Legally Charming Style

Then, finally, last weekend...I decided to do it. I had gotten rid of the navy dress, but I had since bought another one. It's a good thing I work in a business casual office or else those yellow tights wouldn't have been a good move. I changed out the belt for a scarf, added a blazer, and BOOM! Pin-spired business casual. 

Welcome back! 

Today's Throwback Thursday post is dedicated to this pair of pants and the beginning of this blog (can you believe that was only four months ago?)! It's not that long, but it feels like a lifetime. 

It was a new idea to start a fashion blog, decided on a whim after seeing several fashionable accounts on Instagram (and comments that I always seemed to look "appropriate" for every occasion). I was headed out for the night with a friend of mine from law school and decided it was a good time to get someone to take my photo and get rollin'. 

I love this look. Basic but stylish and super comfy (and you guys know I'm all about being comfy). The best way to start a blog. 

So last weekend I decided it was time to pull the pants out for another rodeo. This time I went for something different. Patterns, sparkle, a soft sweater. It was again comfy, but it was also chic. Walking through the grocery store, I felt like I was a housewife in the 50s going to the store in her dress and pearls. 

This look is not something I would have worn four months ago, and I like that. It's amazing the evolutions we can go through so quickly. Changes in style might be something small, but I think it's an interesting testimony to human nature and development. (I also now exceed expectations at Timer Cam selfies and location scouting.) 

Here's to change being a good thing!

It's Tuesdayyyyy!! 

I have no idea why I felt the need to announce that so happily...maybe because it means I'm one step closer to Friday/having my audits done/feeling like I've made progress on my life? 

In any event, recently I've been looking to transition my wardrobe from those happy carefree days of summer to something more substantial in these fall days. One of the more difficult things to transition is a summer dress. I don't own a lot of them, but I really like the ones I have and don't want to relegate them to living in the closet until March. (They're too pretty to waste!) So last week I decided to take a stab at it, and I feel I came out rather successfully. I wore this outfit to class and felt like I was conquering Evidence in much the same way that I had conquered the transition of a summer dress.

So how do you achieve comfy perfection for fall in a bright and boisterous summer dress? Look below and then maybe somebody will tell you that you "look like fall" (which happened to me and was AWESOME).

It's pretty simple: 

1) Toss on a sweater.

4) Add a pretty scarf.

3) Wear seasonally appropriate makeup (such as the dark lipstick I'm rocking here.)

4. Complete it with some tights and boots. 

Happy Monday (night, yikes)! I hope everyone had a good weekend.

 

So yesterday was my big get-my-butt-out-of-bed and do some work day. I tend to get extremely lazy on the weekends, because you know. Sleep. It's important. But once you get me out of bed, I become a contradiction to my own laziness. I put on makeup. I do my hair. I spend 30 minutes figuring out what I'm going to wear that day, instead of 5 minutes the night before (like normal). I like spending time on myself on the weekends, because during the week I hate getting up early to do may hair or put on makeup--again, because sleep. (Obviously, I like sleep a lot. Doesn't everyone?)

 

I wanted to focus my attention on adding just a pop of color to my usual neutral wardrobe, and I decided that this red scarf was the ticket. I haven't worn it in a while, but it's pretty and soft and makes it look like I'm trying a lot harder than I am. I added a fancy knot I learned on Pinterest, threw it on over my floral blazer and some casual weekend clothes, and was ready to go study/create a discovery chart for my scholar students/have a meeting about Women's Bar stuff/go to a Keep-Collective jewelry party.

 

(I was also able to stand on a street corner and take photos of myself with my iPad without feeling really super self-conscious. Honestly, I was pretending that all of the cars driving didn't have people in them who could be staring at me while I took lots of pictures of myself looking fly. It helped that there weren't a lot of other pedestrians around.)

 

Is there anything you do in your beauty routine on the weekends that you can't seem to get around to during the week?

 

 

It's Friday! We made it!! 

