them together so I could actually look at them with my eyes instead of with just my thoughts.

Obviously I can totally afford all of these clothes :)

*Also, when I worked at the Limited last year, they had some fairly rigid rules on what you can and can't wear. If you aren't wearing head-to-toe Limited brand (excluding shoes and accessories), then you can only wear solid black and white pieces. No gray. No black and white stripes. Each article of clothing has to be a solid color, and it has to be black or white. Also, if you are not wearing "dress" pants of some sort (like if you are wearing jeans), then you have to be wearing a blazer too.

So I have no idea the dress code for other stores, but I'm thinking in terms of somewhere close-ish to what the Limited had (hopefully more fun and flexible though).

Pinterest, magazines, and glue sticks

Wow, I haven't posted on here in so long (since February?) but that does not mean I have been skipping out on some fashion sessions. I blame Pinterest. Also, before Pinterest was...well, there, I had a sort of hard-copy lookbook I maintained. I started it about five years ago, but it's just been sitting around gathering dust the last few years. So last night I dragged out the book and did a little editing and updating. It really is amazing seeing how my tastes have changed over the last half-decade. I'd like to think they've gotten a bit more...refined. That is to say, less 19 years-old-ish.

I don't consider the two (Pinterest and my lookbook) as being the same. There are great things floating around Pinterest, and especially during Fashion Week(s) when a lot of new stuff appears, but during the off-seasons, I start seeing a lot of recycling of the same photos. This is why I like magazines. Styles might be similar every now and then, but at least they use completely different pictures for each new edition (barring ads, which are actually terrific for inspiration. Assuming they're not completely...wack).

Here's my Pinterest, if you are interested. And here's a photo (or two photos) I pinned recently. Because so far I've written a lot of text and I suppose it needs to be broken up with an image or two.

I want a poncho please.
[source]

My fall/winter style summarized in four words:
A walking fabric shop.
[source]

So I call it my lookbook because that is the word that I glued on the notebook five years ago and it does not appear as though I will be able to remove them anytime soon so I digress. The Lookbook it is. Anyways, it is laughable what I do: as I read through new magazines, I fold down the corners of pages which contain something that catches my eye. After I'm done reading, I can later go back through quickly, find the pages I marked, and cut out whatever I liked. Then I glue the pictures to 3-hole-punched graph paper and finally nestle said papers into my book. It's like second grade art class. Except I don't have to use safety scissors. (It's time-consuming. I should probably be doing things more socially acceptably productive.)

I do, in fact, have a point to the previous three paragraphs. As I mentioned, I started updating the books, and I just thought I'd share some of my favorites. These are ones that I have not yet seen on Pinterest, so hopefully they are a breath of fresh air (or at least non-recirculated air) for you as well.

I hope you enjoy these. I'm predicting that it will take me a hella long time to scan these. (And yes, 'hella long' is a standard scientific measurement of time.) So without further ado...

I heart gold

I'm really loving gold right now, especially the idea of pairing a gold shirt with a gold skirt, especially two different tones of gold. I think pairing this with black booties (if in doubt, wear some black booties, right?) and some unique but still understated black earrings.

Stella McCartney long sleeve top, $1,000 / Loose shirt, $120 / Crop tank top, $24 / Fabergé short mini skirt, $640 / Calypso St. Barth tiered mini skirt / Gold pleated skirt, $160 / Skater skirt / Emilio Pucci black ankle booties, $1,245 / Black bootie / Eddie Borgo long drop earrings / Nickel free jewelry / Miso sparkly earrings, $8.12

Check out the set I made on Polyvore.

So what do you think...two-tone gold outfits...yay or nay?

PS-I swear a new mani tutorial and the Rodarte star hairpiece diy will be up in the next few days!

Now craving...

I've never been a scarf person, except for winter scarves, because when it drops to -10 F here, I mean, they're a necessity. But fashion scarves...they're cute, and a great way to add color or print or just something interesting to an outfit, but I've always felt kinda stupid wearing them. But I've decided to give them another go, because they are super cute.

My favorite place to (formerly) look at scarves and (hopefully) buy soon is definitely Nordstrom 3rd level (that's what my family calls it). I guess you could call it the "junior's" section at Nordstrom, but Nordstrom is just so amazing and "junior's section" just sounds so...crappy. Well, this is not crappy, definitely not. It's got all the style of the designer's section of Nordstrom (the 2nd level, as we also say), but at like 1/20th of the price. Sounds good to me!

scarf crazy by annabanana770 featuring printed scarves

LULU printed scarve / LULU floral scarve / David & Young printed scarve / David & Young printed scarve / David & Young david young / Sheer scarve