Incognito

Confession:  I'm not much of a Halloween person.  I don't remember going trick-or-treating as a kid at all.  I also don't remember dressing up most years, although there is evidence I was Minnie Mouse in preschool, and I have a vague memory of being a bunny rabbit one year.

As a grown-up, I don't really have much use for Halloween.  Our church does host a "Harvest Party", where kids wear costumes and play games and stuff.  A couple years ago, we were helping out with one of the games, and someone told us that most of the adults wear costumes, too.  About 2 days before the event, we threw together a pretty awesome couples costume (if I may say so myself!)

As it turns out, most of the adults were NOT wearing costumes, but we were very popular with the kids.  This one girl was probably 7 or 8, and she came up to me just freaking out, like "Oh my goodness!  Princess Peach!  You are totally my hero!  I am always you on MarioKart, I mean, ALWAYS!"  It was so funny.  Then there was a little boy dressed as Mario, but he had the "real" costume, which is all polyester, and he was very jealous of John's real overalls.  

This next photo is not from Halloween, but it's just awesome.  John's sister had a movie-themed costume party when she turned 17, and we went as Han Solo and Princess Leia.  

I hope you all have a safe and happy Halloween!  Do any of you have fun costumes??

Shrek-tacular!

Last week, the Omaha Broadway season kicked off with Shrek the Musical.  It was pretty much what I expected.  Since I work in market research, I always think of how I would rate the show if I was given a survey.  Likelihood to Recommend = poor.  Overall rating 0-10 = probably about a 4.  There were some funny parts, but I wouldn't pay to see it again.

Before the show, I met my mother-in-law for dinner.  She was nice enough to agree when I suggested the Chick-fil-A!  We don't have a real one in Omaha yet, but there is an "express" in a building near downtown, so it was right on the way!  Of course, I had to pose with the cow and his sign!

Dress: Target
Shirt, tank, and belt: Gap
Boots: Guess

Birthday Weekend Wrap-Up

On Saturday, we celebrated my birthday with John's parents and sister.  We went out to lunch, and then 

over to their house for presents and fancy cupcakes - I might be a little bit spoiled!  

Saturday evening, we went over to an open house for some friends who recently got married, and then back over to John's parent's house to watch the Nebraska vs. Michigan game.    

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend!  

Cardigan: Marisa Kristina

Shirt: J.Crew

Jeans: Old Navy

Boots: Wanted via Piperlime

Camouflage

I really like this camo jacket, but I never really know what to wear with it, so I was perusing Pinterest and found this picture.  I was waiting for the perfect fall day when shorts and a sweater/jacket combo would be appropriate.  Apparently, that type of day doesn't exist in Nebraska, so I just went with jeans.

Most days, I don't get comments from my co-workers about my outfits.  On Friday, I learned that wearing a camo jacket will inspire random guys at work to mention it.  A few guys asked me if I borrowed it from John.  One guy was like "Cool jacket!  Can I touch it!?"  I think he expected it to be some sort of fancy weatherproof hunting fabric.  It's not. I explained to them that it's fashion camo, not hunting camo.  I don't think they believed me.  I was tempted to send them evidence, but thought that would be a little weird.      

In other news, these are my first official tripod pictures!  I felt kind of like a weirdo, and I'm not sure what I would have said if my neighbors asked me what I was doing.  I need to play around with the settings and figure out a way to get better focus, but I'm excited to mix up my locations a little bit, and take more outdoor photos (just in time for the snowy season!).

Jacket: Gap
Necklace: Bass
Everything else: Gap

Birthdays are Awesome

It is possible that I am more excited about my birthday than someone in her late 20s ought to be, but I just can't help myself.  I love an excuse to celebrate anything, and my birthday is extra exciting because I get texts and phone calls from friends and family.  I'm sure the presents don't hurt, either!

Anyway, on Wednesday, I just worked like normal, but one of my co-workers brought in a stash of delicious baked goods for me.  Then in the afternoon, we had a little birthday get-together.  Another co-worker was also celebrating his birthday, so we had even more treats!

After work, I got to open my presents from John!  He got me a tripod for my camera, which you all should be excited about, because it means you might get some more interesting backgrounds than the wall in my entryway!  It also means John and I can take better pictures together!  Can you tell I am excited about it??

