Target Labworks Review

OK, this is only a review of the two pieces I ordered, so nothing too exciting. I had not heard about the labworks collection at Target until I read about it on Piper's blog, and then I ended up buying two of the same pieces that she bought.

First up is the lime twist-front tulip skirt, which I ordered in a large and XL with the intention of returning whichever one didn't fit. The XL is pictured here:

As you can see, it's suuuuuuuuuuper tight and unflattering on me. The material is very thin; and even with the lining, it's still pretty sheer. If I wanted this to work (which I don't really), I'd probably try the plus size version instead. Then again, the waist fit fine, so who knows.

The second item I bought is the black/lime sleeveless neoprene dress in a large.

This one was the correct size for me. I wasn't sure how the cutouts were going to work, but it turns out that they're kind of cute and fun. The length, however, is not. I shouldn't have been surprised - all dresses from Target that aren't Merona brand are basically minis on me. It might work for concerts and outdoor festivals and such. I could even sew a strip of black neoprene at the bottom, but that sounds like too much effort. I ended up asking my husband what he thought, and he wasn't a fan. Looks like this one is probably getting returned, too.

The cool thing about this collection is that they offer all the items in plus, regular, and petite sizes - so no one misses out. Unfortunately, it's only available online, so ordering things in a couple of sizes like I did might be your best bet.

This is a stretch for "favorite score" for the We Love Target link-up, but I'll go with it. They had potential... Bridget's wearing a cute Target T-shirt and skirt, so that works.

Picking out Clothes in the Dark

I needed easy outfits all last week because the light in my closet was burnt out, so I was picking out clothes with the help of the flashlight app on my phone. Eventually, I did get around to replacing the bulb...6 days later. This outfit is from last week Tuesday.

Dress: New York & Company; Belt: White House Black Market;
Cardigan and Sandals: Target; Bracelet: Michael Kors

My mom and I saw this dress when we went shopping for a Dressed by outfit, and the only reason we passed it up because it wasn't on sale at the time. There's no reason to ever by anything full price at New York & Company because they're always sending out coupons and having different sales. Kinda like Kohl's. Anyway, I stalked it for a few weeks and ended up buying it myself when it did go on sale. Although I felt guilty about it at first, it fits so well that I didn't feel too bad about it for long.

I should've taken a picture of the little cutout in the back, too, but you can see it in the product picture if you're curious.

A Bit of Earth

How spooky do these photos look with the fog in the woods? I kind of love it. It's kind of Secret Garden-esque.

Dress: Anthropologie; Hat and Sandals: Target; Bracelets: ?

The idea for the work version of this outfit came from this Style Me Pretty post featuring Emily from Cupcakes and Cashmere.

Blazer: Narciso Rodriguez for Kohl's; Shoes: CL by Laundry via swap

I didn't notice my stupid lapel was flipped up until afterwards. That was not intentional.

I'm not too impressed with the dry cleaning of this blazer. I found a couple blue spots on it, and I'm not sure if they're from leaving the blazer sitting on the dryer for months before taking it to the cleaners (and possibly getting detergent on it??) or from the cleaning process itself. I'm just hoping the spots are not too noticeable today. Either way, I think I'm going to try hand washing it next time. And by hand washing, I mean using the Hand Wash setting on the washing machine. Because I'm lazy like that, and I'm not too invested in this particular article of clothing.

Besides a couple quibbles related to this blazer, I'm in a much better mood today. I cleaned the laundry room and our bedroom last night, and it's amazing how much of a stress relief having a clean(er) house is. Being a messy person myself, I often forget that. Now if only we can keep it that way for awhile! Bridget even helped out by picking up all her toys in the living room! Hubs and I were very proud of her.

Lack of Good Rain Boots

I almost wore boots today, but I couldn't bring myself to do it. It's the end of May. At least it wasn't too cold out. It's days like these when I wish I had brightly colored rain boots to get me from place to place, but I just don't think I would wear them often enough to justify buying Hunters, and I think the cheap ones are painful to walk in.

Skirt: Target; Top: New York & Company; Belt: from some random dress;
Cardigan: Calvin Klein via Goodwill; Shoes: C-Label

Anyway, my mood kind of matches the weather today, so I'm going to call this a post before I start complaining about something else.