The Orioles are playing the first game of the ALCS tonight! My first post-grad fellowship application is turned in! Classes are done for the week! I feel a lot lighter now. And to celebrate, I am playing a few rounds of touch football tomorrow and then getting back to the grind on Sunday-after all, I've got the final draft of my emerging issue due, a membership chart to make, oodles of reading to do, and my first round of appellate clerkship materials to put together.

But for now, I'm taking time to type up a blog entry because who doesn't like to have fun every once in a while? Especially with one's wardrobe. For example, yesterday's very hipster combo. I joked to my law school friends that this outfit is an iteration of everything my mom thought I would grow up to be: an artist/actress living in a loft with a hipster artist boyfriend. (At least the loft part happened.) I felt like a beatnik, but MY version of a beatnik--not in all black, but just enough to be a little off the beaten path. The grown-up soon to be badass lady lawyer version of a beatnik. ;) 

 So how to make this work?

1) Two colors, MAX. 

If you're just starting out on this jewel-tone-mixing business, it's usually best to cap yourself out at two colors. One color would have just looked average. Three colors in this (like, jewel-tone tights) would have been OTT. Two colors is just enough. Fun to look at without inducing eye seizures. And have fun with your picks--emerald and cobalt would have been pretty here, just like purple and ruby. Jewel tones look nice together, kind of like wearing a multi-colored stone necklace.

2) Minimize those patterns.

Notice my shirt is patterned, but it's a small pattern. And the skirt is solid. Keeping it small and simple draws the eye to how cool your color mixing is, and who doesn't want to feel like a cool cat in their jewel tones? (Also, never forget the power of a tied shirt and flouncy skirt. You will look like you have a TINY waist!)

3. Anchor it with black. 

For me, the perfect way to cap off these colors was a pair of black tights and black booties. Because to me, if you're going to put a lot of bright in one spot, you want to give it all the attention. Here, the black puts the eye up on the color. Again, giving your cool color-mixing some cred here, kid. I don't think this look works as well without it--for instance, come springtime, it won't feel as cute with neutral flats as this did with black.

Add those together and there you have it--a cute outfit! 

Perfect for taking over the classroom (at 8:00pm, when no one else is hanging around to watch you take pictures of yourself sitting on desks...)! 

Now, this probably ISN'T the question that you were asking yourself when you started reading this post, but...WHY did I wear purple yesterday? There's a good answer to that!

As some of you (not everyone) knows, October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month, and the color that symbolizes the domestic violence movement is (you guessed it) purple. As a former social worker for survivors of domestic/intimate partner violence, it is one of the most important months of my year. I have thought about domestic violence every day for the last five and a half odd years--after all, it's hard not to when it's either a) your passion or b) your job--but it comes to a head every year in October. Since I've been out of social work for two Octobers now, it's a reminder to me to keep thinking about domestic/intimate partner violence, and to keep talking about it. One in four women in this country will experience domestic violence in their lifetime, and that's just what is reported. One in three women who die as a result of homicide are killed by either a current or former intimate partner. It's a serious issue--one that we should be talking about, whether or not Ray Rice is in the news. 

If you or someone you know is a victim of domestic violence, there is hope and help. You are not alone. it is not your fault. There is support out there for you. Below is the number and website for the National Domestic Violence Hotline (US). This hotline can offer information and referrals to local domestic violence agencies in your community. 

1-800-799-7233

1-800-787-3224 (TTY for deaf and hard of hearing)

www.thehotline.org  

These are also helpful resources to find out about local domestic violence organizations that could use your time, talents, or donations to help make their programs more successful in assisting survivors who are seeking counseling and/or have left their abusive homes to pave a new life free from violence.

If you're unable to make a monetary donation, then consider wearing purple with me again on October 23rd, when the National Network to End Domestic Violence (NNEDV) hosts its own Wear Purple Day (#purplethursday) for awareness. After all, speaking out for domestic violence awareness is always the fashionable thing to do.