My favorite variation is Penguin suit up

So, Linda stole the title I had planned out for Blazer day (darn my getting posts up late!), and her blazer looks kinda similar to mine too...Wanna be twins, Linda?  So I thought I'd make a nod to my favorite variation on Barney Stinson's well-known "Suit up!"  (although, the pajama suit up and slut up never fail to crack me up).

Unlike Barney, I'm more appreciative of suits on others instead of consistently looking devastatingly attractive in them myself (okay, so I kinda have a thing for NPH in How I met your mother).  In fact, as adorable as blazers look on others, I struggle to wear them myself.  Even when I find one that fits well (and I'll be honest- this one fit better a couple years back when I bought it), I still find myself feeling awkward wearing a blazer for any length of time due to the restrictive nature of the fabric and cuts.  Nonetheless, it was fun to style it up for the day, and maaaybe having it as part of my 30 items will help convert me to more blazer-ing up.  And what do I wear with a hard to style item?  Of course, another item that I've found difficult to style. This dress has come to be known in my head as the "naked dress".  As in, I'm looking through the closet and pull it out to show to the bf and say, "Sweetie, will this dress make me look naked?"  "Yes Heather, naked and lacy, are you sure that's what you want to wear in public?"  And yet, I find myself unable to resist the lures of this dress, although it may be relegated to only being worn with something dark on my legs or a skirt pulled up over the bottom part of the attached slip, so that people are kept aware of the fact that I am in fact wearing clothes.  Unfortunately, it turned out that my dress choice wasn't the only awkward part of my day (I actually wound up feeling really excited to wear this dress).

Outfit: BLAZER: Old Navy, Dress: Ruche, Skirt: Loft, Boots: Madden Girl via Delias, Leggings, Socks: Target

Stripe-tastic

Hope ya'll don't mind that this posting of lots of pictures has continued.  It's nice to have more fun with the photoshoots again, and having the tripod has basically changed my life. And hopefully I won't turn into Awkward McAwkwardson now that it's warmed up and people won't be actively avoiding the outside.  Someday I might stop talking about the weather, but probably not any time soon.  For example, today- cold enough that I can still wear my new scarf (which I've been wearing basically all weekend), but warm enough that I can be outside with only one pair of tights and my hands might not get scary close to frostbitten during picture time.  Not that I don't enjoy the sort of effects you can do with two layers of tights- this day my under layer was maroon, so my legs looked like they were slightly glowing from the small amount that showed through the outer layer (which is Awesome).

Outfit: Dress: Modcloth, Jacket: Banana Republic, Boots: Madden Girl via Delias, Scarf: Made by me!: Tights: Target layered over We Love Colors

 

Wildflowers growing

Outfit: Dress, Earmuffs: Ruche; Shirt, Cardi: Anthropologie; Tights (2x): We love colors;= Boots: Madden Girl via Delias, Necklace: Tiffany's (gift)

Note, no wildflowers were harmed during the taking of these photos.  There was however, a sign up letting me know that wildflowers were growing (which is good, since I thought it was mostly grasses and stuff), so this might be a ridiculously pretty place come spring (Texas wildflowers are gorgeous).  A lot of the grasses had previously been tramped down, I'm thinking either by teenage hoodlums, drug dealers, or wildflower eating beasts.

Fighting crazy with crazy

Don't get me wrong, I love wearing bright colors, including colored tights, but sometimes, I just don't have something that feels like the right color (I knew I should have gotten more we love colors tights!) and sometimes it's 20 degrees out and you need to not freeze.  To tone down the bright green base layer I threw on a pair of teal/black patterned tights that normally receive a fair few comments on their own.  Their powers combined, I felt like it worked better (and kept me warmer) than either on their own would.  And honestly, having experienced WLC tights, I'm not sure if I can go back.  And someday, I will learn how to take actual detail shots (see Monkeyface and JoAnn's).

The upside of cold and windy days in Houston is that there are very few people in public parks, and the people who are around are just trying to walk through as quickly as they can.  I attempted to use this and my layering powers (I'm like a well-dressed onion) for good, and took more outside photos (hurray tripod, you've changed my life!), although by the end of it my coat had to go back on to avoid freezing.  Both yesterday and today, most of my body has been covered by 3-4 layers, which helps with temporary coatless-ness.

Outift: Shirt: express, Skirt: Anthropologie, Jacket: Banana Republic: Tights: We Love Colors with Target patterned over, Boots: Steve Madden Intyce, Scarf: Gift

I may be a little overexcited about finally going back to outside photos and having the freedom that comes with using a tripod, so warning, there are excessive photos after the jump.  I've also been trying to implement jumps to speed up load time and make blog reading a better, easier experience for you, so please let me know your thoughts on this or if there is anything that would make that happen for you.

It's not snowing here...

