fantasy tour – the band nerds – texas

In a just few weeks time moseyman and I will be traveling south by south west… here’s my Austin-inspired getup:

Shopping: jeany sandals, white ankle socks, stripey top and pocket tote, black and white skirt (can’t remember, sorry)!

Previous fantasy tour posts

easy breezy mix-n-match

I don’t know about you, but at times, a lighter and airier fabric can make for a lighter and airier me. I love these mix and match navy, black and white pieces. Cowl sleeved tanks and thinly layered fabrics make summertime seem more bearable and just looking at these pieces make me feel cooler.

frilled hem swing skirt – topshop, side cowl top – urbn.uk, zip tape pocket tank – topshop, striped burnout skirt – urbn.uk, london rebel woven thong – urbn.uk

the shoe breakup

As some of you may have noticed, I’m an avid online shopper at Urban Outfitters. I post far too many items that I find there, including my recent shoe purchase, which I gleefully displayed few posts ago, the black cutout oxfords.

This new, special shoe brought me immense pleasure and felt like real love at first sight, but all feelings for them soon quickly evolved into a destructive love-hate relationship.

What happened was my cutout oxfords collapsed and tore up everywhere after just one wear, and only became worse. After just 5 wears I could no longer frolic around town comfortably in them.

I sent an email to complaints department at Urban Outfitters a few days ago, explaining my dilemma and requesting a solution. I didn’t expect much from their customer support so I was happily surprised when an email came my way from a Miss Julie Barna offering not only her sincere apologies but also a gift card in the amount of the cost of the oxfords.

Lesson to be learned: Stop bitching and do something about it. When you buy a product you’re not happy with, write a letter and you shall most likely be compensated for your misery, and in my case earn a mini shopping spree out of it!

Has anyone else ever complained about something they bought and were compensated for it?

new shoes make me happy

I was excited to get my new black, flat, Vida cutout oxfords in the mail the other day. I love the way they look. They can toughen up the frilliest of dresses and provide some breeze to the feet while maintaining the sophistication of wearing a real shoe as opposed to a flippy floppy. The downer side is that I wore them out the day that I got them and almost immediately noticed severe wear on each of the heels. So in that sense, the price should have been a little gentler! The excitement of having them overrides it all though. Look, my dog, bonnie even seems to like them.

my new cut-out oxfords from urban outfitters w/ bonnie the dog

(please excuse the poor photo quality – took pic in evening light with crappy camera phone)

ready to work

Although work attire is simple and relaxed here in the Middle East, I remember back in my NYC days, it was an entirely different story. I at first ran around to job interviews wearing my sister’s black, Jcrew, pant suit. Then later after scoring a job, I had to keep up with my stylish workmates who shopped waaaay more than I did. Of course, work dress code depends a lot on which field you work in and what position you might hold, but overall, New Yorkers are known (amongst a billion other things) for their fabulous work getups.

These days, I not only work in the high tech industry, which is notorious for it’s relaxed work attire, but I work in a country that doesn’t enforce any kind of work dress code. (or any kind of code code period.) It’s such a breeze! You wake up, shower or not shower and throw on a pair of dog haired jeans and a crumpled up top you grabbed from the dirty laundry. Who cares?

Well, sometimes I do. I can miss those L train fashion packed commutes, rallying uptown in the morning then back out to Billyburg in the evening, peering over at a girl’s skirt impatiently swishing around while waiting on the platform, or a boy’s sneakers planted directly below my subway seat gaze. Each day was truly a full day of fashion inspiration.

In my work wear daydream today, I picked out some work pieces that I could wear just about anywhere. Shopping on: opening ceremony, urban, anthropologie and shopbird.

~ ready to work ~

black neon or peach ice cream?

Today I was feeling a bit blah so I threw on a skirt and a frilly shirt then balanced it out with my fuchsia canvas skips and voila. An instant cheery upper. But just a week earlier I was feeling too frilly and girly and had to figure out how to toughen it up a bit, if you know what I mean. I decided to collage these nerdy feelings into a reflection collection. Black Neon vs. Peach Ice Cream! Do you usually feel like a black neon or a peach ice cream? Or do you go through phases like I do?

BLACK NEON

PEACH ICE CREAM

Shopping includes: shopnastygal, urban.co.uk, monster commerce

sweet summer shoes

All I can think about today is Obama’s important speech in Cairo, but here are some sweet summer shoes to check out while waiting for his global feedback…

lace up tap

plaited sandal

blue peep toes

triangle cut outs

lace up cut outs

vanessa bruno studded

Shopping: Urban.co.uk

f-troupe=amazing

I know F-Troupes are talked about a lot, but man these are pretty!!

2 strap flats - tan

2 strap flats - patent leather

espadrille inspired

I’ve never been a huge fan of espadrilles. I bought a pair of red wedges at mini market in Brooklyn a few years back and only ended up wearing them once… which was on the day that I bought them. In a recent craze of getting rid of the unnecessaries, I threw them out. That’s okay. Perhaps I can replace them with Tsumori Chisato’s version of the espadrille. My friends, meet Tsumori Chisato’s purple flower espadrille sandals. I think they would match perfectly with my pale purple AA getup and these pretty little Rachel Comey hair pins.

hairpins and sandals - Refinery29, mini dress - American Apparel

Shopping: Refinery29 & American Apparel

FIELD TRIP PICKS ~ let me take you down

Today was field trip day again. We ended up driving to a nearby forest for our city escape, but as it turned out, everyone else seemed to have the same idea. It was so saturated with families and kids and loud cheesy music, that we found ourselves escaping from our escape.  Just as we thought our getaway had been ruined, we fell upon an amazing strawberry field. The sweet smell was so intense and the rows of red sprouting berries were so deeply red, it was all I could do to not stop and gorge myself. I could imagine a perfect strawberry picking date for that spot. So… I present you with my affordable strawberry-picking-date inspired, field trip picks. Hope you like!

To shop these looks go to: topshop, 80spurple, UO

*TIP on Topshop – Their shipping flat fee is usually $15 (!) but right now, they’re offering free shipping (on any amount you spend) until April 9.