Week 18!

Welcome back for this week’s edition of the Fashion Files, hosted by Amy and me! If you don’t know Amy, her blog is Coffee and Cocktails at the Casa. It has been a week, my friends! Indiana and surrounding states were hit by massive storms, including derechos. In case you don’t know, a derecho is a ferocious thunderstorm with straight line winds. That means those winds aren’t forming tornadoes, but they are just as damaging. Nigel and I once drove from Northeast Indiana to Virginia following the path of a derecho. The scenery looked like a bomb had gone off, and power was out for the northern part of Pennsylvania. That meant no gas stations were open which meant no restrooms! We finally stopped at a hotel, and Nigel stood watch while I went into a restroom. He had to hold the door open just a bit so I could have some light!

Storms…

We were lucky in that we don’t live near any rivers so we haven’t had any flooding. But, many communities near us have been devastated by the rising waters. Of course, all that rain has left puddles all over. There are many reminders to not drive through puddles, even on a road you know well. As I drove to the museum several times, I’d see various degrees of damage. The White River flows close to the museum. It’s been very dry for the last several years. It’s very high now and rushing quite a bit. Unfortunately, we’re expecting more rain in the coming days. August is traditionally one of the hottest and driest months of the year. It’s definitely hot…it feels quite tropical outside. Everything is really lush and green, but our yard actually squishes when I walk on it!

Let’s get this party started…

If you’re a fashion blogger, this is the place to be. It’s the day of the week where I talk about the things I wore last week and what I did as well as anything I might have bought. It’s also the place where you can tell us about what you wore, what you bought, what you wished you’d bought! Please tell your friends about our link party because we’d love to see it grow and grow! I have to confess the last two weeks have been so busy, I haven’t been able to read all of your posts. I promise to rectify that as soon as I can.  I know how much work it is to link up. For example, my son set the security on my laptop some sorta way so link parties don’t even show up. There is no button at all…not even on my own posts! I have to toggle back and forth between my laptop and iPad to link up as well as to look at people who have linked up on my posts.

Last week’s looks…

Tuesday – I had a Contemporary Core meeting that day. I love these meetings! That’s a big thing for me to say because I’m notorious about disliking meetings! These meetings, however, are different from those we would have at school. We actually get things done. We talked quite a bit about the Giants: Art from the Dean Collection of Swizz Beatz and Alicia Keys exhibition, opening next month. I realized, as I was sitting there, I won’t be around for the opening. I will be at our women’s retreat…le sigh! I would have paid big money to attend a special event. Hopefully, Ms. Keys will come to visit her art more than once. After discussing that, one of our best docents gave presentations on two different pieces of contemporary art. I take lots of notes because I use that information when I’m doing Gallery Conversations. Right now, I’d have to say my knowledge base at the museum is a mile wide and an inch deep. I want to get to the point where it’s a mile wide and ten miles deep! I wore these fun Tulip Clothing pants with a longer J Jill white shirt. I got so many compliments on this look. I am telling myself it was because it was so different from what I usually wear rather than they don’t like what I usually wear!

Wednesday – This was a stay at home day. I listed some items on Poshmark and worked on the blog. I also did laundry. Tuesday seems to be my laundry day! I did spend quite a bit of the day polishing up my Tell Us About post. I’m not sure I accomplished my goal which was to tell y’all about a day when I was going to the museum. I did try, though! I wore these cute culottes from Kantha Bae with a black graphic tee I bought for our second train trip back in 2018 or so. I need to figure out how to make these culottes work for my body. The bottom part is silk, but the top is cotton kantha cloth. There’s a bit of a bulge where they are sewed together. I have a belt I think that will work when I wear these outside the house. For this day, I just tucked the bottom of the shirt into my bra band. Y’all know that trick, right? If your top is too long, just tuck the bottom of it under your bra band, and you’ve easily cropped it. This works well for me because I’m short and short waisted. I don’t worry much about the back though I probably should!

Thursday – Here’s proof I re-wear my clothes! Nigel had a physical therapist appointment, but I dropped him off a little early and ran a few errands. This is the cool longer gauze dress and white gauze palazzo pants from Tulip Clothing. I absolutely love this outfit! If Debbie had this dress in another color (hopefully, next spring), I would order it! I already have the pants in white and aqua. I looked at my other dresses to see if either pair would work under them, but I didn’t dwell too long on that. Again, I worked on the blog, finishing up the Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot post.

