(Dress, Closet; shoes, Kurt Geiger)
Happy Christmas, everyone! War is over! Oh no, wait, wrong song…
This year I was dreaming of a White Christmas, and by that I mean “a white dress”. Well, I wouldn’t have been talking about snow, would I?
They say you should never wear white after Labor Day, but I generally just ignore Them, and this was no exception. My choice of attire did cause some consternation amongst my parents and Terry, who couldn’t understand why I would choose to wear something I had absolutely NO CHANCE of not spilling red wine/ketchup/coffee/anything else I touched on, but actually, I surprised everyone (including myself) by managing to keep the dress clean all day, partly because when we sat down to dinner, Terry and my mum draped me in lots of different aprons and tea towels and various other garments, so the dress stayed white. It’s probably going to be my biggest achievement of 2011, to be honest: the family were all so proud!
Anyway, we had a fabulous Christmas, and here’s what it looked like:
I didn’t photograph the food other than the sorbet and, well, the wine, so you’ll just have to take my word for it that it existed, although not for long, because my mum and dad really excelled themselves this year and Terry and I lost no time in clearing our plates.
Actually, I tell a lie: I did photograph the dessert, which was lovingly made by my mum, who also put together the “heart” theme on the table:
My mum needs to go into party planning, seriously. Both of myselves agree:
Instead of a Christmas tree, this year my mum created a “Random Tree”: a branch from the garden painted white, hung with fairy lights, and then festooned with little “random” messages which we all wrote in the run up to Christmas and read out on Christmas Day. (It was going to be a wishing tree, but we thought it might be more amusing to allow people to just write whatever took their fancy, and also, I don’t think anyone wanted to listen to me read out what would essentially be the entire Christian Louboutin back catalogue…). It was a really cool idea, so we’re going to do it next year, too…
As for Rubin:
Don’t be fooled (by the dogs that he got/he’s still, he’s still Rubin from the block…): he is posing here only very grudgingly. He was much more interested in the (edible) contents of the Christmas stockings my parents and his Auntie Lila provided, so Sam the Dog was all but forgotten. Poor Sam.
And that was Christmas day! At some point in the food fest, we managed to fit in a visit to Terry’s family, who we’ve also been spending time with over the past couple of days: two of Terry’s brothers and their families are in town, so it’s been great to catch up with everyone, and we still have lots more planned, so there may be large gaps between blog posts. Then again, there might not be, so don’t go getting your hopes up.
Hope everyone’s having a great holiday!
(P.S. My blog is taking comments hostage again, and we’ve no idea why… if yours doesn’t appear right away, don’t worry, you haven’t been blacklisted or anything – it’s just the blog behaving badly, and your comment will be published as soon as I’m online!)
(Skirt, ASOS; Shoes, Giuseppe Zanotti c/o Shopbop; top, ancient, no idea)
Wow, ever since I realised I have nothing to post about here any more, I’ve been posting a LOT, huh? I bet you’re all thinking, “God, I hope Amber’s going somewhere without Internet access for Christmas, because that’s probably the only thing that will shut her up now…”
Well, I AM heading to my parents’ place for Christmas (they DO have Internet access, of course, but I promise not to abuse it), so this is my official “Goodbye, farewell, have a Happy Christmas!” message. To help me spread tidings of comfort and joy, here is a photo of Rubin in a holiday sweater:
Don’t worry, he only had to wear it for long enough to get the photo. And he was almost hysterically excited by it, for some reason. Maybe he secretly wishes he was a personal style blogger?
Or, you know, maybe not.
(He’s been bathed and groomed since this was taken, by the way. Winter is a hard time for him – and by “him” I mean “us” – because every time he goes outside, he returns looking like he’s been dragged through a hedge backwards. Sometimes I think he probably HAS…)
Here is what he’s getting for Christmas, and seriously, you guys, DON’T TELL HIM:
It was labelled “Sam the Dog”, so it will be one of the few toys Rubin owns which has a REAL name, and isn’t called something like “Ponky” or “Bluddy” or whatever. I cannot WAIT to see his face when he opens this on Christmas day. He’ll either be SUPER DUPER EXCITED by it, or he’ll completely ignore it in favour of ripping the wrapping paper it came in to shreds. Maybe both, actually.