But it was snowing heavily in Connecticut when we visited over Christmas.  The bf and I went out for a brief walk when the snow first started falling (when it's still really exciting, especially if you're from Houston and haven't seen any sort of snow in about a year), and I persuaded him to take some pictures of his crazy gf who tried to take her coat off for outfit pictures.  Needless to say, there weren't really any proper outfit pictures, and I couldn't smile without looking like I was in pain.  Clearly I should have aimed for a more aloof blogger-esque expression.  But I thought, hey, I enjoy seeing the sillier side of bloggers, and I didn't want to deprive you of the opportunity to see my ridiculous cold face (well the last one is mushy rather than silly).  Or deprive you of what I look like with an obscene amount of layers.

"You want to take your coat off?  Really?  Wait, I'm going to have to take my gloves off for this?"

Outfit: What you can see- earmuffs (Ruche), scarf (vendor in Montreal), cardigan (Banana Republic), sweaterdress (Anthropologie), skirt peeking out from underneath (Lucy), socks (Target), and boots (Uggs inherited from Mom).
What you can't see- tanktop, full slip, three-quarter length shirt with cowl (yeah cowls), two pairs of tights, and an additional pair of socks.

With all of that in place, I attempt to look like a seasoned pro at this whole posing in the cold and snow thing.  And fail.  But really enjoyed doing so.

The marks in the snow that you can see there were made by me attempting to twirl.  Sadly, no pictures were gotten out of this.  Luckily, I did not fall over at any point, even though me and gravity have long had a touchy relationship.

Neutrals with a pop of tights

I am planning to do a 30 for 30 wrap-up, but I'd like to put some thought into it, and currently I'm not up for careful thinking.  Instead I'm all about showing off how I'd layer tights (ya'll may have figured out that I love layering things), since it's been quite cold for Houston these past couple days.  I'm also excited to start working through this back-log of photos that were taken between when I considered myself finished with the 30x30 and when I realized that I wasn't going to recreate outfit solely for pictures and needed to keep on wearing 30x30 items.  Fortunately I still adore the items I picked and they've gotten a lot of use since the end, but right now I'm just excited to post something that's not 30x30.  What makes me so excited about this outfit?

Outfit: Skirt: Gap, Cami: Lucy's, Sweater, Socks, Outer Tights: Target, Inner Tights: We Love Colors, Boots: Steve Madden Intyce, Bracelet: Gift, Coat: Old Navy, Scarf: Vendor in Montreal

Reasons why this outfit made me happy:
1.  It's positively frigid for Houston, which means it's cold enough to wear a coat and bike in (although unfortunately cold enough in my lab for me to need a coat inside- what the what building facilities?)
2.  This skirt is pretty ancient, as in surprised it still fits me that's how old- it's been lying in the pile of needs fixes.  It'd be more of a win if I'd actually replaced the zipper, but instead I've reconciled myself with wearing slightly broken items so long as it can be hidden, and I'm totally okay with that.
3.  I went through a phase where I wanted to dress preppy (think black pants, khakis and polos), and while I now realize that layering a collared shirt would've totally upped the prep factor (although the socks and coat probably balance this lack), it's fun to have a slightly prep outfit.
4.  Cold enough to need layered tights, but warm enough for one of them to have a pattern!  So exciting I needed to take a detail shot-and you even get a better look at the bracelet for a two for one bonus.

Have you guys recently rediscovered anything really great in your closet lately?  This baby is a nicely cut lightweight full skirt (bought before I even realized how valuable full skirts were in my closet), and because of the color I can probably sneak it into keeping with the military trend (I don't really worry about trends, but I'm tickled when something accidentally qualifies as trendy-ish).

Also, this is what I was wearing last night at the bar when I described myself as a nerd and my friend's friend (who I had just met), looked at me and said "oh, I wouldn't have categorized you that way."  Don't get me wrong- I'm totally proud of my nerdiness and wouldn't have it any other way, but it was a very weird and interesting thing for me to hear, since I've categorized myself as a nerd forever.  And now I'm wondering- when and where did this disconnect between the way that I see myself and the first impression I might give off others happen?  Some of it may be due to self editing, like in yesterday's post where I put up flattering pictures of a dress that I described myself as not being terribly comfortable in, only it's with my clothes and personality that I may be editing.  But I'd like to think that I'm not dressing to convey anything other than myself- the same girl who has an I <3 nerds shirt and wound up wearing bright blue fishnets on her first day of college.

Or it could be an argument over semantics- the two of us may have totally different qualifications for the term nerd, much like how I tend to think of fashion and style bloggers as distinct terms, something that I got into a little bit in the comments of my recent FBFF post.  Clearly, I'm just using what could have been a 5 second anecdote to overthink something, and grasp to make connections with my recent thoughts, but hey, I'm a grad student.  So how about you guys- have you had any experiences with a (perhaps shocking) disconnect between how you self-identify and how others perceive you?  How much do you think your clothing choices influence this?