No Brainer Wardrobe – My Closet

April 12, 2012 Leave a Comment

I’ve been reading The No Brainer Wardrobe, and from page one was finding it an inspiring read. So I thought that this would be a great book to try and get my wardrobe on track. And guess what? I’m going to take you all along for ride. Lucky you dear reader.

So first thing is first. This is my closet currently:

Now I know what you’re thinking. “That doesn’t look that bad. What kind of reworking is needed.” There’s a few things that need to be cleared up.

1. This is by no means all the clothing I own. The clothes that are in that closet are the clothes that I put there for immediate use. Down in the basement I have a whole huge plastic tote full of Spring/Summer clothes, a whole huge plastic tote of clothing that is for a smaller sized me, and some are hanging up on makeshift hooks. I also have some clothing that needs washing. Usually this is closet is filled to bursting.

2. We live in a 1920′s store front. So this closet is the size that a closet would be in the 1920′s.

3. Most of the clothes in here are clothes I have simply because I can fit into them and they’re easy. I don’t necessarily like them and some of them are larger than I need.

The end result of this is that I have a wardrobe I really don’t feel good in, am not comfortable in and I’m not proud of. This isn’t the way a woman should dress herself. Life is too short to feel frumpy.

In the book Hayley Morgan, the author, talks about the evolution of clothing. This explains my existing closet space. In the 1920′s the amount of clothing a woman owned normally was less than what an average woman has now. The types of cloth available, the ready availability of updated styles, the advent of factories removing the need to create clothing herself and the ability to shop online and in retail shops easily has made it possible for a woman to amass a huge collection of fabric in all types of shapes and colors. It’s not that she necessarily needs all of it, but it’s made clothes shopping a kind of hobby where clothing creation and altering used to make its home. My 1920′s closet is still a little larger than most I’ve seen and that is because this store front was originally a seamstresses shop. Whatever the woman that lived here wanted she could make out of scraps and unwanted fabric.

Hayley suggests that you can live with 50 – 60 articles of clothing and I fully believe that she is correct. In the first set of Action Items the author asks a few questions and on thinking about it the last few days I’ve come up with some answers:

On any given day it takes me about 2 minutes to choose an outfit. This isn’t because my wardrobe is easy to navigate and everything meshes beautifully. It’s because I wear jeans every day and I’ve just started to not care what I throw on on top. I’ve become uninspired, and because I really don’t like my clothing I don’t bother analyzing my outfit. I’m not going to be happy with how I look no matter what I put on so why put forward an effort? I don’t buy a lot of clothing. In fact the pair of jeans I bought a couple of days ago is the first clothing anything I’ve bought in over half a year.

Oh this is not good you all. On to the next section.

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The Geek Mommie Makeover – The Beginning

April 3, 2012 1 Comment

(I apologize for the really long post. Following ones will be shorter.)

This makes me nervous. I mean really nervous. The reason for that is that I’m about to post before pictures on a public blog, and I look like complete cow patties. No really. It’s not a pretty sight. Especially if you “knew me when.”

In high school I was super skinny, but my fashion needed some serious help. It was in the 80′s, and there is some question if I missed out on anything during that time period really. But I was definitely not a fashion plate.

In college I was a little better, but I dressed like a single woman in her 20′s who was into partying. I had a few nicer clothes for when I worked and a few clothes that were very casual for the times I went to class. Definitely a hodge-podge and definitely not a style a mom in her late 30′s should go back to dressing.

When I met Flyboy things had evened out. I worked in offices and so had a wardrobe that matched. I also had discovered a different style of dressing I enjoyed. According to Flyboy I looked classic and had a sophistication that he liked.

Somewhere along the way I did the inevitable when you get older and don’t change your activity level and the way you eat. I gained weight. And my way to deal with that development was to dress in a way to hide it with the intention of losing the weight. Instead I just kept gaining and gaining and suddenly what was classic and sophisticated became dowdy and run down. All my own fault.

Then a year ago I got pregnant. I was already 40 – 50 lbs over weight when it happened, so my midwives insisted I was not to gain any weight early on as much as possible. Turns out that wasn’t as hard a task as I thought it might be because the little being inside of me was in love with fruit and vegetables and I craved them constantly. I didn’t gain a pound until the very last month of my pregnancy. When Little Lass finally made her appearance I lost 20 lbs right away, and then another 5 lbs as she and I tried to find a happy feeding balance. I ended up weighing less than when I got pregnant. Women hated me and I was preening.

So now the issue is this. I am still needing to lose about 20 – 30 lbs to get to a healthy level, but I’ve plateaued. My wardrobe is full of baggy shirts, jeans and sweatshirts. And I have a little girl that I want to look better, feel better and eat better for.

     
My current “uniform”

Not attractive... at least to me.

Hence the Geek Mommie Makeover. I don’t want Little Lass to have all her memories be of a me that isn’t happy and confident, or to have pictures where my smiles are tense and forced. That’s not the way to raise a child. That means cleaning up my wardrobe and finding my style. I also don’t want her to end up having just memories of me and that means cleaning up my weight and my health.

Details on the challenge:

Goal 1: Dropping my weight down to 120 – 125 lbs. (I currently weight about 150 lbs.)

Goal 2: Finding my style and having my wardrobe reflect that style.

Goal 3: Being able to jog at least a mile without stopping.

Deadline: Beginning of June.

Tools:

  • The No Brainer Wardrobe – An e-book put out by The Tiny Twig that not only helps you pare down your wardrobe, but also helps you find your style and fill your wardrobe with pieces you will love. You can find it from this link and on the right hand side of this blog. She gives you steps to follow and I can’t wait to start.
  • My Fitness Pal – A free site that helps track your calories, your activity and your weight.
  • Our Wii system and our DVD player – Fitness games and DVDs are my friend.
  • Scout – My new jogging partner. This fulfills another goal not related to this challenge, keeping my dog from getting incredibly bored and full of destructive energy. (For anyone that knows our other dog, Jada, do not worry. Flyboy’s got her covered.)

    Scout

So wish me luck, follow along and give me a quick kick in the pants if I fall off the wagon. It’s going to be quite a ride.

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