Style Inspiration: Eddie Bauer Dorky/Outdoorsy

Somehow the catalog people found my new apartment, and I've been getting all kinds of catalogs unrequested: Eddie Bauer, Victoria's Secret, Land's End, and (my favorite name) Long Tall Sally. The preppy/dorky/outdoorsy pictures in Land's End and Eddie Bauer (I love the cardigan above! SO MUCH!) have caused me to give up on my idea that I should try to dress up more, and embrace the kind of clothes that I usually wear and that make me the most comfortable. A friend of mine usually wears simple, dark colors, like fitted black jeans and loose jersey navy tops. She says her mom dresses like that too, and it's a very understated, urban style. I think I tend to dress like my mom too, laid-back and outdoorsy, with a little ethnic-hippie thrown in ("oh yeah, I got this on my travels in Turkey, no big deal" haha). Of course my mom doesn't always dress like this, which is a shame, because she feels she needs to look more Southern and put-together or "dress her age" or cover her hips or some other total nonsense that she should ignore.

So I totally gave up on nonsense, and today I'm wearing Levis, LLBean rain "mocs" (they're like shoe-boots, if that makes sense, but they were the first totally waterproof footwear I owned and I love them forever and ever), an American Eagle long-sleeve t-shirt that I got in middle school and is wonderfully soft and comfortable, a "Made in England" tan v-neck wool sweater that I got at Unique a couple weeks ago, and a tattered pink silk scarf my mom got from Pakistan 25 years ago. It's the best outfit for getting tea, textbooks, and work done on a rainy, chilly day.

Yesterday I wore the same jeans... and I can't even remember what else, because I was THAT comfortable. Oh right-- a long blue & green plaid button-up I stole from my brother, with an old long leather belt I got at a thrift store in Riverton the day I left Wyoming. The day before that: cords with a ratty silk hippie tank top I stole from my cousin and a ratty thin purple cardigan that I got at a thrift store and wear constantly, with my boyfriend's white scarf to kinda hide the holes and make the loose top a bit more modest. I also have been wearing a gold Huguenot cross that I found on the sidewalk in Paris, on a silver chain. On the first day of class I wore a nice black skirt with a crochet detail at the bottom with some shirt and my new (from Unique) taupe cashmere v-neck sweater and a long striped scarf my coworkers brought back for me from Al Ain, and I froze my butt off because my school building is way too cold. So that's why I'm back to the cords/Levis rotation.