Anyway, that’s more than enough from me for now: I hope you all have a very happy holiday, and that you, too, get something as exciting as a SAMTHEDOG under your tree!
Happy Christmas!
After yesterday’s post, in which I worried needlessly about what to wear to tea with the Queen – and in other, entirely fictional scenarios – I spent far too much time thinking about it, and I figured maybe something like this?
And if she asked me where I got my pearls, I’d say, “Why, New Look, ma’am. They were two for a tenner! Doesn’t everyone get one’s pearls in New Look?”*
(*I would actually be lying about this, though, because to be honest, one can’t remember where one got one’s pearls. One is confident it was from one of the brands one’s parents would describe as “El Cheapo”, though. One will stop speaking like this now, for reals.)
And if she asked me where I got my little jacket/cardigan thing, I would say, “Why, ALSO New Look!” Then I would wink in a way that was supposed to be winning, and a little bit cheeky-in-a-cute-way, but which would actually just make me look like I had a tic.
If she asked me where I got my shoes, though, I would say, “Coo, luvaduck, you’re a curious one, aintchya?” Because in this particular scenario, I would obviously be Eliza Doolittle. Look, it’s MY imaginary life, I get to choose, OK? I would look like Eliza Doolittle too. (The Audrey Hepburn version, I mean. Not the English singer, although she is also very nice.) And I would be riding a magic pony. OK, I’ll stop now…
(Oh, Kurt Geiger, by the way.)
Want to see something scary?
I have a CLAW HAND. Seriously, it was in almost every photo. I can’t seem to take a photo without it. I’m scared that it’ll try to kill me while I sleep or something. And then I’ll never get to have tea with the Queen…
(Grandad pants and cardigan, H&M; sweater, Zara; shoes, French Connection c/o Spartoo)
Ever since I fell off the Dressember bandwagon, I’ve had absolutely no idea what else to write about here, so I’m just going to keep blogging my outfits, and pretend that’s not weird, even although there is almost nothing stranger than taking photos of yourself and posting them on the internet. Seriously, what could be weirder than that? I mean, there was that time I wrote a post from the point of view of the radiator in my bathroom, true. But before I fall headfirst down the rabbit hole of “OMG, blogging be weird!”, let’s get on with the show, shall we?
So, this post is about my Grandad Pants. No, not my grandad’s pants: that really WOULD be bizarre. More so than this is, even. My grandad pants. I call them that because something about the brown check makes me think these are just begging to be worn with a flat cap, and, I don’t know, maybe a pipe? And I would wear them to the dog track, and drink lager from a can? Or something? They also look vaguely like something Betty Draper might wear in one of her more causal moments, though, so I’m going to claim Betty as the inspiration for this outfit (even although she totally wasn’t) and hope you all just forget that stuff I just said about the dog track. Honestly, we don’t even have a dog track here. It’s wrong that I just spent so much time wondering what I’d wear to one.
(Aside: does anyone else do that? Like, you see some fictional scenario on TV, or in a movie or something – tea with the queen, alien-invasion of the planet, that kind of thing – and then you spend the next 60 40 20 10 minutes thinking, “My God, what if I ever find myself in just such a situation? WHAT WILL I WEAR?” And just so you all know, if I ever find myself invited to a registry-office wedding in 1959, and I am the bride, I now know EXACTLY what I will wear, because I found it last week. God, it’s a tragedy that that can never happen. Why is my life so full of suffering?)
I’ve totally lost the thread of this post now. I started off talking about grandad pants, and now I’m worrying about what to wear to tea with the queen. Anyway, these photos were taken as part of the Shoe Challenge, which is now entering its final few weeks, even although it feels like it’s been going on for about ten years or something. I still have 12 pairs of shoes to get through. And once I’ve shown you all of those, what will I write about then, I wonder? Maybe I should go and see if the bathroom radiator has anything to say for itself…
(Skirt, Primark; sweater, thrifted; shoes, Kurt Geiger c/o Idealo.co.uk)
Yesterday I got my hair cut and…
HOLD IT! STOP RIGHT THERE, you, with your finger poised upon the red cross at the top right of your browser. Yes, I see you doing that, but don’t worry, this isn’t one of THOSE posts. You know, those posts where I have a really bad haircut, and then I whine about it, and you all tut-tut and shake your heads and say We told you so, Amber, why you never listen? (In pidgin English apparently. Huh.) and I’m all I know, I know, but this time I have truly learned my lesson!, but you all know I haven’t, and you’re right, because I never do.