Happy Memorial Day

I had this whole post written up complaining about how high maintenance and unpredictable my bangs can be, but it seemed inappropriate and whiny for Memorial Day. So instead, I'll just say thank you to all military personnel past and present.

I was dressed somewhat patriotically earlier today before I changed into sweatpants, but this simple work outfit is actually from last week.

Top: Jason Wu for Target; Pants and Watch: New York & Company; Shoes: Kohl's; Bracelet: Kate Spade

Dressed by Mary Again

Fellow Milwaukee blogger Mary from Babble & Bloom picked out my outfit again today.

Source

I'm a big fan of tone-on-tone looks, but I didn't have anything close to the lovely peach color of that skirt. Instead, I tried to get the same effect by going with a green pencil skirt and a mint tank top, and then I added matching shoes instead of matching shades.

It was really, really windy out, as you can probably tell.

Skirt: New York & Company; Tank Top: J.Crew Factory; Shoes: L.L.Bean; Blazer and Sunglasses: Target;
Watch: Fossil; Bracelet: Target?

I really liked this outfit! Usually I feel oddly formal wearing a blazer with a pencil skirt, like I'm trying to sell someone a new home or something, but this was fun enough to counteract that. (No offense to realtors - they're sharp-dressed people, and my team at work is more on the casual side.) I even got a compliment on my shoes by a man sitting outside of Starbucks.

I'm also linking up with IFB Project #96: Share Your Shades.

Cerulean and Coral

Relatively fun fact - I used the word cerulean in a still-in-progress novel I started when I was 11 to mean "hello" in a made-up language.

But onto the task at hand...here's the Style Imitating Art piece for this week:

And my interpretation:

Dress: Wet Seal; Tank: H&M; Bracelets: NY&Co, street festival, and...Target?; Sandals: Aldo

I admit, I tried to edit the back and arm fat out of this one but to no avail. Plus, I'm squinty.
I like how it showed both bracelets, though.

I got a "You look nice" from my husband with this outfit - score!

That is all. I have to give Bridget a bath now and then head downstairs to drill screws in drywall.

Almost Missed It

I almost missed Marionberry Style's Trend of the Month Link-up this month, which would've been a tragedy for me since the theme is YELLOW. Credit where it's due, this outfit was inspired by this post on Chicago Street Style.

Skirt: ASOS; Top: Old Navy; Shoes: New York & Company; Necklace: H&M; Sunglasses: Target

I'm also linking up with IFB Project #95: Show Us Your Stripes.

Dressed by Noelle

Noelle from Tilly's Notions (another Wisconsin blogger!) sent me an idea from Atlantic Pacific based on the chartreuse skirt she knew I had.

Source

Yup, practically everyone's a poser compared to Blair.

Skirt: Uniqlo; Top: Lela Rose for Target+Neiman Marcus; Shoes: Kohl's; Sunglasses and Headband: Target;
Watch: Michael Kors; Bracelets: Kate Spade, Pandora, Marc by Marc Jacobs, and Charming Charlie

I've really liked every outfit I've worn this skirt with, so I was glad Noelle gave me another reason and another way to wear it!

I believe I only have one outfit idea left to recreate after this one. If you'd like to participate in my Dressed by series, I now have an Outfit Suggestion page with a form you can fill out!

Florida Vacation 2013 Recap

To read some tips on how to pack for a theme-park vacation, you can check out my guest post today on Modly Chic! Here are the outfits I packed for Bridget and me for our Orlando vacation we just returned from:

All of Bridget's Outfits and My Dresses: Target; Green Slytherin Tank: Wizarding World of Harry Potter;
Printed Shorts and Black Tank: Old Navy; White Linen Pants: MICHAEL Michael Kors; Sandals: Aldo

Thursday, we began our Disney fun at Magic Kingdom! Let's see if I can remember everything we did...

1. Watched a parade
2. Dumbo the Flying Elephant ride
3. Daisy and Minnie meet n greet
4. Under the Sea - Journey of The Little Mermaid ride
5. It's a Small World ride
6. Dole Whip

My mom, Bridget, and Minnie

We were amused that one of the poodles was named Brigitte.

