Making Awesome Tuesdays #1

Life Goal: to make Tuesdays exciting. I highly doubt this Tuesday will be any better than meh.

My above Facebook post from today was pretty lame and miserable. Since I’m on this new change my life for the better/blogging kick (I mean, did buy a book last night and all…) I decided to take the bull by the horns and make my Tuesdays awesome. And why document these Awesome Tuesdays on my blog (capital letters necessary again)? Done and done. I'm sure some Tuesdays will be awesomer than others, but why not work on it?

So this Tuesday's awesomeness is brought to you (and me) by this little email I got later in the morning….

Ok, so J.Crew stuff goes on sale pretty often and I've definitely scored some good deals in the past. However, I've been crushing on one little piece of clothing for a while now:

It's a nice solid basic. And for some reason I'm in crazy love with it. Except for the fact that it's $188. And the fact they tend to sell out before they go on sale (or at least they did last season.)  I tried to tell myself that it's not worth it, $188 is crazy steep for me. I even went to the store and tried one on, just to see if it was really worth it and confirm what size fits  the best (in case I found a deal online.) I was hoping it would fit weird or be really cheaply made. But alas, it's not and I fell even deeper in love. Sigh.

I hope you can understand why this 20% off makes my Tuesday awesome. The blazer can be mine! I can handle buying it with a 20% discount. Now if only I could talk myself out of this $98 chambray shirt. It's exactly the shirt I've been dreaming about. It may have to go on the 20% off check as well. 

Sometimes you have to go big or go home.

Orange You Glad I Didn't Say Banana?

During our last family gathering, my little cousin became obsessed with the Banana/Orange joke. She though it was so hilarious that she insisted on telling it 500 times. She kept on forgetting that banana comes before orange, so her punch line always ended up being "Aren't you banana....oh wait, that's not right." It was funny the first time. The next 499 times? Not so much. She's a cute kid, so I'll give her a pass.

The best part about shopping in the junior's department for dresses? They're cheap, like $16.99 cheap. The worst part about shopping in the juniors department for dresses? They tend to be a bit short. I wore shorty-short undies today just in case I ran into any fanny-exposing situations. Gotta keep the old tushie covered in the office. You're welcome. The eye through the hand is a bit freaky, no?

dress- Marshalls junior's department

sweater- Behnaz Sarafpour for Target (couple years old-I love this cardi)

patent belt- from another dress

sandals- TJ Maxx

Blueberry Stains and Technological Annoyances

Ugh, technology. What a pain in my butt. All I ask is for everything to work, to work the same way it did the last time I used it and to be easy. Apparently that is too much to ask in my household. We run out of unique IP addresses once a month. God forbid I bring my work laptop home, it messes everything up. And tonight I can't make the itunes play over the speakers. Huh? That little button was there on Saturday morning, where is it now? Am I losing my mind or did someone's weekend of "categorizing music by genre, blah, blah, I don't like the itunes interface, blah, blah, making my own" actually have some sort of impact on my life. Someone has a unique gift for turning the most elegantly simple of systems into insanely complex messes. Or at least it feels like that on my end. Ugh.

I also am so sick of user names and passwords. I feel like everything has a password and they all have to be random and different and unbreakable. I'm literally running out of room in my head for all of this information. God save us when I produce children and get the dreaded "mom brain." Everyone associated with me is screwed.

Rant over. Onto fun things! Like delicious smoothies. Deliciously cheap smoothies. I had a bunch of cup up fruit in the fridge that was threatening to go bad. It was already mushier than I like, so I had to figure out how it make it more palatable. Otherwise it was going into the composter. And cheap Lisa was not feeling that. I already paid $2 for a yogurt this afternoon, so I was not wasting any more money on food today! I rummaged around in the freezer and found a pint of blueberries I had previously saved from going bad. That combined with ice and a small scoop of ice cream created a lovely and mostly good for me treat. I was a happy camper.

Yummy!

Until I discovered the blueberry stain on my shirt. Oh hell no! This is my most favorite shirt in the entire world (despite the fact that both armpits have holes.) That baby got Shouted immediately. Because I would probably still wear it with a blueberry stain. If I had to pick only one outfit to wear for the rest of my life, it would be this one. It makes me so happy. It's nothing special, but it's 100% me.

top- J Crew sale

jeans- J Crew (the thrifted one I mentioned yesterday)

red shoes (see the cute little bows?!?)- DSW

Getting Rid of Stuff

I love getting rid of stuff. Almost as much as I like getting new stuff. I might like getting rid of stuff because it means I can get new stuff. Maybe. But I still love to purge. Not food mind you. Luckily I have never battled with an eating disorder-I like my food too much. But I love purging stuff. I love that feeling I get from getting rid of the useless junk piled up in my basement. It's so satisfying, like a weight has been lifted off my chest. Getting rid of junk also greatly improves my husband's mood. He doesn't quite understand my love for junk. So I embarked on part 17 of a Major Purge this past weekend. This Purge is so big it requires Capital Letters.