No, it’s not one of THOSE posts. This time. Actually, the haircut was fine. But That Thing happened again. It always does. It happens anywhere I’m forced to make small-talk with people I don’t know, actually, but as I don’t get out much, that means it happens most often at the salon. It goes like this:
STYLIST: So! Off work today are we?
[Thinks: getting her hair done in the middle of the day, wearing an outfit which would in no way be appropriate for a nice, respectable office job: bitch is either out of work, or on a day off. Hope it's the latter, or I'm not getting a tip!]
ME: [Thinks: Oh God, here we go... It's That Thing again, dammit!]
Um, no, actually, I work from home! Am self-employed! Can leave house any time I like, go me!
[Thinks: Why also speaking pidgin English, why?]
STYLIST: Oh, really? What is it that you do?
ME: [I wish I was dead now.] I’m a, er, well, it’s like, I’m one of those…
STYLIST: [Oh God, is hooker!]
ME: I’m a BLOGGER.
STYLIST: ???????
ME: I BLOG.For a living. Also, I wish I was dead. Not for a living, though. Well, kind of.
STYLIST: A booger? That’s a job?
ME: BLAWG. ER. I have blawgs. I mean, blogs. On the Internets.
STYLIST: [The hell?]
[Lengthy pause.]
So! Off anywhere nice on holiday this year?
This happens every single time I meet someone new. Or rather, it DID. You see, after the first few times, I got wise to it. I came to realise that while I live, eat, and breathe blogging, to most of the rest of the world it’s still quite a new, and really totally weird, thing. I realised this after the one-millionth conversation with my mum in which she said, “I met So-and-So today. She asked what you were up to these days, so I told her you were a blogger, and then I had to spend twenty minutes explaining what that was. She still didn’t understand, though. Next time, I think I’ll just say you’re dead.”*
(That last bit was a joke, by the way. Parents very supportive of blogging career. Also totally reading this. In fact, right now, my mum’s turning from her screen to shout, “John! She’s making us look bad on the Internet again! Do you want to phone her this time?”)
(That was also a joke. Mostly.)
Once I realised that people in the Real World aren’t really ready for the concept of blogging for a living, I decided there was no point in mentioning it. So now I just say something like, “I have an online publishing company,” (which is technically true, but always makes me sound like a bit of an asshole) or, more often, “I run a bunch of websites”. Both of these answers have exactly the same conversation-stopping abilities as “I’m a blogger,” though. Not once has anyone ever followed up with “What do you write about?” or anything like that (Well, other than my dentist, but I had my mouth full at the time, so I couldn’t really answer him properly. He still thinks I’m a “dogger”, which is, like, a TOTALLY different thing…): instead, their eyes just take on a glazed look, and I can almost see the cogs in their brains turning as they try to come up with a conversational out. “Trust me to get stuck talking to the weirdo in the room!” I sense them thinking. And then I do that thing where I start talking too fast about absolutely nothing at all, in a bid to cover my embarrassment, and… actually, I wonder if this is why no one ever invites me to their parties any more?
I don’t really know why it should be this way. The Internet, after all, is not a new invention. Neither is publishing. But publishing ON THE INTERNET? WHOA, there, sister! Enough of that crazy talk! Ironically, my websites get more visitors per month than many magazines do, but if I were to tell my stylist I ran a magazine, say, she’d probably find that vaguely interesting – or at least know what I was talking about. Saying you’re a blogger, however, still has a bit of a stigma to it, even it’s only the stigma attached to something that is not yet mainstream enough for people to really “get” it.
Honestly, I blame Jude Law. For a lot of things, actually, but seriously, have you seen Contagion?
Anyway, my search for a way to explain what I do for a living without making people recoil in horror continues. Of course, I could just go back to saying “I’m a writer”, but, having done that in the past, I find it makes me sound a lot more interesting than I actually am, and I like to keep people’s expectations of me good and low, so I don’t disappoint them any more than I can help. On second thoughts, maybe I should just stick with “blogger”…
It may just be December 15th to everyone else, but for us it will always be T-Day.
