Red Shoes

Last week I talked about making some of the changes that I’d like to make this summer. Starting with my house, and making it more into a home. Something that I am so excited about. I had originally planned to take next week off, but an opportunity for some overtime at work came up, and I had to take it, so I moved my week off to the following week, which will probably work out better since I’ll have the whole week instead of Monday being a holiday and busy with all the holiday stuff.


But I’m getting way off topic here. So anyway, other changes that I’d like to make this summer are more along the lines of a personal makeover. Because well, I’m a hot mess.

First my hair. I don’t really take good care of it. I last had it trimmed almost a year ago, and I think the last time it was done before that was about another 9-12 months prior. Needless to say, I’ve never been a salon gal that goes in every 6-8 weeks to get my hair done. I dye my own hair, and I have been doing so for about 12 years or so. Always red. I love my read hair, and though I do get itches for something different occasionally, I just love my red hair too much. I have had it done professionally twice, both about a year apart and by two different stylists because my soul dies at the thought of dropping $60+ every 6-8 weeks to have done something I can do in my bathroom for $10. I even consider the $10 a splurge because I can do it cheaper by buying the stuff separately from Sally’s Beauty Supply.

But, I’m not a mid-20’s starving college student with a part time job anymore. Somewhere along the line I moved into a professional job with a professional title and my own office and everything. And just because it most certainly isn’t the job I want to retire from and is miles from where I want to be in life, I still need to start acting the part. So, goal #1: Get my hair done and keep it up. I’m going to get my hair trimmed/cut (depending on how damaged the ends are), dyed professionally and get the blond chunky highlights that I got once before and loved but was too cheap to keep done again. Now, I can’t guarantee I’ll be sitting in a salon every 6-8 weeks, but I’ll certainly aim for 12 weeks and under depending on budget constraints. I do want to grow my hair out for now, so I’m not anticipating any major cuts right now. We’ll see if and when that changes.

Next, clothes. And good lord are my clothes bad. Truly. They may not have ALWAYS been bad, and individual pieces may not be too bad, but overall, my wardrobe is sadly lacking in decent modern style. I typically wear the same 5 or so outfits a week (and by outfits, I mean tops). Many of which have holes in them. I have about 2 pairs of pants I trade off wearing and I wear my one decent pair of jeans on Friday. Most of my tops are now stretched and faded so they are far from flattering. I look through my closet and realize that most of the clothes I have, just really don’t suit me anymore. When I was 24 and going to the club after class until 2AM they were cute. Now, they just look sad. Not to mention that the last time I had a closet full of cute, in style outfits was when I worked at Mervyn’s and I got fired from there in 2003, and never really bothered to update my wardrobe since. Yes, I’ve bought a piece here and there and I do admit that I do have a few really cute things, but the overall of my closet is just sad.

Now the wardrobe fix is trickier than the hair fix, because quite honestly, I am so overwhelmed by clothing and style, it’s not even funny. Part of the problem is I’m cheap. Incredibly cheap when it comes to clothes. I’m shocked and incredibly annoyed at the thought of paying more than $15-$20 for a piece of clothing or shoes. And I feel that once I’ve spent that $20, I need to stop because I’m spending too much money. Let me make it clear at this point that in no way does Chris contribute to this thought process. He thinks I’m crazy for turning down a cute top that’s $25 because “that price it outrageous!!!” And he actively tells me that it’s ok for me to buy some new clothes when I point out a new hole in a shirt. But this doesn’t seem to end the enormous guilt I have for buying new pieces of clothing.

What to know the funny part, this cheap side of me seems to only apply to certain areas. I seem to have no problem dropping $30 on a pedi that’s going to last only 6 weeks or so, or spending close to $100 for a goblet that I’m only going to use a max total of 14 days a year. But a new top for $25 that I can wear once a week for a good year or so? That’s crossing a line apparently. Yeah, my brain is totally logical.

The other side to this is I’m a pretty casual person. Though I adore a complicated outfit perfectly pulled together, I am generally too lazy to go through all that work. Hence why I end up wearing pretty much the same things every day. Hand in hand with this is also just the “simple” lack in confidence that I could even pull off anything trendy, cute and pulled together. Going back to the days of childhood, when I was relentlessly teased for my clothing choices, so now I tend to stick with the basics and avoid anything that might seem too bold for the sake of reliving those tortuous elementary school years. :/ And there is the fact that accessories scare me. I have no idea how to use them. And I’m pretty convinced that they may look adorable on others, but will look like crap on me of which everyone in my office will laugh at me like I was 7 years old again.

I may have a few issues I’m dealing with.

However, for the same reason as above. I’m an actual adult with a professional job and I really do need to start looking the part. I don’t plan to go on a thousand dollar spree or anything (though, if anyone wants to nominate me for What Not To Wear, I would love you forever. I'll be happy to provide pics if necessary.). But I do plan to slowly buy some more quality staple pieces at what I know will be more expensive. :/ But that I can augment with some cheaper trendier pieces. I will toss/donate the clothes in my closet I don’t wear anymore or don’t fit in anymore. And I will try not to hang on to pieces of clothing until their ripping at the seams because I know I can wear it one more time!!!

But if anyone wants to volunteer to be a shopping guide with me, I could really use the help, because as I said, I am completely overwhelmed and honestly have no idea what looks good on me outside of the same things I always buy. I tend not to veer too far off the path of what I know and am pretty scared of changing for fear of getting laughed at. Yes I’m almost 31 years old and still afraid of being teased. But in an attempt to break out of my rut a little I did make a bold move last week. I bought shoes. Red shoes. This is huge for me. Mostly because Every. Single. Pair. Of shoes I have are black. All of them. So I took a bold step and bough these really cute red shoes that I fell in love with. Time will tell if I actually wear them. I’m a little scared. Ok, a lot scared. :/

They are a lot more red than the pic shows. Apparently Target has some kind of block on their pics so I'll just link to them instead.

I’ll clearly never be a fashionista and I don’t want to be. I like being low maintenance in my style. Plus my work place is pretty casual, so its not like I need to dress for Wall Street, but I do think some improvements need to be made.

Lastly, My body: I really need to start working out again. Since I stopped taking the hormones I dropped about 6-7 lbs in a month and it was great and I stopped there. I would love to lose about another 5lbs, But more than that I’d really just like to tone up. Plus I know I’ll feel better about myself and overall if I’m exercising. I’m going to get back on Spark People and set small weekly goals for myself to get myself going. I’m going to start using my Wii Fit again and possibly the 30 Day Shred. But I’ll probably wait for that until later in the summer. Chris and I are going to start going on evening walks together. I'm going to start tracking what I eat again and start cutting back on the fast food. Some nights I'm just too lazy to cook so we run to grab fast food. I really need to work more at not doing that by doing more meal planning. I've started buying food at Sprouts which has organic meats, fruits and veggies at a ridiculously good price. And I want to start going back to the Farmer's Market now that faire is done.

Ok, I think that’s about it. Sorry this is so long. I have a lot of personal making over to do. :) At least I didn’t even get to the personality/inner self makeover stuff! Maybe later.