John also got me a new watch!  Let's be honest - he did an awesome job at picking this out.  I like how it is classy and will go with everything, but it's also kind of different.  I just need to find a place to get a few links removed.  Or I need to gain some weight in my wrists, which might be tricky.

After presents, we went to dinner at one of my favorite restaurants!  After a delicious steak, baked potato and beer bread, I got the most amazing dessert for FREE!

We got home and I talked to various relatives who called to say Happy Birthday.  Then at the very end of the day, I got a call from my friend Anne, who I haven't talked to in way too long.

All in all, I would say it was a pretty fabulous birthday!

Cardigan and tank: Gap
Skirt: J.Crew
Shoes: Seychelles
 

Guest Starring

I'm guest posting for Bri Marie today, over at Work Clothes, I Suppose.  You should go read my post over there, where I completely copycat one of her outfits.  Then you should start following her blog!

This worked out nicely, because I am still in somewhat of a sugar-induced stupor from all the birthday treats I had yesterday! 

Birthday Girl

It is my 28th birthday!  Whoo-hoo!  I thought I would use this very exciting day as an excuse to post random pictures from my various birthdays over the years and write self-deprecating commentary about my outfits.  Lucky for you, I was the fourth child in an age before digital cameras, so there aren't 28 pictures!  

According to the writing on the back, I am actually 3 days old in this picture, but it will have to do!  You can tell I was already a fashion trailblazer - wearing all white after Labor Day.

I don't have a picture from when I turned 2, but I found notes in my baby book about the gifts I received.  Someone gave me pantyhose.  For my 2nd birthday. I don't even know why that would happen.  

In third grade, I got to have a party with my friends from school.  I made sure to dress my very best in pink floral short-alls.  The worst part is that they were a fairly recent hand-me-down from my sister who was 16 at the time.  You only get a glimpse of their awesomeness in this photo,  If you aren't too distracted by my bright blue scrunchy.  I'm also 90% sure that present was a book version of Disney's Aladdin.

1993

Action shot from my 14th birthday.  Let's ignore my giant bangs and focus on the fact that I had this shirt in 2 colors.  Mock neck shirts must have been really awesome.

Sweet 16 coming up!  This year was really fancy.  I got a cookie cake AND a chocolate cake shaped like a boot.  You might remember this shirt from when I was in middle school.  I was still wearing it 4 years later.  I believe this was the birthday when my parents took me to see "Remember the Titans."  

For my 18th birthday, I had a big party with one of my best friends.  We even had balloons!  I mean, it was pretty crazy.  I remember telling my friend that my dad was running to pick up the cake, and she thought I said "keg", and was very confused for a second.  To be clear, it was not a keg party.  The only 6-packs were of Orange Crush.

This is my birthday when John and I were dating.  We look so young!  And isn't Leanne Rimes kind of creepy in the background??  

And finally, a picture from my 25th, when my parents came to visit!  Special thanks to them for putting up with me all these years.

Squirrelly

My photographer is easily distracted by the wildlife in our backyard.  This is one of many friendly neighborhood squirrels.  They are pretty cute, I guess.  They also destroyed our bird feeder last summer, but I definitely prefer them to the rabbits who destroyed our garden.  I'm glad we don't have too many crazy animals in our backyard.  My neighbor recently told me there has been a possum around, which totally freaks me out!  I haven't seen it, so I just pretend she was wrong.

When I was in high school, (actually the day of my junior prom), there was a wild turkey in our backyard.  We lived in the middle of a city, so it didn't really make sense.  Of course, I was the only person home, so I called my dad and told him about it.  I don't think anyone believed me, but I had taken a picture as evidence.  This was back in the olden days where we actually had to get film developed, so about a week later, when I got my prom pictures back, I had a very blurry picture of a turkey to prove I wasn't imagining it!

Shirt and Cardigan: Gap
Skirt: Bass
Shoes: BCBGeneration

Time Travel

Saturday evening, John and I went on a good old-fashioned date:  dinner and a movie!

We grabbed dinner at Ingredient, which is kind of the perfect restaurant for me.  They have a few standard menu items, but they mostly have a huge list of ingredients and let you customize whatever you want.  They don't even look at you funny if you order a pizza with no sauce and four types of cheese.  I mean, if you were the type of person do order that.  (if so, let's be best friends!)