Today is the 6th anniversary of Terry’s kidney transplant. Which means that even although it’s cold and miserable and wet outside, we have one HUGE reason to celebrate.
(I am celebrating by having my hair cut. I know, why ruin such a great day, right? I’m sure it’ll be fine. I mean, what could possibly go wrong? And then tonight, there will be champagne, and chocolate, and… well, there will be champagne and chocolate, anyway. Happy days.)
(Dress, Dorothy Perkins (sold out); Shoes, French Connection c/o Spartoo)
Last summer, workmen dramatically tore down the old office building I used to work in, and started building a gigantic Primark in its place. It was kind of like the opposite of paving paradise and putting up a parking lot, although only if your definition of “paradise” involves fighting people to the death for that last polyester skirt in your size. And actually, they DID also put up a parking lot, too, so it wasn’t really like that AT ALL, other than in the sense that ANYTHING would seem like “paradise” after that office block. (I may have to go back and delete that line later.)
Anyway, getting a Primark was a big deal for our town. We only got the round wheel, and, you know, FIRE, a few years ago, so to have a gigantic Primark is something of a coup. We were all, “Haha, Edinburgh, take that! You can keep your poxy castle: we got us a POLYESTER PALACE, by God! And then Edinburgh was all, “Actually, we’re getting one too, AND we have Zara. Also: Anthopologie. And did we mention Harvey Nichols?” and we all felt a bit stupid after that.
Now, as it happens, my idea of paradise doesn’t actually include fighting people over a dress, although don’t think I wouldn’t do it if I had to. But I needed tights. Yes, my old nemesis, tights. And I wanted to get them from Primark, because, well, they’re cheap, and come in 150 denier, which is how I like ‘em.
(Note to all of the people who are about to tell me that I TOTALLY need to try Wolford tights and that even although they cost as much as a small car, I will never look back once I have tried them: NO. There is no way I’m doing that. I just don’t care enough about tights, sorry-I’m-not-sorry. And if it’s a choice between spending £20 on tights and spending £20 on a top, say, I know what I’m buying…)
So I needed tights, and I figured that as I was going to be spending money on something that would give me no pleasure whatsoever, I may as well make the experience even worse by going to this new Primark on the very day it opened. I know, what was I thinking? Because the fact is, I don’t really like people. And most people seem to live in the mall at this time of year. As you know, The Others make it their business to goad and torment me at all times, by getting all up in my face, crowding around me any chance they get, squeezing into tiny spaces of which I am the only other occupant, walking really slowly, and other acts of extreme evil like that.
But I needed tights. So I went, I saw, I shopped. And as we were at the mall, well it would’ve been rude not to have a look round all the other stores, too, wouldn’t it? My mum came with me, because sometimes I need someone to calm me down in these situations, and together we had a rare old time. Here is what I bought:
Yeeeeees. It says quite a lot about me, doesn’t it? I mean, can anyone guess which colours and patterns I like?
I also bought two pairs of trousers. This is why I’m officially giving up on Dressember. (Well, that and the fact that the posts were about as popular as … a really unpopular thing… and without the Internets to motivate me to take photos, I just won’t do it.) I want to wear my trousers, dammit. And also that skirt I just ordered from ASOS. (WITH A GIFT CARD, TERRY.) (Mum: it’s not the one I needed you to alter: you can stand down.) And I think that what I’ve learned from Dressember this time around is that, as much as I love my dresses, I also love my trousers and my skirts. And I don’t really like restricting myself to just one thing: in fact, as soon as you tell me to do that, I will want to do the exact opposite. I’m reminded of how, when I was a child and my parents would tell me I wasn’t to touch that new ornament/gadget/piece of expensive electrical equipment they’d just bought, I would nod solemnly in agreement, and then, the moment they left the room, I would go straight over and TOUCH THAT THING. And I would like it. And only once did I actually break it. (“It” just so happened to be a set of glass shelves containing glass ornaments, mind you, so… that was unfortunate.)
The tl;dr version of this post: I quit Dressember.
