January 9, 2015 by gn0mel0ver

Maroon Foggy Fire In The Snow

I took five outfit photos the day it snowed at my house this year. It had not snowed in years and it was too good of a photo opportunity to pass up.

Eck, I am such a blogger.

This outfit ended up being my favorite.

This is surprising to me for several reasons.

Mostly because I hate. Yes, hate. The color maroon.

I don’t know where this hatred came from. But it is there and alive ~~and well~~. And I just learned that marsala is the 2015 color of the year! Which is pretty much a fanciful way of saying “maroon.”

Oi.

Maybe the fashion gurus are on to something. Perhaps it is the name. When I purchased this Free People Embroidered Fable Dress two years ago, this color was called Mulberry. I like that name. Let’s think of some more.

Foggy Fire.

Lusting From Afar Red.

Sunset Sangria.

Yes, I like all of those.

I get more offers to buy this dress than any other item in my closet. The color is discontinued, but honestly, I love the grey color they have in it right now, too. The sweater is an old Anthropologie item I purchased from a sweet reader last winter. They had a a similar sweater this year that is now on sale. I loved that one when I reviewed it and would have picked it up if I did not all ready own and love mine.

What is your least favorite color to wear? Mine actually isn’t maroon. It is brown. I guess I like cheery colors. But now that I can rename the offenders, I am liking their sultry offerings. Perhaps 2015 is the year I change my ways.

Or perhaps not.

It’s too maroon to tell.

December 29, 2014 by gn0mel0ver

Babydoll Dress

Free People does not actually call this dress, “babydoll,” however the shape that this is could not be anything else, in my humble little gnome opinion.

I was on the fence about keeping this dress, because I had also gotten the dress in this post and I try, oh how I try, not to be a glutton. But I kept taking it out of the return box and caressing it until finally it felt weird to send back a dress that I had touched so many times. I’m not that kind of girl.

Speaking of baby dolls, I have to admit to being terrified of them (ahem, gnomes being completely different). When I was a child of eight years old, I had a Cabbage Patch Doll I named Mary. I had begged Santa for a Cabbage Patch Doll that year, the ones I had seen on t.v…. With hair. And clothes… And chubby cuteness.

I was rather surprised when I opened up Mary on Christmas day to find a withered up little thing staring at me from the box. She was a premie Cabbage Patch Kid. She was ugly. She was scary. However, she was the only one that I had and so I loved her. I played with her for years, but always in the back of my mind, was sorrow over not having a “real” Cabbage Patch Kid. Always she was not perfect. Regret swallowed her strange little head.

I do not know what happened to Mary. Perhaps this is for the best. Otherwise I would have felt obligated to give her to my own daughter and the generational Mary duty would have continued. In fact, my daughter had no interest in baby dolls. It was not a fad while she was growing up. She did have every single Kelly doll ever made (thanks to an aunt who loved Barbie) which I regret donating many years ago.

There was one doll I purchased for my daughter… It was a cute little baby. A sweet face… Whose body was made from some sort of water vessel. This meant she weighed one trillion pounds. She was dressed in… Wait for this. It is a doozy. She was dressed in an Eeyore suit from Winnie The Pooh and even had the hoodie with donkey ears attached. I do not know what I must have been thinking the day I purchased that doll.

She played with it for a bit… And then it disappeared. I know. It could be anywhere. I am worried I will open up her closet one day to find the Eeyore baby staring at me from the depths of the closet. Its water body having slowly oozed out of the Eeyore suit to form a wretched smell. A gooey film clinging to its body as it stares at me accusingly.

Aaaaaahhhh!

How do I always manage to get so off track?

Do you own any babydoll dresses? Or baby dolls? Or warped Eeyore water babies languishing in your closet plotting your doom? I am hoping I can only answer “yes” to one of those questions.

December 21, 2014 by gn0mel0ver

It’s The Little Things: Tights

One of my favorite aspects of the wintertime are the tights. Dresses that might normally be too short can be transformed with the addition of another layer. I love to play with different colors, but sometimes the very best tights are simply black and grey.

Cable knit tights are fabulous, however, I am often guilty of rushing when I put them on. The pattern will creep up my legs in a different angle than its twin and can feel discombobulated and look sloppy.

My go-to tights this year have been Nordstrom Rack’s Free Press Plush Tights. They are thick. They are cozy. They have a fuzzy lining that feels like tight sweatpants but in the very best possible way. They come in a tights version and leggings. My daughter prefers the leggings, while I prefer the tights.

