One year ago, at the end of my reflection on Year One, I wrote this:
In year two I hope to keep challenging myself to focus on the things I love about my body and the styles that make me feel great about myself. I also plan to continue challenging myself to try new looks, gather inspiration from others, and take a few more style risks!
Well, I do think that in year two I focused on my best features and styles that make me comfortable (our Dress Your Best Week helped with that). I don’t think I took all that many style risks. For me our first year of blogging was very much about experimenting, reveling in the new, and pushing myself outside my comfort zone. I think this second year was more about expanding my comfort zone and striking balance – between academia (including dissertating, teaching, and advising), home life (including marriage, running, gardening, cooking, etc) and blogging.
I like that my top ten outfits reflect some of this balance. I’ve included my first day of teaching outfits for both the Spring (# 1) and Fall (# 7) semesters. Pictures #3 and #4 show date-night outfits and #4 also shows off my my running legs from training for yet another marathon. I also included a simple casual outfit worn for a day of writing at the library and coffee shop that still kept me feeling stylish (# 9). Picture #6 is a less than perfect picture, but it allowed me to talk about some of the challenges of style blogging. And of course, I’ve included my wedding dress (# 10) – my happiest memory from this year and my favorite style moment! I still love my simple grey dress from J Crew, my “custom” shoes, and my borrowed necklace.
I think my style has changed a little since year one. I still love pencil skirts and my belts, but I also wore full skirts more and love the way the look on me (#3, #6, #8). This time last year, I was slowly embracing the skinny jeans, wearing them mostly with fuller/longer tops and boots. Now, I can’t imagine life with out them and confidently sport them with heels (#4) and shorter fitted tops (#9). I discovered my love of the classic color combination of red, white and blue (#7 and #8) and added the perfect blazer to my closet (#8 and #6).
Looking back on all my outfits and all my posts, #2 is one of my favorites because of the accompanying text. In this post I talked about being comfortable in my own skin and about dressing for myself rather than for others. I like that this year I blogged more about clothing as it relates to gender and sexuality and that I took the opportunity to share more about myself with you readers. This has been one of the most rewarding parts of bloging in year 2 (THANK YOU) and it’s something I plan to do more of in year 3!
As I look back on these ten outfits, right now, (besides my wedding dress) I think #5 is my favorite outfit. Maybe it’s just because I am longing for warm sunny days when I have toned arms and some color in my skin!
Which is your favorite?
I love and would wear each one of your outfits!
#9 is my favourite. It’s very stylish, but it doesn’t go over the top.
I think the wedding dress remains my favorite of yours for the year, but like you, I like a full skirt.
I wish I could have your style. Of course, your wedding dress is amazing (and with the pearls it’s so classic).
My all time favorite is number 4. It’s super flattering and a little sexy take on the typical “jeans and a button up”.
I love them all, but #5 is my favorite! It’s just perfection!
I love them all! What a fab post!
[...] I wanted to show you first days of school and coffee shop favorites. But, there was just too much! I got overwhelmed and like E. and S., I decided I better stick to this last year of blogging instead (but see how I cheated there just a little bit?). For more reminiscing, you can see my top ten from year one and year two. [...]