Friday – I was looking forward to this day!!! The kitchen “planner” was coming with samples for new countertops and flooring! I’m not sure if he’s truly a planner or the salesperson. He didn’t really give me any advice as far as what he would do. I think he knew I’d pretty much settled on a particular quartz for the tops. My daughter came over to help me out. We have completely different taste in many things. But, I knew she would have a fairly impartial eye and would keep me from making glaring mistakes! I am supposed to contact him on Monday to see what he came up with as a quote. He lives in one of the areas hard hit by the flooding so I’m not sure my kitchen would have been one of his priorities. I’ll contact him, but I won’t be surprised or upset if he tells me he couldn’t get to it. I really hope his home wasn’t affected as I know it’s got lots of sentimental value to him. It belonged to one of his grandparents. Yes, he was a talker; I’m a talker, and Nigel has become a talker, too. Our daughter left shortly after we’d arrived at choices. She is not a big talker just for the sake of talking! I started thinking about what I wanted to accomplish in the pantry. It’s a large closet kind of pantry, but the shelves are very dark faux wood. At first, I thought I’d just paint them, but that would get scratched off and just look bad. So, I’m thinking of buying contact paper. The problem with that is the bottoms are also dark. I’m not sure I can get the entire shelf out of the pantry. So, I might end up painting the bottoms. I wore these Gudrun pants (more proof I repeat) with an old Talbots linen tee. It’s a little big, and I just did a sloppy half tuck. I have a couple of these, and I think I may soon donate them to my friends (if they want them).

Saturday – As you know, I’m a VTS (Visual Thinking Skills) docent (read more about that here). In a nutshell, VTS is about looking at something critically by asking three distinctly worded questions. It is often used with medical students to hone their observation skills. This morning, I was the docent for Gallery Explorers which is a program for children ages 5-10 years old along with a parent or grandparent. The staff person who runs this is so good! She introduces the program (read about it here), talks a bit about VTS and how it works, explains the agenda, and then off to the galleries we go. In the selected gallery, the kids and their adults wander about and look at the art in that gallery, completing a VTS based paper as they go. They can look at just one piece of art or several. You are probably going to be surprised at the gallery I had…OK, you’re probably not! It was in the Body Beyond exhibition which features fashion from Dior, Balmain, Halston, Rei Kawakubo and Issey Miyake as well as Vivienne Westwood and Alexander McQueen. After about 20-30 minutes, it was time for me to take over. I had selected two pieces I thought would fascinate the kids. One was from the Rei Kawakubo collection for Comme des Garçons, the Lumps and Bumps dress (see here). The other was one that looked like you would wear it on a lifeboat! It even came with a flashlight! We ended up using the entire plinth which had a total of five outfits. The parents even got into it, pointing out the movement on the “Lumps and Bumps” dress. One dad even suggested the movement could be that of water. See, that’s what VTS does! It gets you to look and think beyond the apparent. I wore this outfit (seen on a Songful Style post) for a couple of reasons. It had been raining, and I thought we all needed something cheerful. The second reason was I’d never given this tour before so I wasn’t sure if I’d be on the floor with the kids. In any event, it’s a pair of Old Navy linen pants, a yellow Halftee, and a Kantha Bae Daisy something or other top.

Sunday – I was scheduled for a regular public tour at the museum. I should probably clarify how I get tours just a bit. The different kinds of tours and gallery conversations are released a month or so at a time. I sign into a program and select the dates and times I want. Right now, the legacy docents are holding off selecting tours because my class has to get their Colleague Feedback tours scheduled. We do have requirements for numbers of tours/activities we do as well as Continuing Docent Education (CDEs). I met those in May or early June! I hold off for a while so that others have the chance to get their requirements in. The Saturday Gallery Explorers was not exactly a last minute thing, but I had the public tour scheduled a long time ago. Anyway, I arrived at the museum and spoke with the Ambassadors to see if anyone had signed up for the tour. Unfortunately, no one had. Since I had some time, I went into the actual galleries to try to entice people into taking my tour…no takers! It was time for my tour to start, and one of the Ambassadors (who had been there for several hours) volunteered to let me practice my Colleague Feedback tour with him. Just as we got started, I noticed a woman approaching the Ambassador desk with a certain look in her eye. Yes, she was here for the tour! So, the Ambassador got to go home, and this lady was just about to get a private tour! My tour’s theme was “Coloring Inside the Lines” and was a variation on my graduation tour. We had already looked at and discussed the first three pieces of art in the tour when this gentleman asked if he could join us. Of course, I said yes! I gave him a little information on the three pieces of art we’d already seen (Bouguereau, Degas, and Bonnard). Then, we started toward the Bernard piece that was next on my tour. Ordinarily, I don’t get that many pieces in, but since there were only two of us in the beginning, we finished the first three quite quickly. That all changed when this gentleman joined us. He was thrilled to be at the museum (visiting from out of state) and wanted to see as much as he could. As we walked past the Monet, I pointed that out as well as the van Gogh, Gaugin, and Cezanne. I finished my tour, but they both wanted to see more! We went on to see paintings by William MacGregor Paxton and Edward Hopper. At that point, the lady decided she was done with touring and would just browse! The gentleman was still highly motivated to see more of the museum. He still couldn’t quite believe we had original paintings by van Gogh, Monet, et al! I took him to see our Rembrandt and Holbein as well as a Bellini. He was actually quite knowledgeable about art himself and discussed the merits and other qualities of various art. We then proceeded to the American galleries where I showed him works by Joan Mitchell, Eduoard Scott, Theodor Grohl, Constance Richardson, and Kyng Rhodes. His plan was to stay until the museum closed and see as much as he could. I was more than happy to show him as much as he wanted, but I think he just wanted to wander from gallery to gallery. I told him where to find various galleries and what floor they were on. I had a really amazing time talking with him because he was so eager to experience everything! I wore this Gudrun Sjödén dress with a lavender slip and amethyst jewelry. Again, you’ve seen the dress before for a Style Imitating Art (here). This is a wonderful example of how changing accessories can completely change the look!