And I never did buy those tights…
DRESSEMBER, DAY, 11
Dress, Stop Staring; Shoes, Office, c/o. Idealo.co.uk
Yesterday was the 11th anniversary of my first “date” with Terry. Of course, yesterday was also a work day, so we decided to do our celebrating on Sunday instead, with a meal at a local restaurant and an opportunity for me to be totally overdressed as usual.
If you read Shoeperwoman, you’ll already have seen this dress, and even if you don’t, it’s the one I’m wearing in my Twitter avatar, my Facebook profile, the “About the author” box on this website… basically everywhere I’ve claimed a small piece of the Internet as my own, I’ve worn this dress on it. So I guess you could call it a favourite. You could also call it “That dress my parents bought me because they got sick of standing around in a dress shop while I agonised between it and another one.” Thanks, folks! (Yes, SPOILED.)
Anyway, it doesn’t really matter that you’ve seen the dress before, because this outfit was really all about the shoes:
These are also one of my favourites, and they were also a gift, this time from Idealo.co.uk, who very kindly allowed me to run rampant on their website earlier this year, and chose some products to review. I picked these Office platforms, because although I already had eleventy-one pairs of red shoes at the time (Joking. I only had eight.) if there’s one thing I believe, it’s that you can never have too many pairs of red shoes. Or too many polka dot dresses. Or too many opportunities to wear both of them together, and pose like an idiot in them. Or… oh, you get the picture.
These are actually much more comfortable than they probably look, which is a good thing given how often I wear them. As I’m fond of repeating over at Shoeperwoman, red shoes are more or less a “neutral” for me, because they work with so much of my wardrobe. Well, except for all the green dresses, obviously: if I tried that, people would probably revert back to using my childhood nickname, “Traffic Lights”, and God knows, it took long enough to get them to stop the first time…
Oh, and just to prove that I do still have a head, even although I cropped it out of all of the other photos:
(I was doing a weird, squinty-eyed thing in all of them. In this one, I appear to be either standing on my toes (why?) or am about to levitate. Let’s pretend it’s the second option: it’ll make this post much more interesting…)
Tagged dresses, shoes
DRESSEMBER, Day 7
Dress, ASOS; scarf, H&M; shoes, Kurt Geiger c/o Idealo.co.uk)
So, are you all suitably impressed that I haven’t complained about the weather yet? Even although the OMGSNOW came last week, and on day one, all everyone could talk about was the OMGSNOW, and on day two all everyone could talk about was how all everyone could talk about was the OMGSNOW? And now I’m talking about everyone talking about everyone talking about the OMGSNOW, and so the circle is complete. Although, if you could all now comment about the fact that I’m commenting about the fact that people are commenting about… actually, on second thoughts, let’s not do that, OK?
Anyway, on Day 3, the snow rested, by which I mean, “it melted, THANK YOU GOD.” And honestly, it wasn’t that bad: the fact is, I have no flights or holidays planned which the snow could conceivably ruin, and I think it realised that, so it didn’t linger, and I didn’t complain.
Then this week, the wind came.
Did I mention that I hate the wind? The wind is, like, my second most hated type of weather (Most Hated is snow, obviously, but I think that goes without saying by now), and I hate it because… well, because it messes up my hair, basically. It also managed to wreak complete and utter havoc with everything else, too, though. It was as if the wind thought, “Ha, I’ll show this snow how it’s done!” and then it proceeded to do just that. So by lunchtime yesterday all the schools were closed, our fence had blown down for the fifth year running, there was rubbish all over the street, courtesy of the bins that had blown over, Rubin was barking at his own shadow, and all everyone could talk about was the OMGWIND.
“Let’s go outside and take Dressember photos in the WIND,” I said to Terry. “They will be dramatic, and kinda cool. And even if they’re not, at least they’ll be more interesting than YET ANOTHER PHOTO of me standing in front of my shoes like a rabbit caught in the headlights.”
So, yeah, THAT worked out well:
And the rest were totally unusable. Remember that time my hair tried to kill me? THAT.
As this is Day 8 of Dressember, though (Yes, I know today is the 9th, but these photos are from yesterday), I suppose I better talk about the dress. As you can see, this dress is neither green nor black. Indeed, it is blue, and this particular shade of blue is currently the holder of the prestigious title of “Amber’s Second-Favourite Colour”. (Oh, hi, did I mention I’m still in high school, by the way? “Blue, you can be my second-favourite colour! And green, you are the MOST favourite colour, like, 4 eva!”) This dress is also a Problem Dress (TM). As well as having to have a substantial chunk cut off the bottom (I’m all about the midi skirts, but when it’s “midi” on the model, it’s “midaxi” on me, it has a funny waist. Or rather, I have a funny waist.
