academichic

Sources:

T-shirt: Forever 21
Necklace: gift from husband
Skirt: test run from Megan Nielsen of an upcoming pattern for DIY Maternity!
Wedges: Naturalizer, via DSW

End Notes:

Today I’m celebrating a body part towards which I was quite ambivalent for many years: my butt, my tush, my rear, my okole. When I was a bony freshman in college, I realized that my jeans didn’t really fit the way that my hallmates’ did. Maybe it’s because I didn’t wear pants often enough as a teenager in Hawaii, but once I was on the mainland I suddenly became very self-conscious about my lack of a butt. I used to joke that I didn’t really have a butt per se, just an expanse of upper thigh.

Now, Internet, I’m letting you know that I have a butt.

Somewhere through the past ten years of gaining weight, getting older, running a little, starting to bike, and doing endless squats to pick up little e…I got a butt. I haven’t thought a whole lot about if it’s “cute” or “shapely” or “mom-ish” or any of those things. But I do know that I love the way it looks in a pencil skirt with a good pair of wedges.

Gaining an okole — and being okay with it — as I’ve grown older has been a good reminder of how our bodies are not static. There is not some ideal form that we pass through from ages 18-24 to which we should continually aspire. Do I like every change my body has undergone in the last ten years? Not really. But I’m learning to be more graceful in accepting these shifts, acknowledging how my embodied experiences leave corporeal traces and how those traces can themselves change what I value and why.

P.S. In less than two years, I’ll probably really regret tying my shirt like this. But all the cool kids are doing it now and it gave me the silhouette I wanted for this outfit. I’m such a sucker for a good silhouette.

Sources:

• Striped tank: Target
• Belt: swapped with A.
• Skirt: thrifted as a dress and chopped
• Literal necklace: Tickette, gift from husband
• Wedges: Naturalizer, via DSW

End Notes:

There are a lot of things I love about this outfit — the colors and stripes, the red shoes, the silhouette — but there are also a lot of things I might regret shortly.

Like the fact that a tiny part of me is worried that I’ll look like a member of the Red Hat Society, sans hat, because I’m wearing red and purple together.

Or the fact that I — as an almost 30 year old mother — definitely wore pigtails for part of the day in order to get my hair off my neck in some unbearable heat. Am I too old for pigtails?

Or the fact that I’m maybe-kind-of-sort-of-half-heartedly trying to grow my hair out right now. My avuncular hair dresser, whom I adore and trust, encouraged me to aim for a longer hair length. And while I love the idea, in theory, of being able to throw my hair up into a ponytail, it’s been so long since I’ve had anything other than a bob that I’m a bit at sea right now.

And now you know all my secret fears. But tell me, what tips do you have for that awkward in-between stage of growing out your hair? Are there hair fastening devices I should know about at this point? If a ponytail is still stumpy are there other options — besides pigtails — for lifting hair off the neck? Tell me what I need to know!

The weather swings in academichic central lately have been crazy, swinging up from the fifties to the nineties in a matter of a few days. Which means my wardrobe choices have been something like this:

Sources:

Cold:

• Cardigan: Target
• Tank: Old Navy Maternity
• Skirt: Old Navy Maternity
• Wedges: Naturalizers, via DSW

Hot:

• Hat: Banana Republic
• Scarf: gift from S.
• Top: thrifted (and worn backwards)
• Shorts: consignment shop
• Shoes: Target, thrifted new
• Clutch: c/o Crystalyn Kae (don’t forget to check out Crystalyn and other independent boutiques through our boutique consortium!)

End Notes:

S.’s post on sharing — or not sharing — maternity clothes also brought to mind a recent reader question about what to bring to a clothing swap, that is, how do you decide what clothes to give away or exchange?

I love it when I go to a swap and people have brought clothing that is still a) in great condition, b) not obviously dated, and c) is accompanied with the giver’s desire to find someone who really looks GREAT in that article of clothing. When I’ve culled through my closet, either for swaps, for donations, or to simply pass along to a friend, I am pretty ruthless about putting anything that I haven’t worn within the past year into a “consideration” pile. If something is still essentially new — I bought it on clearance and wore it once but then never again — I might first consider putting that up on eBay to make a few bucks. But, most of the time it’s something that either doesn’t fit my body quite right or a different silhouette that I attempted to integrate into my wardrobe but just didn’t work out. In that sense, I guess I tend to think of clothes-swapping as an opportunity to right my past shopping wrongs, rather than simply a means of cleaning out my closet.

I was delighted to see S. wearing that turquoise top in her pictures! That top got the cut from my wardrobe because it was just wishful thinking and a lot of tugging that kept that empire waistline tucked below my bust. Since I knew that my torso length was unlikely to shorten during future pregnancies, it was time to let that top go. Now we both win! The deal is, clothes-swapping can actually be a humbling experience — to go back through your closet and acknowledge that you did not make the wisest choices. But it can also be incredibly fulfilling when you can be happy to see someone else looking like a million bucks in a garment that didn’t really do much for you.

Ultimately, I think a lot of these questions relate back to the notion of building a versatile, workable wardrobe that does what you want and says what you want it to say. Although these hot and cold outfits are fairly different from each other, I do think that they give some insight into how my style has changed a little since my last pregnancy. I’m a bit more daring with trends — shorter shorts with a draped top, for example — and I’m finally on board with stripes. I’m a hat lady now, too. On the other hand, the brightly colored shoes are still a big part of my repertoire, and I don’t see myself swapping those out any time soon!

How do you decide what ends up in a swapping pile?