Monday – I had a meeting at church for the women’s retreat this fall. I’m in charge of the guide the attendees will receive so I’ve got lots of revisions. They’re easy revisions, and I have a couple of weeks to get those done. We spent lots of time discussing all the different aspects of the retreat. Our fearless leader had an agenda, and we kept to it with a few tangential conversations at times. I wore a pair of my Gap horseshoe jeans with a floral blouse from J Jill. It’s a kinda weird dichotomy, but I like it! My hair behaved for about five minutes! It was humid and windy when I walked into the church so it didn’t look anything like this for the rest of the day. After I got home, I put on my human hair wig from Wigshe, changed the part, and did a little styling. I’m so not used to that quantity and length of hair. It took me a little minute to get the hang of it! Look for a wig review in the coming weeks!

In between…

I’ve now gotten four, almost five, of the squares knitted for my Christmas blanket. Last week, I told y’all the first one was probably not right and that I might tink it. I finished the elves one, and the first one isn’t far off. So, I’m just gonna stick it in a corner as is! After posting that I might cut bangs into the blonde with dark brown roots wig, a friend contacted me on Facebook. She told me to never cut bangs into a wig! She said it never ends well. She then gave me a link to a wig outlet, and, of course, I ordered another one. I’m still working with it. It’s synthetic but is not heat friendly. That means no training with a blow dryer or heated up/then turned off curling iron. I did wet it down and put rollers in it the other night. It didn’t seem to make any difference. But, ya’ll will see that when I do a post on my wigs. These may become my new obsession…over shoes…shocking, I know!

In other news…

I know I just wrote about giving the kitchen a facelift. Today (Monday), I received the quote and just about fainted! It was about $4000 more than I expected. That amount, however, includes absolutely everything…from demolition to moving appliances to installation. I think, between me and all my boys, we can conquer most of those which pretty much eliminates the $4000. Nigel is still onboard, I think.

Purchases…

I did buy another Ink & Alloy skirt! I know you haven’t seen the first one yet, but they said when they’re gone, they’re gone. I’m a sucker for that clickbait (if it even was). I also bought a some wigs. I didn’t mean to buy the second two, but I use a purchasing app which usually has you review your purchase before actually buying. This website didn’t operate like that so I’m getting two more wigs! I bought another merino wool cardigan from Garnet Hill which has pomegranates on it! I can’t wait to style it even though I’ve never even eaten a pomegranate! Can someone telll me how to even eat them?

What to link up…

Please link up your favorite fashion posts, old and new. Please take the time to visit some of the other bloggers. I’m sure they would appreciate it, and please let them know you are visiting from our link up! I really do thank Amy for being my co-host! Feel free to show us what you’ve been wearing, what you’ve bought, returned, or just thought about. Maybe you could share something you’d love to have but never will for whatever reason. You can tell us…we’ll understand. Tell us about your shopping habits. Do you enjoy thrifting, reselling, or online shopping? Just write a post about fashion of any kind. You could even do a review of an awards show. There are always awards shows, it seems! And, remember, even if you’re a movie reviewer, a baking blog, a book lovers blog, a blog that’s anything but fashion, I’m betting you get dressed. Snap a photo, write a little about it, and link it up! You really don’t have to dress up, either…take a look at my Sunday outfit! Thanks, my friends, for linking up and spreading the news!

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