A Rosy Vogue

Over the last couple of months, I have been clearing out my closet…again. I have finally accepted that I no longer suit some of my ‘younger’ clothes and that my legs are not what they once were. That said, I think women of a certain age should wear whatever they want – no rules! Much of my wardrobe is black because I have to wear it so often for work but it’s not my best color so I decided to choose rosy tones. The soft red floral wrap top (Max Studio in Nordstrom Rack Outlet), above, is styled with my ever faithful buttoned Walmart jeans and floral Carlos Santana boots.

This gorgeous maxi skirt is my bargain of 2022. I found it in our local Interfaith thrift store. It fits me perfectly and it was about $6 – styled with a long sleeved Pima cotton t-shirt from J. Crew’s sale, bought a couple of years ago. The side view shows more of the pretty pattern and swing. It will be great for Salsa dancing!

On our Involuntary Vacation, we stopped at La Grange, Texas for a coffee. I spotted an lovely boutique store, Simple Rags, and moseyed over to it. We have lost quite a few independent boutiques in our home town over the past few years. I miss them so much. On the sale rack was the pretty taupe/pink dress with charcoal embroidery below, reduced from $62 to $18. I bought a prairie dress on the prairie!

I had great plans to wear my new purchases at romantic dinners out on vacation or at home. Teddy’s recent cardiac incident has postponed that temporarily until everything settles down but I wore the red floral top when we went out for decaf skinny lattes this week. More involuntary vacation posts to follow…

Kerry wears J Crew…

I bought these shorts at J Crew this year and everywhere I go people ask where I got them from, including staff in their competitor’s stores. J Crew haven’t paid me for this although a little gift card would be kindly accepted…(methinks that might not happen after they read to the end).  They are beautifully soft and comfortable for our humid heat. The navy ones have silver embroidery and the white has gold embroidery so they sparkle in the light.

I do have a bone to pick with J Crew’s advertising. They regularly send me a catalog and, to be fair, the models range in age but they are incredibly thin. This is a very outdated way to sell clothes and the strange thing is that their clothing is not just for skinny people. In real life I am a small petite size but I had to take the extra small shorts and even considered the extra extra small pair.  Are fashion stores taking us for fools?  I know we have a problem with obesity in the Western and developing world – I was obese for many years.  It took years of changing not just my eating habits but also my mindset.  Like many other obese people I struggled to both see how overweight I was and could easily be deluded into thinking I had lost weight if the clothing size went down.

On my recent road trip I tried on two dresses by the same manufacturer, both of which fitted me.  One was extra extra small and the other a size 6 (normally I take a 4/6 US size) – how on earth are we supposed to know what size to try on? I just eye-ball clothing now and have my clothes altered to fit me properly.  The gold t-shirt (also J Crew) was very long and hid the lovely embroidery on the shorts, so I had it shortened.  Curiously, as I look at the photographs I still think I look fat despite my objective mind telling me that I am slim.  Just a tiny bit of body dysmorphia that comes free with my diagnosis and that statement is not written lightly despite the humor.  Despite all my criticism, I love my shorts and I am sure they would sell just as well with regular models (age 55) like me!