I, you see, was cursed with a long torso. (Which is a really weird curse to put on someone, but anyway) This means that the waistlines of most dresses hit just below my ribcage as opposed to on the natural waist, and also means that I can make almost anything look like maternity wear. I generally solve this problem by just belting everything (and this dress particularly needs a belt, because as well as being too high, the waist is kind of ugly), but the belt that came with the dress was cheap and plastic looking (also: lime green, which just so happens to be the only green I DON’T like), and none of the 11,564 belts in my collection were quite right, somehow, so I ended up having to press this H&M scarf into service instead. And then the wind pulled it in all directions, and you can see the waistline anyway, GOD.
However, let the record show that I have dutifully worn a dress for the 8th day in a row. Let it also show that I have now written 700 words about this, which is really too much for a post about a dress, especially a Friday post, which no one will read anyway, so I’ll shut up now.
Have a good weekend, everyone! (And remember, you can find lots more Dressember dresses here, and I bet none of them use ill-fitting scarves as belts, either!)
P.S. For some reason, my blog has decided to mark around 90% of comments as spam, and block them accordingly: it’s even doing it to my replies, so if your comment doesn’t appear, please don’t take it personally – you haven’t been blocked or anything, it’s just the spam filter and until we manage to work out what’s wrong with it, I will keep checking and approving the comments that end up there!
DRESSEMBER, Day 7
Dress, Zara; scarf, River Island; cardigan, Topshop; bag, Marc by Marc Jacobs (c/o Shopbop); shoes, New Look
OK, so, after the blatant cheatiness of my first Dressember post, and the lateness of my second, you will no doubt be pleased – and by “pleased” I mean “completely indifferent” – to know that I AM actually wearing this dress today. Right now, in fact, as I type this. Yes, I am liveblogging my outfit. It’s almost like you’re right here with me, isn’t it? It doesn’t get more thrilling than this, folks, let me tell you.
(No, really, I’m being serious: it LITERALLY doesn’t get any more thrilling. Some days I wear green dresses, some days I wear black ones. That’s it. GOD.)
This dress is from Zara, which is also known in my family as “Amber’s Wardrobe”.
“I wish I had a walk-in closet,” I whined to my mum, earlier this year.
“You do,” she said. “It’s called ‘Zara’”. And it kind of is. Let’s just say that every night when Terry goes to bed, he says a small prayer of thanks that there isn’t a Zara in our town. And he isn’t even religious.
 (Weird photo, included just to try to show the sparkliness of the cardigan…)
Anyway, I bought this dress while we were on holiday in California this year. Some people like to bring back real souvenirs from their trips, like, seashells, and local produce and… I have no idea, actually. Cheese? Wine? Wine and cheese? Er, tea towels? (We sometimes bring back tea towels emblazoned with a crappy picture of the place we’ve visited, for our parents. It’s a kind of running joke. We like watching their faces as they struggle to look thrilled by a tea towel which we bought as part of a “five for three euros” deal or something.)
Me, though, I like to treat clothes and shoes as my souvenirs. They’re better than seashells and stuff, because:
a) You can’t actually wear seashells. Unless you are Lady Gaga, in which case you probably can. And will.
and
b) They are just as evocative.
Every time I wear this dress, for instance, I remember the day I bought it, in Santa Monica. In fact, here I am, just a few minutes after the purchase was made, with the Zara bag right beside me, and an expression of pure bliss, which has nothing to do with the mojito in front of me, and is ALL ABOUT THE DRESS.
(Photo by my dad, who has a rare talent of capturing me in really awkward moments.)
(And yes, I wore a GREEN DRESS that day, GOD. You can already see how this Dressember business is going to pan out, can’t you?)
So now, as well as getting to be here with me while I wear it, it’s like you were also there when I bought it, no? It’s all getting a bit creepy now, to be honest, isn’t it? And it’s an awful lot of information about what is, let’s face it, a really boring black dress. Look, here are some shoes:
|
|
|