More information on the above outfit can be found in this post.

I even walked down to my mailbox the other night in these tights. I knew I was getting a package. A sequel to this book and I was so very excited that I ran out of the house minus shoes. The tights kept my feet warm and did not snag at all on the pavement. I would not recommend testing your tights in this manner, but it is nice to know they can stand up to a delivery excitement.

The tights claim to be handwash only. I am not a rule follower. And I have to be able to machine wash tights and leggings, otherwise I would never wash them. I have estimated that I have machine washed and dried each of my pairs approximately six times. My daughter and I each have four pairs of these, so it is impossible to tell which ones are which when washing, but they have all held up well. I do not expect them to last forever, but for their low cost, I have been impressed with their wear.

More information on this outfit can be found in this post.

The tights are around $8. I took a M/L. They do have some minuses. I wish they were labeled somehow on the inside, because with four XS/S in the house and four M/L sizes, I have to guess as to whose tights are whose when I finally get around to folding clothes, which I should be doing this exact moment, but instead I am writing this post.

More information on the above outfit can be found this post.

Do you have a go-to pair of tights? Do you have a secret to putting on cable knit tights so the pattern isn’t a weird mark on your legs? Do you ever run to the mailbox barefoot or in stockings in great anticipation of the package that could be inside?

It’s the little things: leg coverings that are both durable, comfortable and affordable. It doesn’t get much better than that.

*I am wearing the Free Press Plush Tights in the above pictures. I have stated my experience with the tights, but please wash and handle at your own risk. I was not compensated for writing this post. I simply adore these tights and wanted to share about a product I have enjoyed these last few months. However, some of the links in this post are affiliate links, clicking on or purchasing from certain links on this page will result in a small commission for ~~warmer legs~~ this blog.

December 19, 2014 by gn0mel0ver

Oh Christmas Tree

Picking out our Christmas tree was a bit of a scavenger hunt this year. We went to our tried and true place. The one we have been going to for the last ten years. And they did not have a single Noble Fir. They said they had been selling out of them by 4:00 each day. Well, with my husband’s work schedule, kids’ schooling and life, 4:00 was out of our reach for the week.

We decided to search for a Christmas tree elsewhere.

I am a true have-to-have-a-real-tree girl. I just am. I like the picking out of the tree each year. I like the smell. I like the tradition. I just like it.

We drove to a place that used to sell Christmas trees the year before, but they were not selling trees this year.

I remembered seeing a Christmas tree lot on the other side of town earlier in the week. We drove there and it was amazing. They were hoarding all of the Noble Firs!

The tree we picked out for our main tree (we also get a smaller one, because I am a greedy tree decorator) ended up being about nine feet tall, but was marked 7-8 and the guy gave it to us for that price. It was a steal! And since my husband refuses to look at any tree taller than eight feet, my stealthy sneaky big-tree-heart exploded with joy.

It almost made me as happy as this dress. I purchased Free People’s Bombora Dress during Free People’s annual 25% off sale. It showed sold out, but in my cart it went to backorder. I honestly did not think it would ship, so I never mentioned it. I thought it was a fluke. I was very surprised to see it show up at my door three weeks later.

It was a happy surprise.

It reminded me of my favorite Christmas movie, “White Christmas.” When I was a little girl my mother would tell me that when it was time for my prom she would make me a prom dress exactly like the ending Christmas dresses in that movie. By the time I finally went to my prom, I no longer wanted a fur-lined red velvet number for an event in May. Instead I opted for a custom designed (by myself) little number modeled after Marissa Tomei’s dress in the movie, “Only You.” In my head it was perfection. In real life, the seamstress did not understand what I was going for and I ended up going to prom in a periwinkle dress with triangle cutouts. Oh. It was bad. So very, very bad. As reality versus dreams usually are.

If only they had had this dress back then. Then both my mother and myself could have been happy.

It only took twenty years for that scavenger hunt to come to a conclusion. What look from a movie do you love? Do you love the hunt for an item? If you have a Christmas tree, do you go real or fake? Theme or sentimental? Our big tree is sentimental. Our little tree is a gnome forrest theme… Of course.

*Also, I am sorry I have been behind on emails, comments and blogs. I plan on catching up this weekend. : )

Gnome Lover

Stumbling through life while still having fun

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Maroon Foggy Fire In The Snow

Babydoll Dress

Oh Christmas Tree