Thursday, October 28, 2010

Messing Up ... In Public

I messed up. It provoked interesting discussion on the YouLookFab.com forum yesterday. People overwhelmingly told me to return the dresses, and to stick by the rules. I get that. So I scuttled around to shops, returning dresses. (I had bought two more to try, in addition to those I posted, with the intention of finding one that would be right). I knew those were going back, so didn't bother to post them.

Dress #3: bubble skirt dress by MK, from Bloomingdale's: gorgeous but too tweedy for the party:



Dress #4: tweedy sequined sheath by MK, from Nordstrom. Fab but too holiday-ish for the party:





The zippered MK dress, above, is different. It seems silly to send it back and then re-purchase it in January, if I can. It fills a huge wardrobe hole and is perfect for my hairstyle and figure. I realize that this is justification and sounds lame. The honest truth is that the dress came from Zappos and is sitting in its box. It may or may not ever make it to the post office.

I consider spending $150 on clothes since July 17 to be pretty darned good. But I am not holding to the rules I set for myself, and I get that. People want to see me actually do it. They want to live vicariously through me, even if they are not managing to do it themselves. It feels like I'm on display, and that's not comfortable this week.

SYC hasn't bothered me too much until this week. I had fun decorating my house (more to do, waiting for further budget!), borrowing from friends, shopping my own closet. It was a relief to stop shopping for a while. But this week, it is driving me stark raving mad!!

Today, I'll go and shop my girlfriend's closet for a dress for Friday. It will be fun, and doing this makes me feel I'm fulfilling one of the goals of SYC. More tomorrow!

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Resisting Temptation. Or Not.

I am going to a party on Friday night and the theme is orange and black. My friend and I decided to wear little black dresses, tall black heeled boots and orange wigs. Lovely, right?? (The wigs arrived yesterday and I've never seen anything quite this shade of orange in my life! Totally unnatural and wrong!).

Given my world-renowned dress collection, it's hard to believe that I don't own a little black dress. I don't. But I do have a black pencil skirt and could rustle up some sort of top - so it's not like I'd have to show up naked. But I caved and ordered two little black dresses.





* Full disclosure: To my credit, I am borrowing the tall black boots from my girlfriend. Yay, Laura.

This week has been full of temptations. Thankfully Kristen (hi Kristen!) helped me resist a pair of over the knee Stuart Weitzman boots on sale at Nordstrom Rack's new website. What was I doing looking at Nordstrom Rack's new website? Good question!

Now the debate for myself is whether I buy a dress and break SYC, or not. Although I'd love to wear one of the dresses and not tell anyone (bad Laura!), I decided to 'fess up and put the question to all of you. I am 100% convinced you will tell me to return the dresses, which is not what I want to hear but I will accept it. What would it mean to buy a dress right now? You decide.

This weekend, I will post my party outfit ...