After dinner, we went and saw Looper, which was pretty good!  One complaint though:  about five minutes into the movie, these 3 guys who looked like they were probably college-age came in.  The theatre wasn't packed, but they asked us to scoot over and we did.  So this random guy is sitting right next to me, and he proceeds to text and look at Facebook and other random stuff on his phone for about half of the movie - super distracting!.  At one point, he was so focused on his phone that he didn't realize his elbow had completely infringed into my space and hit me in the side.  Of course, I elbowed him to get him to move, and leaned closer to John, but he didn't even seem to notice!  I'm officially turning into a grumpy old woman who laments today's youth!  Seriously, if someone is nice enough to scoot over for you when the movie has already started, you could at least be polite!  (rant over)

How was your weekend?  Any good movies to see?

Shirt, Skirt, Shoes: Gap
Jacket: Izod

Double the Polka

Something about polka dots just makes me want to wear more polka dots!  (Exhibit A)  I'll very likely wear these shoes with my polka dot skirt and this sweater at some point.  Maybe with my green tights, like this?

I hope you are all having a lovely weekend!

Cardigan and Belt: Old Navy
Shirt: Gap
Skirt: Limited
Necklace: inPink
Shoes: Madden Girl

Super Casual

You might remember from this outfit that I can wear pretty much whatever I want to work.  I think our dress code says something like "if you can wear it to the gym, you shouldn't wear it to the office", but I'm pretty sure some of the guys wear gym shorts. Long story short, we have a very casual work environment.  I really like it, because on days when I am feeling lazy or under the weather, it's completely acceptable for me to throw on jeans, a hoodie, and chucks and call it good.

T-shirt, tank, jeans: Gap
Hoodie: Target
Shoes: Converse via Target  

Unintentional Copycat

As I was editing these pictures, I thought the outfit looked really familiar.  Then I realized it was very similar to the outfit from this pin.  (I just wish I had realized I was stealing this outfit, because I would have added a skinny belt.  I also really wish I had a polka dot scarf, which is one of the items on my birthday wish list!) 

Then I thought copying an outfit without realizing it sounded familiar, and I remembered that I read about a very similar situation on Whitney's blog the other day.  I'm beginning to wonder if there are any original thoughts left in the world. 

Sweater and Skirt: Express
Scarf: Loft
Shoes: Seychelles

Boot-Scootin' Boogie

I am super excited to link up with Bri Marie today for the first ever "Third Thursday Threads" party.  The theme of this month is BOOTS!   I bought these boots almost a year ago, and they were actually featured in my first ever outfit post!  I'm actually wearing the same shirt, too.  But my hair is way longer now!

Now for a story (that is kind of about boots) from my childhood.  The first country songs I really remember loving was "Boot Scootin' Boogie" by Brooks and Dunn.  I have no idea when this happened, but the song came out in 1992, so I'm guessing it was Labor Day weekend of that year.  We were down in Arkansas or Missouri for the annual family reunion.  One of my 2nd or 3rd cousins was a teenager and he had just gotten a new truck with a fancy sound system, so he was showing it off to the rest of the cousins, and he played Boot Scootin' Boogie for us.  I thought it was pretty cool.  Prior to that, I thought I didn't like country music, probably because I only knew Achy Breaky Heart.  Anyway, I was a pretty big country music fan throughout my elementary and middle school years.  My sister and I went to a bunch of really great concerts (wearing some really hideous outfits).  I don't have a lot of patience for current country music, but I will jam out to some 90's country!

What kind of music did you like when you were a kid? 

Blazer: Jones New York
Shirt: Sunny Leigh
Jeans: Jessica Simpson
Boots: BareTraps via DSW

Fall Frenzy

Remember this summer, when I did my first blog swap?  Well, the completely adorable Meg is at it again this fall, and (of course) I had to join in for the fun.

I was paired with Jenny over at A Full Cup of Life, and sent me a box full of fall goodness!

• Vanilla Candles
• Plum nail polish
• Candy Corn
• Dove chocolate bar
• Halloween themed towels

Special thanks to Jenny for the fun presents and to Meg for hosting the swap!

Outfit details:
Sweater, Button-down shirt, and Jeans: Gap
Shoes: Target