I refuse to throw things away, so I am a donating/freecycling machine. Some people can just shove it all in a trash can and call it a day, but I can't. Partly because I love the Earth and partly because of the the recently-discovered super-cheap streak I have deep in my bones. Getting something for less has always appealed to me-I grew up always being broke. And now that I have the money to afford nice, decent things (and then some), I still refuse to overpay for things. I work hard for my money dangit. So you better treat me right and give me an excellent deal. That means I am obsessed with thrifting and freecycle. Why should a slightly imperfect lounge chair sit in a landfill when someone else could make good use of it? Why should I drop a stack of wedding magazines in the recycle bin when someone might get good use out of them without having to buy them? I strongly believe in paying the junk forward. I know that If I put good, useful-to-someone-else junk out into the world, useful-to-me junk will eventually appear. It's the circle of life.

Back to the Major Purge. I finally said goodbye to a HUGE pile of clothes. I really have to watch my clothing intake/outtake or I may end up on an episode of Hoarders soon. But off to the Goodwill they went. I even managed to sweet-talk the hubs into donating a bunch of clothes. Double purge-I love it! And in return, the Goodwill gods blessed me with a Lilly Pulitzer dress in my size, a pair of JCrew Matchstick jeans in my size and a Coach leather purse perfect for the Fall. I love it!

I also Freecycled a huge pile of stuff that was just taking up space. I was able to get rid of a ton of scrapbooking stuff I'll never use, a pile of greeting cards I've never touched and a stack of magazines. But my best freecycle of the weekend was the useless box of plastic tubes I had sitting in my basement. About a month ago, I bought plastic shelving off of craigslist (half the cost of Home Depot and in excellent condition!) The seller gave me enough supports for 3 more sets of shelves, and I was stuck with a box full of 12" long plastic tubes. What the heck am I going to do with 25 plastic tubes? I could have shoved them all in a couple garbage bags and thrown them out, and I would have if it came to that. But I wanted to list them on Freecycle first, just to see what would happen. And a women who builds crazy cakes is now getting good use out of them. I love that!

I'm enjoying the feeling of the purge just talking about it. Ahhhh...

Where The Heck Did That Photo Go?

I was going to post yesterday's outfit, but it somehow disappeared off my iphone. Maybe it's on my camera?? Alas, photo management is not one of my strong suits. I sure I'm making the camera-to-blog process waaay more complicated than it needs to be. I find the whole taking/downloading/editing process is exhausting! That's one reason I keep dropping blogs-poor babies.

What I need is one of those artsy photographer husbands. Someone to take my picture and make me look all gorgeous but still appear as the approachable girl next door. I'm convinced that alone would solve all my blog-keeping related issues (we'll just ignore my laziness, need for instant gratification and burning desire to create instant perfection-mmmkay?) Instead I married an engineer. Granted, he is very handy on the computer. But until I turn into an airplane of any sort, he has little interest in taking my photo. Sigh. What can I say? Ever since he saw Top Gun as a wee 8 year old, my man has loved airplanes. I like airplanes a lot too, but for different reasons. I see glamorous travel and exciting places ala Catch Me If You Can and family reunions and that whole arrivals gate scene from the end of Love Actually. I love that scene.

My husband sees Mav and Goose and buzzing the tower. And in his eyes, it is resplendent.

Anyhoo, no photographer husband and it's easier for me to get photos off my phone. So here you go, another pic in the mirror!! Watch out, here comes the sassy patrol! Check out that coats on the coat rack and my lack of knees or feet! Woo Hoo! Baby steps people. Baby steps.

Top-Anthro

Belt- Nine West via sample sale (I got it for a buck!)

Jeans- thrifted JCrew

New Beginnings

It's time to start a blog. I need an outlet to talk about things I enjoy-my outfit choices, home projects and amazing thrift finds. I have amazing luck at my Goodwill (DVF, Paper Denim and Lilly Pulitzer.) So I making a vow, no matter the low quality and funny faces, I'm going to post my pics here. The only way to go is up. To take slightly messy or "off" things and give them a stylish turn. Life's imperfections aren't crooked, they're Jauntily Askew.

Check out the grainy iphone photo in our unfinished spare bedroom. Awesome!

teal dress- Target about 3 years ago

orange ruffle leather sandals- TJ Maxx last year

black patent pleather belt- from another dress I got at TJ Maxx