It's a small world after all...

Dole Whip!

The lines weren't too long, and we waited less than 25 minutes for every ride. Still, with a two-year-old, we had to be choosy with what we wanted to get on because we knew our time was limited. We made it about 4 - 5 hours that day. Bridget was a champ! She started to melt down while in line for a Dole Whip, but she was better once we got her some ice cream.

We grabbed lunch back in our room, swam in the pool a little bit, and ate dinner at the resort. My mom was excited to go back to Magic Kingdom that night if possible (my parents had already been there 3 days, so they were pretty well rested), but my husband, Bridget, and I were beat.

On Friday, we took a little bit longer to get out the door, but then we headed to Universal Islands of Adventure and put in a few hours there. I was super bummed the Jurassic Park water ride was down for maintenance, but we still found plenty of fun things to do, such as:

1. One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish ride
2. The Lorax and Cat in the Hat meet n greet
3. The Cat in the Hat ride
4. Caro-Seuss-el
5. The High in the Sky Seuss Trolley Train
6. Ate lunch at Three Broomsticks and drank butterbeer
7. The Forbidden Journey (single rider)
8. Flight of the Hippogriff
9. The Amazing Adventures of Spider-Man ride (single rider)

Meeting the Lorax - Hubs' shirt is wet from the One Fish Two Fish ride

On the Caro-Seuss-el

She loved having her face painted! Seriously, she did, despite her expression in this picture.

Hagrid's hut in the Wizarding World of Harry Potter

My mom has a bunch more pictures, but she hasn't posted them yet. You can see the rest of mine here. There aren't that many others - I only took about 30 total.

That night for dinner, hubs and I met my friend from high school and her boyfriend at Giordano's for some Chicago style pizza! I didn't even know they had locations outside of Illinois, but apparently they have three of them in Florida.

On our last full day (also the day my parents flew home), we attempted a visit to Animal Kingdom. The day started off a little rocky after the It's Tough to be a Bug attraction scared Bridget, but we soldiered on to stand in line for The Festival of the Lion King show. The show was excellent, and Bridget loved it, but she was also getting hotter and more rundown by the minute. We had to call it a day and get her back to the hotel and into bed.

Later in the afternoon, I drove my parents to the airport and then met my friend and her boyfriend again for dinner while hubs offered to stay back with Bridget. The original plan was for them to come to our hotel to hang out, but we didn't want to keep Bridget awake. Instead, we went out to a restaurant called Brick House, which was right next to their hotel. The food was good, the atmosphere was cool and man cave-themed, but the service left a lot to be desired. I'm going to give the place the benefit of the doubt and assume it was just our waitress and not the establishment in general. (I'll have to steal my friend's picture she took of us when she posts it on Facebook.)

And Sunday, we flew home! Bridget was still feverish, and hubs had come down with some sort of stomach bug, so it wasn't the most pleasant traveling day for them, but we made it.

Dressed by My Mom

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there! Here's a special Mother's Day edition of Dressed by, featuring a dress my mom picked out for me and a top I picked out for her.

My mom did a little research before our shopping trip and went into it with a couple different ideas. The two trends she was interested in were peplum or colorblocking. Both were pretty abundant in stores, but we seemed to have better luck with the former. While she was picking out something peplum for me, we even found a peplum top for her, too. My mom also helped picked out the cardigan, necklace, and shoes from stuff I already had to complete my outfit. I ended up wearing this out to dinner with my husband. He approved.

Dress: Anne Klein via Boston Store; Cardigan: H&M; Shoes: C-Label; Necklace: Maurices

And here's how my mom wore her new peplum top:

Top: Calvin Klien via Boston Store; Skirt: Rafaella via Boston Store;
Cardigan: Sweater Project brand

Fashion blogger in the making, am I right? And yes, I know, we look exactly the same.

Although I didn't pick out the rest of the mom's outfit, doesn't it look like something I would've put together?? I love it! And I want to steal it! By the way, I should've had her take a picture of her walk-in closet. She has the most enviable closet. It's freakin' huge.